Vice President and Senior Counsel, The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty
Daniel Blomberg is vice president and senior counsel for Becket. Before joining Becket, he clerked for Chief Judge Alice M. Batchelder of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit and served as litigation counsel with the Alliance Defending Freedom. Daniel’s clients have included an international order of nuns, the world’s largest religious media organization, synagogues, members of the U.S. military, religious healthcare ministries, peaceful protestors, halfway houses, religious colleges, state legislators, homeless shelters, religious business owners, an art gallery, and churches. Daniel has represented a wide variety of faith groups, including Anglicans, Baptists, Catholics, Hindus, Hutterites, Jews, Lutherans, Mennonites, Muslims, Presbyterians, Russian Orthodox, and Sikhs. Cases on which he has served as counsel to a party include: Our Lady of Guadalupe v. Morrissey-Berru, 140 S. Ct. 2049 (2020); Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn v. Cuomo, 141 S. Ct. 63 (2020); Zubik v. Burwell, 136 S. Ct. 1557 (2016); Little Sisters of the Poor v. Sebelius, 134 S. Ct. 1022 (2014); Wheaton College v. Burwell, 134 S. Ct. 2806 (2014); Fellowship of Christian Athletes v. SJUSD, 82 F.4th 664 (9th Cir. 2023) (en banc); Singh v. Berger, 56 F.4th 88 (D.C. Cir. 2022); Demkovich v. St. Andrew the Apostle Parish, 3 F.4th 968 (7th Cir. 2021) (en banc); Maxon v. Fuller Theological Seminary, 2021 WL 5882035 (9th Cir. 2021); Intervarsity Christian Fellowship/USA v. University of Iowa, 5 F.4th 855, 867 (8th Cir. 2021); Business Leaders in Christ v. University of Iowa, 991 F.3d 969 (8th Cir. 2021); Whole Woman’s Health v. Smith, 896 F.3d 362 (5th Cir. 2018); Lee v. Sixth Mount Zion Baptist Church, 903 F.3d 113 (3d Cir. 2018); Gagliardi v. TJCV, 889 F.3d 728 (11th Cir. 2018); Harvest Family Church v. FEMA, 2018 WL 386192 (5th Cir. 2018); Fratello v. Archdiocese of New York, 863 F.3d 190 (2d Cir. 2017); Eternal Word Television Network v. U.S. Dep’t of HHS, 756 F.3d 1339 (11th Cir. 2014); InterVarsity Christian Fellowship/USA v. Bd. of Governors of Wayne State Univ., 534 F. Supp. 3d 785 (E.D. Mich. 2021); and Singh v. Carter, 168 F. Supp. 3d 216 (D.D.C. 2016).
Daniel has been featured on CNN, Huffington Post Live, Fox News, EWTN Nightly News, and CBS Evening News.
He earned his J.D. from the University of South Carolina School of Law, graduating magna cum laude. While in law school, Daniel clerked for the South Carolina Attorney General’s Office, served on a South Carolina Supreme Court task force, and interned with Judge J. Michelle Childs of the Circuit Court for the Fifth Judicial Circuit as a part of the Judicial Observation and Education program. He is a Blackstone Fellow. Daniel received his undergraduate degree from Columbia International University. He and his wife have five children and too many animals.
Vice President for Legal Strategy, Stand Together
Casey Mattox is Vice President for Legal Strategy at Stand Together and Senior Advisor at
Americans for Prosperity. In these roles he advocates for and creates strategies and
partnerships to ensure a constitutionally limited government that protects the civil liberties of all
Americans. Prior to joining Stand Together and AFP Casey’s legal career focused on defending
the First Amendment rights of students, faculty, healthcare workers and religious organizations.
Casey has a J.D. from Boston College School of Law and an undergraduate degree from the
University of Virginia. You can find him on Twitter at @CaseyMattox_ and on LinkedIn at
@Casey-Mattox-ST.
Founder, Civic Renaissance; Adjunct Professor, Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy
ALEXANDRA O. HUDSON is a writer, popular speaker, and the founder of Civic Renaissance, a publication and intellectual community dedicated to beauty, goodness and truth. She was named the 2020 Novak Journalism Fellow, and contributes to Fox News, CBS News, The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, TIME Magazine, POLITICO Magazine, and Newsweek. She earned a master's degree in public policy at the London School of Economics as a Rotary Scholar, and is an adjunct professor at the Indiana University Lilly School of Philanthropy. She is also the creator of a series for The Teaching Company called Storytelling and The Human Condition. Her first book, The Soul of Civility: Timeless Principles to Heal Society and Ourselves, is forthcoming from St. Martin’s press this October. She lives in Indianapolis, IN with her husband and children.
Executive Vice President, The Federalist Society
Dean Reuter is Executive Vice President at the Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies. He has served in two federal government agency Offices of the Inspector General, as Counsel to the Inspector General and Deputy Inspector General, responsible for policing the use of federal funds granted and contracted through those agencies. As such, he helped conduct and oversee criminal investigations across the country. He is the principal author of the non-fiction book, The Hidden Nazi: The Untold Story of America's Deal with the Devil, and editor of Liberty’s Nemesis: The Unchecked Expansion of the State and Confronting Terror: 9/11 and the Future of American National Security. He was appointed by the President and served as Vice-Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Corporation for National and Community Service, and recently served as an appointee on the U.S. Commission on Presidential Scholars. He is a graduate of Hood College (BA with Honors) and the University of Maryland School of Law.
Partner, King & Spalding
A partner in the firm’s Government Advocacy and Public Policy group, J.C. helps companies and trade associations navigate legal, political and regulatory issues commonly associated with doing business in Europe and the United States. He is recognized by clients for his strong, bipartisan relationships with Members of Congress, State Attorneys General, congressional staff and senior government officials across key regulatory and executive branch agencies. He is trusted for his ability to rapidly synthesize complex information and communicate its strategic implications to policymakers and senior institutional stakeholders as well as his candid evaluation of options and potential for success.
As former counsel to the Senate Banking Committee, J.C has developed a deep expertise in financial services, fintech, and emerging technology policy. He has a proven track record of influencing federal legislation, regulatory frameworks, and agency rulemaking impacting digital assets, banking, payments, and technology platforms. J.C. regularly interfaces with financial regulators on a wide array of policy and institution-specific issues, and as co-chair of the firm’s State Attorneys General practice, delivers results on high-impact legal work at the intersection of law, policy and regulation.
J.C. is skilled in developing and executing comprehensive advocacy strategies, shaping legislative language, and positioning clients to successfully navigate complex and evolving policy environments at the federal, state and international levels. As President of the Parliamentary Intelligence-Security Forum, he has briefed policymakers throughout Europe, Africa, Latin America, and the Indo-Pacific. JC also advises international clients seeking to invest, expand, or operate in the United States.
President George W. Bush appointed J.C. to a six-year term as U.S. representative to the World Bank’s International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID). Mayor Muriel Bowser also appointed J.C. to the District of Columbia; Board of Elections, in which capacity he also served on the U.S. Election Assistance Commission Standards Board. He is currently chairman of the Board of Visitors of The Catholic University Columbus School of Law and President of the Parliamentary Intelligence-Security Forum, where he is a regular speaker on cryptocurrency, artificial intelligence and critical minerals.
Earlier in his career, J.C. established the Boggs Scholarship for Public Service at the University of Delaware in honor of his grandfather and namesake, former U.S. Congressman, Senator and Governor of Delaware, J. Caleb Boggs. He has also served on numerous corporate and non-profit boards, including Jobs for Delaware Graduates (Chairman); The Reserve Trust Company (Vice Chairman), Global Center for Social Entrepreneurship Network (Secretary), Republican National Lawyers Association (President), Kimball Union Academy (Chairman of the Committee on Trustees), and AAA Mid-Atlantic.
J.C. enjoys open-water swimming and is member of U.S. Masters Swimming and the historic Serpentine Swimming Club situated in London's Hyde Park. He has competed in swimming events across all 50 states, ten Canadian provinces and around the world.
Partner, O’Melveny & Myers
Brian P. Brooks is the Managing Partner of Valor Capital Group. He has served as CEO of the Bitfury Group and CEO of digital asset exchange and marketplace Binance.US.
Mr. Brooks became Acting Comptroller of the Currency upon the resignation of the 31st Comptroller of the Currency Joseph M. Otting as a result of his designation as First Deputy Comptroller by Treasury Secretary Steven T. Mnuchin pursuant to his authority under 12 USC § 4.
As Acting Comptroller of the Currency, Mr. Brooks was the administrator of the federal banking system and chief officer of the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC). The OCC supervises nearly 1,200 national banks, federal savings associations, and federal branches and agencies of foreign banks that conduct approximately 70% of all banking business in the United States. The mission of the OCC is to ensure that national banks and federal savings associations operate in a safe and sound manner, provide fair access to financial services, treat customers fairly, and comply with applicable laws and regulations.
The Comptroller also serves as a director of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and a member of the Financial Stability Oversight Council and the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council.
Prior to becoming Acting Comptroller, Mr. Brooks served as Senior Deputy Comptroller and Chief Operating Officer. In this role, he oversaw OCC bank supervision, bank supervision policy, economics, supervisory system and analytical support, systemic risk identification support and specialty supervision, and innovation. He also served as a member of the OCC's Executive Committee and was the Chair of the Technology and Systems Subcommittee, since joining the agency in April 2020.
Prior to joining the OCC, Mr. Brooks served as Chief Legal Officer of Coinbase Global, Inc., where he headed the legal, compliance, audit, investigations, and government relations functions for the company, which served 20 million customers. He held this position since September 2018.
From 2014-2018, Mr. Brooks served as Executive Vice President, General Counsel, and Corporate Secretary of the $3.2 trillion Fannie Mae. Prior to joining Fannie Mae, he served as a Vice Chairman of OneWest Bank, N.A., from 2011 to 2014. Prior to joining OneWest, he served managing partner of the Washington, D.C. office of the global law firm O'Melveny & Myers LLP, where he also served as chair of the firm's financial services practice group. Prior to joining the OCC, Mr. Brooks also served on the Boards of Directors of Avant, Inc. and Fannie Mae, and also served as an advisor to a number of technology startups.
Mr. Brooks holds a bachelor’s degree from Harvard University in government and a law degree from the University of Chicago.
Partner, Foley & Lardner LLP
Patrick Daugherty is a senior corporate and securities law partner of Foley & Lardner LLP, based in Chicago. He also is an adjunct professor of Cornell Law School, where he teaches in residence each Fall Term.
Mr. Daugherty is a member of the Bar in New York, the District of Columbia, North Carolina, Michigan and Illinois. Credentialing organizations have named him “Lawyer of the Year” in both Michigan (2007) and Illinois (2022). A graduate of Northwestern University and of Cornell Law School (Class of 1981), he clerked for SDNY Chief Judge Lloyd F. MacMahon for a year before entering private practice. Mr. Daugherty also served as Counsel to SEC Commissioner Edward H. Fleischman in Washington, D.C., from 1986 to 1989. An Emeritus Member of the American Law Institute, he is the author, co-author or editor of several books and many articles on securities regulation and new financial products.
Mr. Daugherty believes that he was the first lawyer inside the SEC to join the Federalist Society when he became a member in the late 1980s. A mainstay of the Chicago Lawyers Chapter, at the national level of the Society he serves on the Executive Committee for the Financial Services & E-Commerce Practice Group.
Partner, Cahill Gordon & Reindel LLP; Special Professor of Law, Maurice A. Dean School of Law, Hofstra University
Gary E. Kalbaugh is a nationally recognized leader in commodities, futures, and derivatives law.
Gary is a partner in the New York office of Cahill Gordon & Reindel LLP as well as a Special Professor of Law at the Maurice A. Deane School of Law at Hofstra University, where he teaches derivatives law and banking law.
A preeminent authority in the derivatives field, Gary is the author of the principal treatise Derivatives Law and Regulation (3rd ed. 2021) and serves as Editor-in-Chief of the Futures and Derivatives Law Report, the foremost industry publication. He is a past chair of the New York City Bar Association’s Committee on the Regulation of Futures and Derivatives and has over 15 years of experience as a professor teaching derivatives and banking law.
Gary is the leading derivatives lawyer in the digital assets space, and one of few to truly understand the technical side of emerging financial technology. He serves on the CFTC’s Future of Finance Subcommittee, reflecting his recognized leadership at the intersection of financial regulation and emerging technologies. A frequent speaker, writer, and commentator on derivatives, banking law, artificial intelligence, and digital assets regulation, he has served as conference co-chair for the American Bar Association’s “Artificial Intelligence and Derivatives Market” conference and regularly speaks at major industry conferences on cutting-edge issues in financial regulation and technology. Gary is sought after as a thought leader on the evolving landscape of digital asset regulation and the regulatory implications of AI in financial markets.
At ING, Gary served as Deputy General Counsel and Director, where he chaired swap dealer and security-based swap dealer regulatory committees and provided strategic leadership on U.S., European, and other regulations impacting the organization. He had global responsibility for U.S. derivatives regulatory issues and maintained strong relationships with regulators. Gary also co-developed ING legal’s global artificial intelligence training program and was responsible for U.S. regulatory issues relating to ING’s blockchain-based pilot programs and crypto initiatives.
Previously, Gary served as a lecturer-in-law at Columbia Law School and held senior roles at WestLB, where he was executive director, counsel, and chief U.S. data protection officer and chaired the global Dodd-Frank and underwriting committees. He began his career as an associate at a notable international firm.
United States Representative, North Carolina's 10th District
Congressman Patrick McHenry is serving his tenth term as the representative for North Carolina's 10th Congressional District which comprises all or parts of nine counties in North Carolina, from the suburbs of Charlotte on Lake Norman to Pisgah National Forest in Burke County.
In the 118th Congress, Congressman McHenry was elected as the Chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, a committee he has served on since he was elected to Congress. As Chairman, he will continue advocating for innovative solutions that increase access to banking services and credit for American families and small businesses.
Prior to serving as the Chairman, Congressman McHenry was elected as the Republican Leader at the beginning of the 116th Congress. He also served as Vice Chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, a position he was appointed to at the beginning of the 114th Congress by then Chairman Jeb Hensarling (TX-05).
In 2015, Congressman McHenry was selected by then House Majority Whip Steve Scalise (LA-01) to be the Chief Deputy Whip. As Chief Deputy Whip, Congressman McHenry directly assisted Majority Whip Scalise by building consensus for the conservative policy agenda of the House Republican Conference. One of his proudest accomplishments as Chief Deputy Whip was the passage of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, which helped to fix our nation’s broken tax code and provided much-needed tax relief to American families and businesses.
During the 113th Congress, Congressman McHenry served as Chairman of the House Financial Services Committee’s Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee. In this role, he provided oversight of the Federal Reserve, the Treasury Department, the Securities and Exchange Commission, and other federal financial regulators. Congressman McHenry was previously a member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.
In addition to his leadership roles on the Financial Services Committee, Congressman McHenry has successfully passed important legislation into law that helps entrepreneurs and startup investing. In the 114thCongress, Congressman McHenry authored the “RAISE Act” (Reforming Access for Investments in Startup Enterprises), which was signed into law by President Obama, providing the means for startup employees to sell their stock options to private investors.
Additionally, Congressman McHenry authored the primary legislation to legalize equity-based crowdfunding in the United States. The crowdfunding language he first authored in 2011 was eventually included in the JOBS Act which President Obama signed into law in April 2012. In recognition of his work supporting crowdfunding, Congressman McHenry was presented with the 2013 “Crowdfunding Visionary Award” by the Global Crowdfunding Convention. Congressman McHenry was also awarded the Crowdfunding Leadership Award by the University of California at Berkeley Fung Institute’s Program for Innovation in Entrepreneurial Finance in 2013.
Congressman McHenry’s interest in crowdfunding and capital formation more broadly developed as a child, when his father attempted to grow a small business but struggled for financing. It was this experience—and the lack of small business financing in rural western North Carolina—that drove Congressman McHenry to become a leader on crowdfunding, capital formation, and other forms of disruptive finance. Recently this has expanded to encompass fintech as he works with industry leaders to discover innovative ways to combine finance and technology with the goal of expanding access to capital for America’s entrepreneurs and small businesses.
Throughout his career, Congressman McHenry has been a vocal and effective advocate for the men and women who wear the uniform of our country. He received awards from the North Carolina Chapters of the American Legion and Marine Corps League for his extensive work in bringing a veterans’ health care clinic to his district after nearly two decades of delay. The National Guard presented Patrick McHenry with the Charles Dick Medal of Merit for his exceptional service to the North Carolina National Guard.
Congressman McHenry has been recognized as a leader of the conservative movement in America. Having never voted for a tax increase in his career, Congressman McHenry is continually recognized as a “Hero of the Taxpayer” by Americans for Tax Reform.
Congressman McHenry is the recipient of several additional awards including: the National Association of Manufacturing’s “Manufacturing Legislative Excellence” Award, the Small Business and Entrepreneurship Council’s “Small Business Champion” Award, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s “Spirit of Enterprise” Award, the 60 Plus Association’s “Guardian of Seniors’ Rights” Award, the Family Research Council’s “True Blue” Award, and Citizens Against Government Waste’s “Taxpayer Hero” Award. In 2009 he was recognized by Time Magazine as one of the “40 Under 40,” a list of rising stars in American politics.
Most importantly, Congressman McHenry continues to listen to the voters of the 10th District and act as their voice in Washington. His main focus is to provide the highest level of constituent services at home in western North Carolina.
Prior to being elected to Congress in 2004 at the age of 29, Congressman McHenry represented the 109thDistrict in the North Carolina House of Representatives. He also served as Special Assistant to the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Labor, a post he was appointed to by President George W. Bush.
Congressman McHenry is a graduate of Ashbrook High School in Gastonia, N.C. and Belmont Abbey College, where he earned a Bachelor of Arts in History. Congressman McHenry and his wife Giulia live in Denver, N.C. and worship at Holy Spirit Church. They are the parents of two daughters, Cecelia Rose and Therese Anne (who goes by Rese), and one son, Peregrine Callan (who goes by Perry).
Partner, Fusion Law, PLLC
Paul is the founding partner of Fusion Law, PLLC. He has extensive experience with state, federal, and global regulators building coalitions and implementing policies to promote innovation in financial services. He is responsible for designing and implementing the first state (Arizona) and federal (CFPB) FinTech sandboxes in the United States. He also designed the CFPB no-action letter and trial disclosure policies. He helped found the first global regulatory innovation coalition (Global Financial Innovation Network) and led the founding of the first U.S. regulatory innovation coalition (American Consumer Financial Innovation Network). He served on the Financial Stability Oversight Council subcommittee on digital assets. He also has drafted state-level laws on blockchain and utility tokens.
Paul also has significant enforcement and litigation experience. He led many multi-state consumer protection enforcement matters as Civil Litigation Division Chief at the Arizona Attorney General’s Office.
Prior to his government service, Paul practiced law in the areas of securities litigation and transactional work for approximately six years at two well-known law firms. He also clerked on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit.
Professor of Law, South Texas College of Law Houston
Josh Blackman is a national thought leader on constitutional law and the United States Supreme Court. Josh’s work was quoted during two presidential impeachment trials. He has testified before Congress and advises federal and state lawmakers. Josh regularly appears on TV, including NBC, CBS, ABC, Fox, and the BBC. Josh is also a frequent guest on NPR and other syndicated radio programs. He has published commentaries in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, and leading national publications.
Since 2012, Josh has served as a professor at the South Texas College of Law Houston. He holds the Centennial Chair of Constitutional Law. Josh is an Adjunct Fellow at the Manhattan Institute. Josh has written more than seven dozen law review articles that have been cited more than a thousand times. Josh was selected as the Jurist of the Year by the Texas Journal of Law & Public Policy, received the inaugural Meese III Originalism Award, and was awarded the Inaugural Joseph Story Award. Josh was selected by Forbes Magazine for the “30 Under 30” in Law and Policy. Josh is the President of the Harlan Institute, and founded FantasySCOTUS, the Internet’s Premier Supreme Court Fantasy League. He blogs at the Volokh Conspiracyand posts@JoshMBlackman.
Partner, O'Melveny & Myers LLP
Gregory Jacob is a partner in O’Melveny’s Washington, D.C. office. Greg Jacob represents financial services companies including banks, investment managers, health care payors, and insurers, as well as other employers, in class action and other litigation concerning ERISA and other labor and employment matters. A former Solicitor of Labor, Greg has extensive knowledge on a wide variety of labor and employment issues including ERISA, FLSA, OFCCP, and whistleblower law. He regularly litigates in federal courts throughout the country, defends clients against Department of Labor investigations, and provides counseling to plans and plan sponsors.
Prior to rejoining O’Melveny in 2021, Greg served as Counsel to Vice President Pence and Deputy Assistant to the President. He directly advised the Vice President on all legal issues relating to the Office of the Vice President, and advised the White House Coronavirus Task Force concerning the Defense Production Act and other legal issues related to bolstering the domestic supply chain.
Chairman, Secura/Isaac Group
William “Bill” Isaac served as Chairman of the FDIC during one of the most important and tumultuous periods in US banking history. Some 3,000 banks and thrifts failed during the 1980s, including Continental Illinois and nine of the ten largest banks in Texas. In addition to the failures of many of the largest regional banks throughout the US, most of the money center banks in the US were on the watch list due in large part to the enormous amount of loans on their books to less developed countries.
President Carter appointed Bill Isaac to the board of the FDIC in 1978. He was confirmed by the Senate at the age of 34. President Reagan named him Chairman of the FDIC two years later, making him the youngest FDIC board member and Chairman in history. Bill Isaac also served as Chairman of the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council (1983-85), as a member of the Depository Institutions Deregulation Committee (1981–85), and on the Vice President’s Task Group on Regulation of Financial Services (1984).
Bill Isaac is currently Chairman and principal owner of three premier consulting firms, Secura/Isaac Consulting, Blue SaaS Solutions, and Secura/Isaac Talent Advisors. He is a member of the boards of directors of Emigrant Bank and New York Private Bank & Trust and serves as Chairman of Sarasota Private Trust and Cleveland Private Trust, all of which are owned by Howard Milstein and his family.
After completing his service as Chairman of the FDIC at the end of 1985, Bill Isaac founded The Secura Group, a leading consulting firm, which he sold in 2008. He served as Chairman of the Board of Fifth Third Bancorp, one of the nation’s leading banks, and worked as Senior Managing Director at FTI Consulting from 2011 to 2019. He then joined Howard Milstein in the financial services business. Bill Isaac is a former board member at TSYS, a leading payment processing company that today is part of Global Payments. He has served on the boards of Amex Bank, The Associates (a finance company formerly owned by Ford Motor Company), credit reporting company TransUnion, and staffing firm MPS Group.
Bill Isaac is involved extensively in thought leadership relating to the financial industry. He is the author of ‘Senseless Panic: How Washington Failed America’ with a foreword by legendary former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker. ‘Senseless Panic’ provides an inside account of the banking and savings and loans crises of the 1980s and compares that period to the financial crisis of 2008/2009. Bill Isaac’s articles appear in the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, the New York Times, The Hill, American Banker, Forbes, the Financial Times, the Washington Times, and other leading publications. He appears regularly on television and radio, testifies before Congress, and is a speaker before audiences throughout the world (www.WilliamIsaac.com).
Bill Isaac was formerly a senior partner at Arnold & Porter, which was a founding partner of The Secura Group. He left the law firm in 1993 when Secura purchased Arnold & Porter’s interest in Secura. Before his appointment to the FDIC, Bill Isaac served as vice president, general counsel and secretary of First Kentucky National Corporation and its subsidiaries, including First National Bank of Louisville and First Kentucky Trust Company. He began his career with Foley & Lardner in Milwaukee where he practiced general corporate law specializing in banking law.
Bill Isaac received a Distinguished Achievement Medal in 1995 from Miami University and a Distinguished Alumnus Award in 2013 from The Ohio State University. He is a Life member of both the Board of Directors of the Miami University Foundation and the Board of Directors of The Ohio State University Foundation. Bill co- founded in 2016, with his former classmate, the William Isaac & Michael Oxley Center for Business Leadership at Miami University.
Partner, Simpson Thacher
Mr. Noreika leads projects related to the U.S. banking industry, as well as clients that span beyond traditional banking including financial technology and cryptocurrency companies. He is the company’s focal point for C-suite advice on compliance and regulatory requirements at all levels, domestic and international.
Prior to joining Patomak, Mr. Noreika was a partner at Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP and was a lead lawyer in the firm’s financial institutions regulatory practice, focusing on banking regulation and related litigation. In that role, he advised domestic and international financial institutions on regulatory issues relating to mergers and acquisitions, minority investments, capital issuances, structuring and compliance activities, and litigation matters.
Mr. Noreika’s extensive experience includes advising regional and multinational banks on the structuring of their U.S. operations, compliance with the Volcker Rule, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and other federal agency regulations, Bank Secrecy Act and anti-money laundering rules, as well as transactional matters and related regulatory applications. He has counseled numerous private equity funds with respect to investments in banking organizations.
In 2017, Mr. Noreika served as acting Comptroller of the Currency where he led the 4,000-person independent agency responsible for chartering, regulating, and supervising all national banks and federal savings associations as well as federal branches and agencies of foreign banks in the U.S. There, he worked to make regulation more accountable, improved the efficiency of chartering and licensing decisions, and sought the enhance the value of the national bank and federal thrift charters and their ability to meet the credit and banking needs of their communities. In this role, he also served as director of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and member of the Financial Stability Oversight Council.
Mr. Noreika has been recognized as a leader in his field by Chambers USA in “Financial Services Regulation: Banking Compliance” since 2014. He received his law degree from Harvard Law School, where he was editor of the Harvard Law Review. He earned his B.S. in economics with a concentration in finance from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.
Senior Fellow, Mises Institute
Alex J. Pollock is a Senior Fellow with the Mises Institute, providing thought and policy leadership on financial issues and the study of financial systems. His work includes cycles of booms and busts, financial crises with their political responses, housing finance, government-sponsored enterprises, risk and uncertainty, central banking, banking and financial regulation, corporate governance, retirement finance, student loans, and the politics of finance.
He previously served as the Principal Deputy Director of the Office of Financial Research in the U.S. Treasury Department 2019-2021. He was a Distinguished Senior Fellow with the R Street Institute 2015-2019 and 2021, and a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, 2004-2015. Among the many aspects of his AEI work, he developed the One Page Mortgage Form to give borrowers in clear form the key information they need in order to know what they are committing themselves to. He was President and CEO of the Federal Home Loan Bank of Chicago from 1991 to 2004. There he invented the Mortgage Partnership Finance program, which successfully created front-end mortgage credit risk sharing beginning in 1997. His decades of banking experience include being a Visiting Scholar at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, 1991.
Pollock was a director of the CME Group 2004-2019 and of Ascendium Education Group 1989-2019. He is a director and past-chairman of the Great Books Foundation and a past president of the International Union for Housing Finance.
He is the co-author of Surprised Again! - The COVID Crisis and the New Market Bubble (2022), and the author of Finance and Philosophy—Why We’re Always Surprised (2018) and Boom and Bust: Financial Cycles and Human Prosperity (2011), as well as numerous articles and Congressional testimony.
Pollock is a graduate of Williams College, the University of Chicago, and Princeton University.
His work is available on alexjpollock.com.
Robert Kavesh Professorship in Economics, Leonard N. Stern School of Business, New York University
Lawrence J. White has been with New York University Leonard N. Stern School of Business for more than 35 years. His primary research areas of interest include financial regulation, antitrust, network industries, international banking and applied microeconomics.
Professor White has published numerous articles in the Journal of Business, Journal of Economic Perspectives, Journal of Economic Literature, Journal of Political Economy, American Economic Review, Review of Economics and Statistics, Quarterly Journal of Economics, and other leading journals in economics, finance, and law. He is the author of The S&L Debacle: Public Policy Lessons for Bank and Thrift Regulation, among other books, and he is the co-editor (with John Kwoka) of the 6th of edition of The Antitrust Revolution. He contributed chapters to both of the NYU Stern books on the financial crisis - Restoring Financial Stability and Regulating Wall Street. He is the co-author (with Stern's Viral Acharya, Matthew Richardson, and Stijn Van Nieuwerburgh) of Guaranteed to Fail: Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and the Debacle of Mortgage Finance.
Trial Attorney, Civil Rights Division, United States Department of Justice (incoming)
Adam Griffin is a graduate of the University of North Carolina School of Law. During law school, he served as a research assistant to Professor Stephen E. Sachs and UNC Law Dean Martin Brinkley. After law school, he spent two years litigating for liberty at the Institute for Justice as an inaugural Law and Liberty Fellow. He served as a law clerk to Chief Judge Richard E. Myers in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina, and is now a separation-of-powers attorney at Pacific Legal Foundation.
Richard and Frances Mallery Professor of Law and Faculty Director, Constitutional Law Center, Stanford Law School
Michael W. McConnell is the Richard and Frances Mallery Professor and Faculty Director of the Constitutional Law Center at Stanford Law School, and a Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution. From 2002 to 2009, he served as a Circuit Judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit. He was nominated by President George W. Bush, a Republican, and confirmed by a Democratic Senate by unanimous consent. McConnell has previously held chaired professorships at the University of Chicago and the University of Utah, and visiting professorships at Harvard and NYU. He teaches courses on constitutional law, constitutional history, First Amendment, and interpretive theory. He has published widely in the fields of constitutional law and theory, especially church and state, equal protection, and separation of powers. His book, “The President Who Would Not Be King: Executive Power Under the Constitution,” was published by Princeton University Press in 2020, based on the Tanner Lectures in Human Values, which he delivered at Princeton in 2019. His latest book, co-authored with Nathan Chapman, “Agreeing to Disagree: How the Establishment Clause Protects Religious Diversity and Freedom of Conscience,” was published by Oxford University Press in mid-2023. McConnell has argued sixteen cases in the United States Supreme Court, most recently Carney v. Adams (2020). defending a provision of the Delaware Constitution requiring political balance on that state’s courts. More recently, he was co-counsel in Gonzalez v. Google. He earned his B.A. from Michigan State University and his J.D. from the University of Chicago, and has received honorary degrees from Notre Dame University and Michigan State. He served as law clerk to Supreme Court Justice William J. Brennan, Jr. and D.C. Circuit Chief Judge J. Skelly Wright. He has been Assistant General Counsel of the Office of Management & Budget, Assistant to the Solicitor General of the Department of Justice, and a member of the President’s Intelligence Oversight Board. He is Senior of Counsel to the law firm Wilson, Sonsini, Goodrich & Rosati, and is co-chair of Meta’s Oversight Review Board.
Tocqueville Associate Professor Department of Political Science and Concurrent Associate Professor of Law, University of Notre Dame Law School
Vincent Phillip Muñoz is the Tocqueville Associate Professor of Religion & Public Life in the Department of Political Science at the University of Notre Dame. He is the founding director of Notre Dame's undergraduate minor in Constitutional Studies and directs Notre Dame's Tocqueville Program for Inquiry into Religion and Public Life.
Muñoz writes and teaches across the fields of constitutional law, American politics, and political philosophy with a focus on religious liberty and the American Founding. His first book, God and the Founders: Madison, Washington, and Jefferson (Cambridge University Press, 2009) won the Hubert Morken Award from the American Political Science Association for the best publication on religion and politics in 2009 and 2010. His First Amendment church-state case reader, Religious Liberty and the American Supreme Court: The Essential Cases and Documents (Rowman & Littlefield) was first published in 2013 (revised edition, 2015) and is being used at Notre Dame and other leading universities.
Muñoz's current project is a scholarly monograph on the natural right of religious liberty and the original meaning of the First Amendment's Religion Clauses. Articles from that project have appeared in American Political Science Review, The Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy, Notre Dame Law Review, American Political Thought, and the University of Pennsylvania's Journal of Constitutional Law.
Senior Fellow, American Enterprise Institute
Sadanand Dhume writes about South Asian political economy, foreign policy, business, and society, with a focus on India and Pakistan. He is also a South Asia columnist for the Wall Street Journal. He has worked as a foreign correspondent for the Far Eastern Economic Review in India and Indonesia and was a Bernard Schwartz Fellow at the Asia Society in Washington, D.C. His political travelogue about the rise of radical Islam in Indonesia, My Friend the Fanatic: Travels with a Radical Islamist, has been published in four countries.
Judicial Law Clerk, U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida
Nitin is a recent graduate of Cornell Law School. Before his time in Ithaca, he majored in International Studies and Political Science at Johns Hopkins University and focused on power competition in South Asia during his graduate studies at the University of Oxford.
Justice, Supreme Court of Arizona
Clint Bolick was appointed by Governor Doug Ducey in January 2016 to serve on the Arizona Supreme Court and was retained by the voters in 2018 and 2024.
Prior to joining the Court, Justice Bolick litigated constitutional cases in state and federal courts from coast to coast, including the U.S. Supreme Court. Among other positions, he served as Vice President for Litigation at the Goldwater Institute and as Co-founder and Vice President for Litigation at the Institute for Justice. He has litigated in support of school choice, freedom of enterprise, private property rights, freedom of speech, and federalism, and against racial classifications and government subsidies.
Justice Bolick received his Juris Doctor degree from the University of California at Davis, where he has been recognized as a distinguished alumnus, and his Bachelor of Arts degree magna cum laude from Drew University. He serves as a research fellow with the Hoover Institution. Among other honors, he was named one of the 90 Greatest DC Lawyers in the Last 30 Years by Legal Times in 2008, received a Bradley Prize in 2006, and was recognized as one of the nation’s three lawyers of the year by American Lawyer in 2002 for his successful defense of school vouchers in Zelman v. Simmons-Harris.
Justice Bolick is a prolific author of a dozen books and hundreds of articles. Among his most recent books are Unshackled: Freeing America’s K-12 Education System: Immigration Wars: Forging an American Solution, co-authored with former Florida Governor Jeb Bush; and David’s Hammer: The Case for an Activist Judiciary. Bolick serves as an adjunct professor of constitutional law at Arizona State University’s Sandra Day O’Connor School of Law and has served as a lecturer at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government.
Justice, Supreme Court of Tennessee
Justice Sarah Campbell was confirmed to the Tennessee Supreme Court in 2022. She previously served as an Associate Solicitor General in the Tennessee Attorney General’s Office and as an associate at the law firm of Williams & Connolly LLP in Washington, DC. Justice Campbell earned her law degree from Duke University School of Law, a Master of Public Policy degree from Duke University, and her undergraduate degree from the University of Tennessee, where she received the Torchbearer Award. She served as a law clerk for Justice Samuel A. Alito, Jr. on the United States Supreme Court and Judge William H. Pryor Jr. on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit.
Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Eighth Circuit
David Stras became a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit on January 31, 2018. Before serving on the Eighth Circuit, Judge Stras was an Associate Justice of the Minnesota Supreme Court, a position he occupied from July 1, 2010 until his appointment to the Eighth Circuit.
Prior to becoming a judge, Stras was a member of the faculty of the University of Minnesota Law School from 2004 through 2010. He taught and wrote in the areas of federal courts and jurisdiction, constitutional law, criminal law, and law and politics.
Judge Stras received his Bachelor of Arts degree, with highest distinction, in 1995 and his Master of Business Administration in 1999, both from the University of Kansas. He also received his law degree from the University of Kansas School of Law in 1999, where he served as Editor-in-Chief of the Criminal Procedure Edition of the Kansas Law Review.
Following law school, Stras clerked for The Honorable Melvin Brunetti of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and then for The Honorable J. Michael Luttig of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit.
From 2001 to 2002, he practiced white-collar criminal and appellate litigation with the Washington, D.C., office of Sidley Austin Brown & Wood. Following his year in practice, he clerked for The Honorable Clarence Thomas of the Supreme Court of the United States.
Chief Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit
JEFFREY S. SUTTON is the Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. He has served as Chair of the Federal Judicial Conference Committee on Rules of Practice and Procedure, Chair of the Advisory Committee on Appellate Rules, and Chair of the Supreme Court Fellows Commission. He currently serves as Chair of the Executive Committee of the Judicial Conference of the United States. Since 1993, Chief Judge Sutton has been an adjunct professor at The Ohio State University College of Law, where he teaches seminars on State Constitutional Law, the United States Supreme Court, and Appellate Advocacy. He also teaches a class on State Constitutional Law at Harvard Law School. Among other publications, he is the author of Who Decides? States as Laboratories of Constitutional Experimentation and 51 Imperfect Solutions: States and the Making of American Constitutional Law. He is the co-author of a casebook, State Constitutional Law: The Modern Experience, as well as The Law of Judicial Precedent. He is also the co-editor of The Essential Scalia: On the Constitution, the Courts, and the Rule of Law. In 2006, Chief Judge Sutton was elected to the American Law Institute, and in 2017 he was elected to its Council.
Presiding Justice, Supreme Court of Georgia
Justice Sarah Hawkins Warren was appointed to the Supreme Court of Georgia by Governor Nathan Deal and was sworn in on September 17, 2018. She previously served as Solicitor General for the State of Georgia under Attorney General Chris Carr.
Justice Warren earned a B.A. in Public Policy and Spanish, magna cum laude, from Duke University. After graduation, Justice Warren served as Deputy Press Secretary for the White House Office of Management and Budget.
Justice Warren received her J.D., magna cum laude, from Duke University School of Law, where she served as Editor in Chief of Law and Contemporary Problems and on the Executive Committee of the Federalist Society.
Following her graduation from law school, Justice Warren served as a law clerk to then-Chief Judge J.L. Edmondson of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit and to the Honorable Richard J. Leon of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia. She also practiced as a litigation partner at Kirkland & Ellis LLP in Washington, D.C., where she represented clients before state and federal courts and was outside counsel to Georgia in Florida v. Georgia, No. 142 Original (United States Supreme Court).
In 2015, Justice Warren and her family returned home to Georgia, where she began service in the Office of Attorney General Sam Olens as Deputy Solicitor General and Special Counsel for Water Litigation. In January 2017, she was appointed Solicitor General by Attorney General Chris Carr, and in that role served as the chief appellate lawyer for the State of Georgia and the primary constitutional law advisor to the Attorney General. As Solicitor General, Justice Warren represented Georgia in multi-state litigation and in appeals before state and federal courts, including in an argument before the United States Supreme Court.
Justice Warren currently serves on the Duke Law School Board of Visitors, the Berry College Board of Trustees, and the Advisory Board for the Atlanta Lawyers Chapter of the Federalist Society. She lives in Atlanta with her husband, Blaise, and their three children.
Managing Partner, Allen Wellman McNew Harvey, LLP
Michael has been an attorney with Allen Wellman McNew Harvey, LLP in Greenfield, Indiana, since 2006 and currently serves as the firm’s managing partner. He concentrates his practice in the areas of business and commercial law, and complex litigation in state and federal court. Michael regularly advises clients in the areas of business planning, contracts, employment law, prelitigation planning, dispute resolution and workouts. He also advises farmers in business and succession planning, and government regulation including disputes arising under the Food and Security Act of 1985. While Michael’s practice is focused in central Indiana, he regularly represents clients throughout the state and regionally.
Michael has significant appellate practice experience, and regularly represents clients in appellate matters in both administrative and judicial reviews over a wide range of legal areas. He has briefed and argued cases as lead and sole counsel before the Indiana Court of Appeals and the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit and served as lead counsel on Petitions to Transfer to the Indiana Supreme Court. Michael successfully obtained reversal of a United States Department of Agriculture wetland determination before the Seventh Circuit in Boucher v. USDA, 934 F.3d 530 (7th Cir. 2019), an important decision addressing the requirements of a wetland under the Swampbuster provisions of the Food and Security Act.
Michael also oversees the firm’s bankruptcy and insolvency work, representing debtors and creditors in cases and litigation arising under Chapter 7, Chapter 12, Chapter 13, and Chapter 11 of the United States Bankruptcy Code. Michael also represents debtors, financial institutions, and receivers in foreclosure and receivership cases arising under state law.
Michael grew up in Rush County, Indiana, and obtained his undergraduate degree from Franklin College in Franklin, Indiana, and his law degree from the Indiana University Robert H. McKinney School of Law. He resides in the Meridian Kessler neighborhood of Indianapolis with his wife Michele, and their sons, Evan and Ryan.
Senior Agriculture Policy Specialist, National Wildlife Federation
Duane Hovorka is a Senior Agriculture Policy Specialist at the National Wildlife Federation. Prior to this role, he directed the Izaak Walton League’s Agriculture Program, where he provided analysis and outreach on federal Farm Bill programs to deliver healthy soil, clean water and wildlife habitat benefits, and oversight of agricultural policy issues in key states.
Partner, Luther Strange & Associates
Annie Donaldson Talley is Partner at Luther Strange and Associates. She recently departed the White House after serving as Deputy Assistant to the President and Deputy Counsel to the President. Over the past four years, she provided outside counsel to the Donald J. Trump for President campaign; helped stand up and manage the White House Counsel’s Office; interfaced with agencies across the federal government; and advised the President of the United States, White House Counsel, Chief of Staff and other senior staff across the Executive Office of the President on a broad range of issues from regulatory reform to executive nominations to the day-to-day issues facing the Administration.
Prior to her White House service, Annie Donaldson Talley counseled clients in the non-profit, for-profit, political, and government sectors, as well as high-profile individuals in private practice at Jones Day and Patton Boggs. She provided strategic counseling to clients structuring their affairs to ensure compliance with a web of state and federal laws and represented clients in complex, multi-faceted investigations, leading teams navigating issues of intense public scrutiny.
Annie Donaldson Talley is also a veteran of three presidential campaigns and served in state government. She holds a B.A., summa cum laude, from the University of Alabama and a J.D. from Harvard Law School, where she served on the Harvard Law Review. She lives in Montgomery, Alabama with her husband, Brett.
Of Counsel, Covington & Burling LLP
The Honorable Paul J. Ray is currently Of Counsel at Covington & Burling LLP where he advises clients on regulatory opportunities and challenges and helps them formulate and execute advocacy strategies for their regulatory policy priorities before the executive branch and Congress.
During the first Trump Administration, Paul held various senior positions at the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) within the White House’s Office of Management and Budget, including as acting, and then Senate-confirmed, head of the office. As OIRA Administrator (the "regulations czar"), Paul supervised the review of hundreds of regulations from across the government, drafted numerous executive orders governing the regulatory process, and led the Administration’s regulatory reform effort. As a result of this experience, Paul is well-positioned to help clients understand and achieve regulatory policy priorities in the context of the government’s regulatory agenda and ongoing reform efforts.
Most recently, Paul was also the Director of the Roe Institute for Economic Policy Studies at The Heritage Foundation. In that role, he supervised the formulation of the Foundation’s economic and regulatory policy recommendations and provided technical assistance to congressional committees and staff regarding legislative changes to the regulatory process. In addition to his role at The Heritage Foundation, Paul also served as a Senior Advisor at a strategic advisory firm. Before his time in government, Paul practiced law at a law firm in Washington, specializing in administrative law matters.
Prior to his role at the White House, Paul was Counselor to the Secretary at the U.S. Department of Labor. There he led departmental efforts in high-profile rulemakings and helped formulate the Department’s legal positions and strategy.
Paul served as a law clerk to Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito and as a law clerk to the Honorable Debra Livingston of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.
Paul is a thought leader in the conservative legal movement and is a frequent commentator and speaker on regulatory policy and reform matters, including at law schools, professional gatherings, and other venues. He is the Chairman of Innovations in Peacebuilding International and the Regulatory Process Working Group of the Federalist Society’s Regulatory Transparency Project and a public member of the Administrative Conference of the United States. Paul is also an adjunct lecturer at the Hillsdale College School of Government.
Director of Equality and Opportunity Litigation, Pacific Legal Foundation
Joshua directs the litigation for PLF’s Equality and Opportunity Program, where he fights to dismantle unconstitutional barriers to opportunity, freeing individuals to rise based on their choices, character, and ability.
Joshua joined PLF as an attorney in 2007. His litigation practice has covered all PLF subject areas with a particular focus on equality and opportunity. Joshua argued PLF’s 13th case before the United States Supreme Court, Cedar Point Nursery v. Hassid, where the court ruled that a California regulation that allowed union organizers onto private property violated the Fifth Amendment’s Takings Clause. Other litigation highlights of his include ending a decades-long racial quota in Hartford, Connecticut, lifting a ban on boys’ dancing in Minnesota, and vindicating an entrepreneur’s right to start a moving business in Kentucky.
Joshua’s writings have been published by the USA Today, Wall Street Journal, and Washington Post. And his research has been published in journals such as Texas Review of Law & Politics, Alabama Civil Rights & Civil Liberties Law Review, Journal of Civil Rights & Economic Development, and Northern Illinois University Law Review. He has appeared on national television and radio, including PBS Newshour, NPR’s All things Considered, Stossel, and Univision.
Joshua earned his BA with distinction from the University of Wisconsin-Madison with a triple major in political science, international relations, and German. He earned his JD cum laude from Michigan State College of Law where he was on the law review and trial practice institute. Joshua lives in Sacramento, California with his wife and three children. He loves playing chess and rooting for Wisconsin sports teams.
Joshua is a member of the bar only in the state of California.
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