From the New York Times, I'm Natalie Ketrowa.

This is the Daily.

Yesterday, we heard from Americans reflecting on the end of affirmative action and decades

of race-conscious admissions at colleges across the country.

Now we turn to one of the most powerful figures behind that reversal, Supreme Court Justice

Clarence Thomas, the second black justice to sit on the court.

Thomas spent years opposing affirmative action, a policy that arguably shaped his career.

Today, my colleague Abby VanCickel explains the impact of affirmative action on Justice

Thomas' life and how he helped bring about its demise.

It's Friday, July 14th.

Abby, a couple weeks ago, as we know, the Supreme Court ended affirmative action by a 6-3

majority.

One of the most interesting voices in all of this was Clarence Thomas, who wrote in his

opinion, this scathing takedown of this longstanding feature of American education.

I want to understand how did he arrive at this opinion?

I cover the Supreme Court for the New York Times.

I have spent the last several weeks just trying to understand and dig into the life of Clarence

Thomas, in part to really be able to understand and articulate his views on affirmative action.

And to understand Justice Thomas, I think he really have to start with where he grew up.

He grew up in pinpoint Georgia and just really extreme poverty.

And he moved with his sibling and his mom to Savannah.

And in his autobiography, which he reads for the audiobook, he describes what that was

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