Trump makes civil-rights-related appointment to Dept. of Homeland Security Cameron Quinn has been named the officer for civil rights and civil liberties

 -- Just hours after President Donald Trump held a press conference in New York and he lashed out over criticism of his initial remarks about Saturday's white nationalist rally in Virginia, he announced a civil-rights-related appointment to the Department of Homeland Security.

A White House statement released Tuesday night — as anti-Trump demonstrators were surrounding Trump Tower — announced the appointment of Cameron Quinn as the cfficer for civil rights and civil liberties at the Department of Homeland Security.

According to the statement, Quinn previously served in the office of the assistant secretary for civil rights at the Department of Agriculture, as a senior policy adviser in the civil rights division of the Department of Justice, as counsel to the chairman of the Merit Systems Protection Board and as an assistant attorney general for Virginia.

She has also served on the Virginia advisory committee for the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. She also served as Virginia's chief election official, the United States elections adviser for International Foundation for Electoral Systems and, more recently, in the Federal Voting Assistance Program at the Department of Defense.

Quinn has taught election law for more than a decade at George Mason University's Scalia Law School.

She is a graduate of the University of Florida and earned a juris doctor and a master's degree in accounting from the University of Virginia.