Legal Fellow, Center for the Separation of Powers, Pacific Legal Foundation
Alison Somin joined Pacific Legal Foundation in May 2020 as a legal fellow in the Center for the Separation of Powers and part of the equality before the law practice group.
Before joining the Pacific Legal Foundation team, Alison was a special assistant and counsel for over a decade to Gail Heriot, a member of the bipartisan United States Commission on Civil Rights. She also has deep roots in the liberty movement. Alison was a Koch Associate at the National Federation for Independent Business Legal Foundation and, during law school, completed summer clerkships at the Institute for Justice and the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation. She holds a J.D. from Emory University School of Law and an A.B. in history from Dartmouth College.
Her work has been published in the San Francisco Chronicle, the Daily Journal, Texas Journal of Law and Politics, and The Federalist Society’s Engage magazine and blog.
She lives in northern Virginia with her husband Ilya; two children; and golden retriever Willow. In her spare time, she enjoys reading, baking and cooking, children’s art projects, and training and exercising Willow.
Senior Scholar, Manhattan Institute; Professor of Law Emerita, University of San Diego
Gail Heriot is a Senior Scholar at the Manhattan Institute, a Professor of Law Emerita at the University of San Diego and the Chairman of the Board of the American Civil Rights Project. She served on the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights for 18 years. Her new book is entitled “Why We Walk on Eggshells: How Our Civil Rights Laws Stifle Our Public Discourse.”
Legal Fellow, Center for the Separation of Powers, Pacific Legal Foundation
Alison Somin joined Pacific Legal Foundation in May 2020 as a legal fellow in the Center for the Separation of Powers and part of the equality before the law practice group.
Before joining the Pacific Legal Foundation team, Alison was a special assistant and counsel for over a decade to Gail Heriot, a member of the bipartisan United States Commission on Civil Rights. She also has deep roots in the liberty movement. Alison was a Koch Associate at the National Federation for Independent Business Legal Foundation and, during law school, completed summer clerkships at the Institute for Justice and the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation. She holds a J.D. from Emory University School of Law and an A.B. in history from Dartmouth College.
Her work has been published in the San Francisco Chronicle, the Daily Journal, Texas Journal of Law and Politics, and The Federalist Society’s Engage magazine and blog.
She lives in northern Virginia with her husband Ilya; two children; and golden retriever Willow. In her spare time, she enjoys reading, baking and cooking, children’s art projects, and training and exercising Willow.
Topics
On Heightening the Contradictions of Grutter v. Bollinger: Thoughts on the Fisher v. UT Oral Argument
Yesterday, Justice Scalia's controversial question about mismatch theory at the Fisher v. UT oral argument...
Topics
Justice Scalia and Mismatch
It was the oral argument question that launched a thousand progressive blog posts. "Scalia: Black Students...
Topics
Eminent Domain and Race
Eminent domain is in the news again because of ever-controversial presidential candidate Donald Trump's remarks that the condemnation...
Topics
Supreme Court Preview: Of Fisher II and Paper Tigers
“There are not many dull moments in the debate about race preferences in university admissions....
Commission on Civil Rights Releases Flawed Report on Immigration Detention Facilities
Yesterday, the United States Commission on Civil Rights* released a new report* on conditions at...
NYT Misses the Mark on Mismatch
This past weekend, the New York Times ran a lengthy article titled "A Prescription for...
The EEOC as Unwise Gambler
All federal court opinions that begin with Kenny Rogers quotations are worth blogging about, even...
"A Dubious Expediency: How Racial Preferential Admissions on Campus Hurt Minority Students"
"We expect that 25 years from now, the use of racial preferences will no longer...
A Lady or a Tiger?: Thoughts on Fisher v. University of Texas and the Future of Race Preferences in America
Alison E. Somin
Engage Volume 14, Issue 3 October 2013
Note from the Editor: This article is about the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Fisher...
Sleeping Giant?: Section Two of the Thirteenth Amendment, Hate Crimes Legislation, and Academia’s Favorite New Vehicle for the Expansion of Federal Power
Gail L. Heriot, Alison E. Somin
Engage Volume 13, Issue 3 October 2012
A brief look at the Thirteenth Amendment might suggest that it has rather limited application...