Alphonso David (born 1970) is an American attorney and LGBT civil rights leader. In August 2019, he became the president of the Human Rights Campaign. He is the first civil rights lawyer and first person of color to serve as president of the organization.
I wish I could say that I was surprised by the Human Rights Campaign’s decision to fire its first Black president, Alphonso David.
But I was not. After the release of a dossier digging into sexual harassment allegations against former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo that seemed to implicate David, HRC became headline news and David, the center of scrutiny.
As a result, the boards of HRC and its Foundation launched a probe into the matter and then several weeks later terminated David “with cause.” But, given the organization’s long history of overlooking and erasing LGBTQ+ people of color, if HRC hopes to truly nurture stronger relationships with these communities, they need to be more transparent about David’s discharge.