Attorney General Eric Holder promised Saturday to do all in his power to protect Americans' right to vote.

Speaking at the annual conference of the National Council of La Raza in Las Vegas, he praised the group and encouraged it to keep holding politicians' feet to the fire. La Raza is the largest national Latino civil rights and advocacy organization in the United States.

"Despite the truth and transformative power of the American Dream and despite all the progress we've made over the last 236 years, our nation's struggle to overcome injustice and eliminate disparities remains far from over," Holder said, according to a copy of his prepared remarks.

Speaking on behalf of the U.S. Justice Department, which he helms, he said, "We'll do everything in our power to stand vigilant against any and all measures that threaten to undermine the effectiveness and integrity of our elections systems -- and to infringe on the single most important right of American citizenship: the right to vote."

Holder is likely to make similar comments next week at the annual convention of the NAACP in Houston, Texas, where he is scheduled to speak...

...Toward the beginning of his speech in Las Vegas, the attorney general joked that it was nice to be "outside of Washington," a possible reference to the pressure he's been under there because of Fast and Furious -- a discredited gun-running operation that has become a sharp point of contention between Democrats and Republicans.

The House of Representatives voted last week to hold Holder in contempt for refusing to turn over documents tied to the program. President Barack Obama has asserted executive privilege in the case, and Holder will not face criminal prosecution.