Michelle Obama: Ledbetter ‘An Inspiration’

First Lady Michelle Obama honored Lilly Ledbetter with a reception at the White House today after President Obama signed the equal pay bill that bears Ledbetter’s name.

Ledbetter is “an inspiration to women and men all across the country,” Mrs. Obama said in her remarks at the reception, according to a pool report.

“She knew unfairness when she saw it and was willing to do something about it because it was the right thing to do, plain and simple,” Mrs. Obama said.

Ledbetter discovered, on the verge of her retirement from a Goodyear plant, that she had been paid 40 percent less than her male peers. The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, which President Obama signed today, makes it easier for workers to file claims of pay discrimination by effectively extending the filing deadline, using the last discriminatory paycheck (rather than the first) to start the clock on the 180-day filing period.

“I know my daughters and granddaughters and your daughters and your granddaughters will have a better deal,” Ledbetter said in her remarks at the reception. “That’s what makes this fight worth fighting, that’s what makes this fight one we had to win.”

Obama and Ledbetter hugged after Ledbetter delivered her remarks, according to the pool report.