Associate Professor of Law, Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law, Arizona State University
Jonathan Green is an Associate Professor of Law at Arizona State University teaching Civil Procedure and Statutory Interpretation. His scholarship focuses on the history of political and legal thought. He is especially interested in the history of constitutionalism, theories of interpretation, and the concept of judicial power. His research has been published in the Arizona State Law Journal, the Journal of the History of Ideas, Modern Intellectual History, and the Historical Journal.
Prior to joining the ASU faculty in 2024, Professor Green was a Harry A. Bigelow Fellow at the University of Chicago. He previously clerked for Judge Neomi Rao of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, and worked as a litigation associate at DLA Piper in Philadelphia.
Professor Green holds a J.D. from Yale Law School, where he was an editor of the Yale Law Journal. He received his PhD from the University of Cambridge, where he was a joint recipient of Prince Consort & Thirwall Prize, awarded annually for the best dissertation in the Cambridge History Faculty. He also received his MPhil from Cambridge, and earned his B.A., summa cum laude, from Northwestern University.
Judge, United States Tax Court
Senior Judge.. B.A. Harvard College, 1979; J.D. University of Chicago Law School, 1983. Admitted to New York and District of Columbia Bars; U.S. Supreme Court; DC, Second, Fifth and Ninth Circuits; Southern and Eastern Districts of New York, Court of Federal Claims. Practiced in New York as an Associate, Cahill Gordon & Reindel, 1983-85; Sullivan & Cromwell, 1987-1991; served as Clerk to the Hon. Alex Kozinski, Ninth Circuit, 1985-87; and in Washington as Counsel to Commissioners, United States International Trade Commission, 1991-96; Counsel, Miller & Chevalier, 1996-2001; Deputy Assistant Attorney General, Tax Division, 2001-03. Member, American Bar Association (Litigation and Tax Sections). Appointed by President George W. Bush as Judge, United States Tax Court, on June 30, 2003.
Professor, University of Minnesota Law School
Ilan Wurman is the Julius E. Davis Professor of Law at the University of Minnesota, where he teaches administrative law and constitutional law. He previously taught at Arizona State University. He writes primarily on the Fourteenth Amendment, administrative law, separation of powers, and constitutionalism. His academic writing has appeared in the Yale Law Journal, the Stanford Law Review, the University of Chicago Law Review, the University of Pennsylvania Law Review, the Virginia Law Review, the Duke Law Journal, the Minnesota Law Review, the Notre Dame Law Review, and the Texas Law Review among other journals.
Professor Wurman is the author of a casebook, Administrative Law Theory and Fundamentals: An Integrated Approach (Foundation Press 2d ed. 2024). He is also the author of A Debt Against the Living: An Introduction to Originalism (Cambridge 2017), and The Second Founding: An Introduction to the Fourteenth Amendment (Cambridge 2020). His next book, The Constitution of 1789: A New Introduction, is also forthcoming with Cambridge University Press.
Professor Wurman practices law with the firm Tully Bailey. He has litigated a variety of administrative law and constitutional law cases, including cases involving COVID-19 restrictions, transmission lines, and Appointments Clause challenges. He also devised winning public nuisance theories to force city governments to address the increasingly challenging public camping crises throughout the country.
Clinical Professor of Law, University of Arizona, James E. Rogers College of Law
Tessa L. Dysart is the Assistant Director of Legal Writing and Associate Clinical Professor of Law at the University of Arizona, James E. Rogers College of Law. With the Hon. Leslie H. Southwick of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, she co-authored the third edition of Winning on Appeal: Better Briefs and Oral Arguments. She manages the Appellate Advocacy Blog, writes on human trafficking and constitutional law, and lectures nationally on developing effective state anti-trafficking laws.
Professor Dysart is a graduate of Willamette University and Harvard Law School. She clerked for the Hon. Dennis W. Shedd of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. Her practice experience includes working for the United States Department of Justice Office of Legal Policy and the Senate Judiciary Committee. Prior to joining the College of Law faculty she taught appellate advocacy and constitutional law courses at Regent University School of Law, where she coached award-winning moot court teams and advised the program to a national ranking.
Vice President for Legal Affairs, Goldwater Institute
Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit
Patrick J. Bumatay was confirmed as a U.S. Circuit Judge for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in December 2019. He is based in San Diego, California.
Prior to his appointment, Judge Bumatay served as an Assistant United States Attorney in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of California, where he was a member of the Appellate and Narcotics Sections. He also served as a Counselor to the Attorney General on criminal law issues, including on national opioid strategy and combating transnational organized crime. Judge Bumatay has also worked in the Office of the Deputy Attorney General, the Office of the Associate Attorney General, and the Office of Legal Policy at the U.S. Department of Justice. Judge Bumatay has twice received the Attorney General’s Distinguished Service Award.
Judge Bumatay previously worked as an associate at Morvillo, Abramowitz, Grand, Iason, and Bohrer in New York, New York. Judge Bumatay clerked for the Honorable Timothy M. Tymkovich of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit and the Honorable Sandra L. Townes of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York. Judge Bumatay earned his B.A., cum laude, from Yale University and his J.D. from Harvard Law School.
Professor of Law, Michigan State University (currently serving as FCC General Counsel)
Professor Candeub joined the MSU Law faculty in fall 2004. He is also a Fellow with MSU's Institute of Public Utilities. Prior to joining MSU, he served as an advisor at the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). From 1998 to 2000, Professor Candeub was a litigation associate for the Washington D.C. firm of Jones, Day, Reavis & Pogue and also has served as a corporate associate with Cleary, Gottlieb, Steen & Hamilton, also in Washington, D.C. Immediately following law school, he clerked for Chief Judge J. Clifford Wallace, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. While in law school, Professor Candeub was an articles editor for the University of Pennsylvania Law Review.
Professor Candeub's scholarly interests focus on the law and regulation of communications, internet, technology. His numerous law review articles and scholarly papers have placed him at the center of legal and policy controversies, and he often writes for popular outlets such as the Wall Street Journal and US News. Federal courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court, have cited and relied upon his work.
He joined the Trump administration in 2019 as Deputy Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Telecommunications and Information and assumed the role of Acting Assistant Secretary. He later joined the Department of Justice as Deputy Associate Attorney General.
Professor Candeub is a senior fellow at the D.C.-based Center of Renewing America.
Executive Director, First Amendment Clinic, Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at Arizona State University
Gregg Leslie is the executive director of the First Amendment Clinic. He was previously a staff attorney with the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, a Washington, D.C. nonprofit association that provides legal assistance to journalists, and served as the organization’s legal defense director for 17 years.
Leslie serves on the governing committee of the Communications Law Forum of the American Bar Association, and was a member of the ABA's Fair Trial and Free Press Task Force in 2011. He also served as chairman of the D.C. Bar’s Media Law Committee and Arts, Entertainment, Media & Sports Law Section, and taught media law in Georgetown University’s Master of Professional Studies in Journalism program.
Counsel, Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft LLP; Senior Competition Counsel, TechFreedom
Bilal Sayyed represents clients before the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and Department of Justice (DOJ) in significant merger, civil and criminal antitrust matters. A significant portion of his practice involves representing investment funds on antitrust and Hart-Scott-Rodino (HSR) Act compliance matters; he has also provided expert witness services related to HSR compliance. Bilal also counsels clients before the FTC in consumer protection and privacy investigations. He maintains an active amicus and appellate brief writing practice in antitrust litigation and antitrust merger matters.
Prior to joining Cadwalader, Bilal was the Director of the FTC’s Office of Policy Planning (OPP) (2018-2021). In that role, he provided legal and policy advice to the Chairman and Commissioners on antitrust and consumer protection matters and worked closely with the senior and career leadership of the FTC’s Bureaus of Competition, Consumer Protection, and Economics. Bilal previously served as an Attorney Advisor to FTC Chairman Timothy J. Muris from 2001 to 2004. In that role, Bilal advised the Chairman on matters involving a wide spectrum of industries, including chemical and mining, petroleum and natural gas, health care and pharmaceutical, defense and transportation, gaming, various consumer products and retail operations, and professional associations and standard-setting organizations.
Bilal has taught antitrust and competition law at the George Mason University School of Law since 2011.
Bilal received his B.A. from Case Western Reserve University, and a J.D. from George Mason University School of Law. He is admitted to practice in the District of Columbia and the State of New York, as well as before the U.S. District Courts for the District of Colorado and the District of Columbia, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, the Fifth Circuit, the Ninth Circuit, and the U.S. Supreme Court.
Bilal is the host of Rethinking Antitrust, a podcast published by TechFreedom that examines the economics, institutions, law, legislation, and policy goals of antitrust enforcement.
Senior Counsel, Vice President of Litigation Strategy, Alliance Defending Freedom
Jonathan Scruggs serves as senior counsel and vice president of litigation strategy with Alliance Defending Freedom. In this role, he identifies new litigation opportunities, develops new legal strategies, and improves processes across multiple litigation teams in collaboration with the chief legal counsel.
Since joining ADF in 2006, Scruggs has worked on and prevailed in a variety of cases related to Title IX, gender ideology, and people’s right to freely express their faith, including Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, 303 Creative v. Elenis, and Brush & Nib Studio v. Phoenix, which Scruggs argued at the Arizona Supreme Court. Scruggs has argued before numerous federal appellate courts and trial courts across the country and has extensive experience litigating free-speech, religious-liberty, establishment, Title IX, and equal-protection issues on behalf of students, female athletes, businesses, professionals, and non-profit entities.
Scruggs earned his B.A., summa cum laude, from Vanderbilt University in 2003 and his J.D. at Harvard Law School in 2006. He is also a 2004 Blackstone Fellow.
A member of the bars of Arizona and Tennessee, Scruggs is admitted to the U.S. Supreme Court and multiple federal district and appellate courts.
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.
Associate Professor of Law, Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law, Arizona State University
Jonathan Green is an Associate Professor of Law at Arizona State University teaching Civil Procedure and Statutory Interpretation. His scholarship focuses on the history of political and legal thought. He is especially interested in the history of constitutionalism, theories of interpretation, and the concept of judicial power. His research has been published in the Arizona State Law Journal, the Journal of the History of Ideas, Modern Intellectual History, and the Historical Journal.
Prior to joining the ASU faculty in 2024, Professor Green was a Harry A. Bigelow Fellow at the University of Chicago. He previously clerked for Judge Neomi Rao of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, and worked as a litigation associate at DLA Piper in Philadelphia.
Professor Green holds a J.D. from Yale Law School, where he was an editor of the Yale Law Journal. He received his PhD from the University of Cambridge, where he was a joint recipient of Prince Consort & Thirwall Prize, awarded annually for the best dissertation in the Cambridge History Faculty. He also received his MPhil from Cambridge, and earned his B.A., summa cum laude, from Northwestern University.
Judge, United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
Anthony Johnstone serves as a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. Judge Johnstone previously served as the Helen and David Mason Professor of Law and an affiliated Professor of Public Administration at the University of Montana, Alexander Blewett III School of Law in Missoula since 2011. As a professor he taught federal and state constitutional law and legislation, as well as a federal judicial clinic. Johnstone also has served as trial and appellate counsel in federal and state courts, including the Ninth Circuit and the Supreme Court of the United States, most recently with Johnstone PLLC. He served the Montana Department of Justice as state solicitor from 2008 to 2011 and assistant attorney general from 2004 to 2008. Johnstone entered practice as an associate at Cravath, Swaine & Moore in New York from 2000 to 2003. Born to Montanans in Minneapolis, Minnesota, Johnstone received his Bachelor of Arts from Yale University in 1995 and his Juris Doctor, with honors, from the University of Chicago Law School in 1999. Following law school, he clerked for Ninth Circuit Judge Sidney R. Thomas in Billings, Montana from 1999 to 2000.
Judge, U.S. Court of Appeals, District of Columbia Circuit
Justin R. Walker is a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. He was nominated to the court by President Donald Trump on May 4, 2020, and confirmed by the United States Senate on June 18, 2020. He is a former United States District Judge of the Western District of Kentucky.
Justice, Texas Supreme Court
Evan Young is a Justice of the Supreme Court of Texas. Governor Greg Abbott, who appointed Young to fill an unexpired term, swore him into office on November 10, 2021. Justice Young was elected to a full term in November 2022.
Young graduated summa cum laude from Duke University in 1999, where he was inducted into Phi Beta Kappa. He was a British Marshall Scholar at Oxford University, where he completed his studies in 2001 and earned a First Class Honours degree in Modern History, focusing on British constitutional history. He earned his law degree from Yale Law School in 2004.
Young then worked as a lawyer in the judicial and executive branches of the federal government. He first served as a law clerk to Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson III of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, and then to Justice Antonin Scalia at the U.S. Supreme Court. In 2006, after his clerkship with Justice Scalia ended, Justice Young became Counsel to the Attorney General at the U.S. Department of Justice, serving in the Office of the Attorney General under Attorneys General Alberto R. Gonzales and Michael B. Mukasey. While on the Attorney General’s staff, he accepted a detail to the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, Iraq, where he was the Deputy Rule of Law Coordinator. In that position he worked to assist the Iraqi government in its efforts to strengthen its legal regime, including, for example, its courts and prison system.
Young returned to Texas and joined the Austin office of Baker Botts L.L.P. in 2009. His practice focused on trial and appellate litigation. He argued cases before both the Supreme Court of the United States and the Supreme Court of Texas, as well as many federal and state appellate courts. He represented clients across the country before every level of the state and federal judiciary.
Before joining the Texas Supreme Court, Young was appointed in 2017 by Governor Abbott and confirmed by the Texas Senate to serve as a member of the Texas Judicial Council, which is the policy-making body for the Texas Judiciary. In 2015, the Texas Supreme Court appointed him to the Supreme Court Advisory Committee, which assists the Court in drafting the rules that govern litigation in Texas courts. He served on both until his elevation to the bench.
Justice Young is an elected member of the American Law Institute and a member of the Texas Philosophical Society. He has been an adjunct law professor for many years at the University of Texas School of Law, where he has frequently taught the Federal Courts and Religious Liberty courses. He also has been an adjunct professor at the University of Mississippi School of Law, where he has taught multiple courses involving U.S. Supreme Court history. He served as Chair of the State Bar of Texas Business Law Section, Chair of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children's Texas Regional Office, and Trustee of the Texas Supreme Court Historical Society.
Justice Young and his wife, Tobi, live in Austin with their daughter.
Senior Attorney, Institute for Justice
Paul Avelar is the Managing Attorney of the Institute for Justice Arizona Office. He joined the Institute in March 2010 and litigates free speech, property rights, economic liberty, school choice and other constitutional cases in federal and state courts.
As the head of IJ’s national Braiding Freedom Initiative, Paul represents natural hair braiders across the country to protect their right to earn an honest living. The Initiative uses lawsuits, activism and research to remove laws that require potential braiders to undergo hundreds of costly training hours just to braid hair. Since IJ launched the Braiding Freedom Initiative in 2014, 12 additional states have freed braiders from unnecessary licensing burdens. Paul drafted the model Natural Hair Braiding Protection Act, which has been adopted in Arkansas, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Nebraska, New Hampshire, Texas and South Dakota. He is currently representing braiders in Missouri, where state laws infringe upon their right to earn an honest living.
In his free speech work, Paul has challenged numerous laws that trample First Amendment rights. In Arizona Freedom Club PAC v. Bennett, he represented candidates and independent groups in a successful U.S. Supreme Court challenge to the “matching funds” provision of Arizona’s publicly financed elections system. He represented grassroots groups and individuals in Arizona, Mississippi and Washington, where state laws burdened their political speech by requiring them to register with the government, to navigate complex regulations and to face fines and possible criminal penalties merely because they talked about political issues. In Washington, Paul protected a lawyer’s right to defend, pro-bono, the First Amendment rights of political speakers. Through litigation and legislation, Paul leads the fight against abusive civil forfeiture laws in Arizona and elsewhere.
Paul also co-authored the most comprehensive published study of economic liberty protections in the Arizona Constitution. The Chief Justice of the Arizona Supreme Court appointed Paul to the Task Force on the Review of the Role and Governance Structure of the State Bar of Arizona, where he dissented from the majority report and called on leaders to substantially reform the Bar and state regulation of the practice of law. He often speaks at law schools across the country about constitutional issues and his work at IJ.
Prior to joining IJ-AZ, Paul worked as an attorney in Philadelphia. He clerked for Judge Roger Miner on the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, Justice Andrew Hurwitz on the Arizona Supreme Court, and Judge Daniel Barker on the Arizona Court of Appeals.
Paul graduated manga cum laude from the Arizona State University College of Law in 2004 and was elected to the Order of the Coif. He received his undergraduate degree from Princeton University in 2000.
Judge, United States District Court for the District of Arizona
United States District Judge Michael T. Liburdi began his legal career as a law clerk to the Honorable Ruth V. McGregor of the Arizona Supreme Court.
He entered private practice with the law firm of Brown & Bain P.A., which became the Phoenix office of Perkins Coie LLP. He later practiced at Snell & Wilmer L.L.P.
From 2015-2018, Judge Liburdi served as General Counsel to Arizona Governor Douglas A. Ducey. Judge Liburdi provided legal advice to the Governor, advised on appointments to the state judiciary, directed litigation involving the state agencies, and worked with Arizona’s Congressional delegation on legal policy issues.
Immediately prior to his judicial appointment, Judge Liburdi was a shareholder at the international law firm of Greenberg Traurig, LLP.
Judge Liburdi’s private sector practice included complex commercial litigation, antitrust, constitutional law, and political and election law.
Judge Liburdi has served as an adjunct professor of law at the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at Arizona State University.
Judge Liburdi earned his Juris Doctorate from the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law and a Bachelor of Science degree from Arizona State University.
President & CEO, Arizona Chamber of Commerce & Industry
Danny brings more than 16 years of experience in global public affairs and government relations, as well as handling complex legal matters in private practice and public sector service. Prior to joining the Arizona Chamber of Commerce & Industry, Danny was general counsel to the Valor Global leadership team. He focused on helping achieve growth objectives as well as providing continued public affairs guidance in AZ, WA and other States.
Danny worked at Intel, was a shareholder at Greenberg Traurig where he chaired the Phoenix office government law and policy practice. Danny served as Deputy Chief of Staff for Arizona Governor Doug Ducey from 2014 to 2018 where he assisted in the passage of landmark legislation including the Arizona Opioid Epidemic Act and K–12 education funding ballot referral.
Danny was recently named among 2020 Leaders of the Year in Public Policy by Arizona Capitol Times for his contributions in the field of law and public policy. Danny earned his Juris Doctor (cum laude) from Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at Arizona State University and Bachelor of Arts (cum laude) from Pepperdine University. Danny serves as an adjunct professor at Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at Arizona State University, is a board member of numerous community organizations. Danny is passionate about orphan care and volunteers with Orphan Outreach for orphaned and vulnerable children in Mathare, Nairobi and Bungoma, Kenya. He and his wife Ann, live in Phoenix with their three children.
Associate Professor of Law, Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law at Arizona State University
Jennifer L. Selin is an associate professor at the Arizona State University Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law. Her published and ongoing scholarship explores legal institutions and how they work. Using both legal analysis and empirical tools, she demonstrates the structure of the administrative decision-making environment has important consequences for policy implementation.
Prior to joining ASU in 2024, Professor Selin served as senior attorney advisor at the Administrative Conference of the United States. Before working in the federal executive branch, she was a professor at the Universities of Illinois and Missouri.
Selin's scholarship has been published in political science, public administration, and law journals and has been utilized by the Obama, Trump and Biden Administrations, Congress, the Supreme Court, and the media. A proud graduate of Lebanon Valley College, Selin holds a J.D. from Wake Forest University and a Ph.D. from Vanderbilt University. Before first joining academia, she practiced administrative law and specialized in federal electricity market regulation and alternative energy development, licensing and regulation.
Attorney General, Florida
James Uthmeier is the Attorney General of the State of Florida. Before this, he served as Chief of Staff to Governor Ron DeSantis. Previously, he was General Counsel to the Governor, overseeing litigation and judicial nominations. He also served as a senior advisor at the U.S. Department of Commerce. A Georgetown Law graduate, Uthmeier is an adjunct professor at Florida State University College of Law and co-teaches religious education in Tallahassee.
Director, Project on Criminal Justice, Cato Institute
Matthew Cavedon is the Director of the Cato Institute’s Project on Criminal Justice. He focuses on reforming plea-driven mass adjudication, ensuring police accountability, and defending constitutional criminal originalism. Cavedon’s scholarship has been published (or is forthcoming in) publications including the Arizona State Law Journal, Cato Supreme Court Review, Seattle University Law Review, and Georgetown Journal of Law and Public Policy. Formerly a Georgia public defender and fellow at the Institute for Justice, Cavedon has taught law school courses on criminal law and procedure, as well as the First Amendment. Cavedon clerked for a U.S. district court and the Supreme Court of Georgia. He came to Cato following a fellowship at the Emory University Center for the Study of Law and Religion.
Senior Counsel, Chair, Religious Institutions and Education Practice Groups, First Liberty Institute
Jeremy Dys, Esq., is Senior Counsel for First Liberty.
Dys earned his law degree from West Virginia University College of Law in 2005. After law school, Dys clerked for the Hon. Russell M. Clawges, Jr., chief judge of the Circuit Court of Monongalia County in Morgantown, West Virginia. For six years prior to joining First Liberty Institute, Dys led a public policy organization where he led research and advocacy efforts on matters of life, marriage, and religious freedom.
Dys graduated from Taylor University in 2001 with a Bachelor of Arts, cum laude, degree in Communication Studies, with minors in U.S. History and Philosophy. During his undergraduate career, Dys studied at the American Studies Program in Washington, D.C., where he interned with the late David Orgon Coolidge as part of the Marriage Law Project of the Ethics and Public Policy Center.
In support of his clients, Dys has made numerous appearances in local, state, and national television, print, and radio outlets. His written commentaries have been featured at the Wall Street Journal, FoxNews.com, New York Daily News, TheHill.com, Des Moines Register, Dallas Morning News, DailySignal.com, Washington Examiner, Indianapolis Star, Charleston Gazette-Mail, Outcomes Magazine, TheFederalist.com, and others.
Supreme Court & Appellate Litigation Chair, Lex Politica; Of Counsel, Alliance Defending Freedom
Erin Morrow Hawley serves as Chair of Lex Politica's Supreme Court and Appellate Practice overseeing the firm’s strategic appellate litigation and critical motions practice in the trial courts. Erin is an experienced litigator who represents clients in constitutional, regulatory, and appellate matters in federal and state courts throughout the country.
Erin has represented dozens of clients before the Supreme Court of the United States, served as lead counsel in high-profile cases raising novel constitutional and statutory issues, and authored numerous successful petitions for certiorari and briefs in opposition. She has argued in state and federal appellate and trial courts throughout the country, including the Supreme Court of the United States. Erin represents diverse clients in high-stakes litigation from state governments to faith-based nonprofits to Fortune 100 companies. She possesses expertise on a wide range of subject matters including administrative law, the First Amendment, religious liberty, federal jurisdiction, federal preemption, equitable jurisdiction, tax law, the Affordable Care Act, and Title IX.
Erin represents clients in cases where public communications strategy is paramount. She is a sought-after speaker and writer, has testified multiple times before Congress, and is a frequent presenter on constitutional and administrative law issues, including at the Oxford Union, the National Federalist Society Convention, and university campuses across the country. She is a frequent commentator to media outlets, including Fox News, MSNBC, the Wall Street Journal, WORLD, USA Today, the Federalist, and the Hill.
Erin previously oversaw Alliance Defending Freedom’s--where she still serves as Of Counsel--litigation strategies to empower women and protect the dignity of life, defend pregnancy centers’ First Amendment rights from government overreach, and safeguard Americans’ freedoms from the ever-encroaching administrative state.
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.
Director, Project on Criminal Justice, Cato Institute
Matthew Cavedon is the Director of the Cato Institute’s Project on Criminal Justice. He focuses on reforming plea-driven mass adjudication, ensuring police accountability, and defending constitutional criminal originalism. Cavedon’s scholarship has been published (or is forthcoming in) publications including the Arizona State Law Journal, Cato Supreme Court Review, Seattle University Law Review, and Georgetown Journal of Law and Public Policy. Formerly a Georgia public defender and fellow at the Institute for Justice, Cavedon has taught law school courses on criminal law and procedure, as well as the First Amendment. Cavedon clerked for a U.S. district court and the Supreme Court of Georgia. He came to Cato following a fellowship at the Emory University Center for the Study of Law and Religion.
Senior Counsel, Chair, Religious Institutions and Education Practice Groups, First Liberty Institute
Jeremy Dys, Esq., is Senior Counsel for First Liberty.
Dys earned his law degree from West Virginia University College of Law in 2005. After law school, Dys clerked for the Hon. Russell M. Clawges, Jr., chief judge of the Circuit Court of Monongalia County in Morgantown, West Virginia. For six years prior to joining First Liberty Institute, Dys led a public policy organization where he led research and advocacy efforts on matters of life, marriage, and religious freedom.
Dys graduated from Taylor University in 2001 with a Bachelor of Arts, cum laude, degree in Communication Studies, with minors in U.S. History and Philosophy. During his undergraduate career, Dys studied at the American Studies Program in Washington, D.C., where he interned with the late David Orgon Coolidge as part of the Marriage Law Project of the Ethics and Public Policy Center.
In support of his clients, Dys has made numerous appearances in local, state, and national television, print, and radio outlets. His written commentaries have been featured at the Wall Street Journal, FoxNews.com, New York Daily News, TheHill.com, Des Moines Register, Dallas Morning News, DailySignal.com, Washington Examiner, Indianapolis Star, Charleston Gazette-Mail, Outcomes Magazine, TheFederalist.com, and others.
Supreme Court & Appellate Litigation Chair, Lex Politica; Of Counsel, Alliance Defending Freedom
Erin Morrow Hawley serves as Chair of Lex Politica's Supreme Court and Appellate Practice overseeing the firm’s strategic appellate litigation and critical motions practice in the trial courts. Erin is an experienced litigator who represents clients in constitutional, regulatory, and appellate matters in federal and state courts throughout the country.
Erin has represented dozens of clients before the Supreme Court of the United States, served as lead counsel in high-profile cases raising novel constitutional and statutory issues, and authored numerous successful petitions for certiorari and briefs in opposition. She has argued in state and federal appellate and trial courts throughout the country, including the Supreme Court of the United States. Erin represents diverse clients in high-stakes litigation from state governments to faith-based nonprofits to Fortune 100 companies. She possesses expertise on a wide range of subject matters including administrative law, the First Amendment, religious liberty, federal jurisdiction, federal preemption, equitable jurisdiction, tax law, the Affordable Care Act, and Title IX.
Erin represents clients in cases where public communications strategy is paramount. She is a sought-after speaker and writer, has testified multiple times before Congress, and is a frequent presenter on constitutional and administrative law issues, including at the Oxford Union, the National Federalist Society Convention, and university campuses across the country. She is a frequent commentator to media outlets, including Fox News, MSNBC, the Wall Street Journal, WORLD, USA Today, the Federalist, and the Hill.
Erin previously oversaw Alliance Defending Freedom’s--where she still serves as Of Counsel--litigation strategies to empower women and protect the dignity of life, defend pregnancy centers’ First Amendment rights from government overreach, and safeguard Americans’ freedoms from the ever-encroaching administrative state.
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.
General Counsel and Chief Compliance Officer, Arete Advisors, LLC
Partner, DeMarco Law, PLLC
Joseph V. DeMarco is a partner at DeMarco Law, PLLC where he focuses on counseling clients on complex issues involving information privacy and security, theft of intellectual property, computer intrusions, on-line fraud, and the lawful use of new technology. His years of experience in private practice and in government handling the most difficult cybercrime investigations handled by the United States Attorney’s Office have made him one of the nation’s most sought-after lawyers on Internet crime and the law relating to emerging technologies. In addition to his counsel practice, Mr. DeMarco serves as an Arbitrator, resolving complex commercial and high-technology disputes between businesses. He is on the National Panel of Neutrals of the American Arbitration Association (AAA) and Federal Arbitration, Inc. (FedArb).
From 1997 to 2007, Mr. DeMarco served an Assistant United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, where he founded and headed the Computer Hacking and Intellectual Property (CHIPs) Program, a group of five prosecutors dedicated to investigating and prosecuting violations of federal cybercrime laws and intellectual property offenses. Under his leadership, CHIPs prosecutions grew from a trickle in 1997 to a top priority of the United States Attorney’s Office, encompassing all forms of criminal activity affecting e-commerce and critical infrastructures including computer hacking crimes; transmission of Internet worms and viruses; electronic theft of trade secrets; illegal use of “spyware”; web-based frauds; unlawful Internet gambling; and criminal copyright and trademark infringement offenses. As a recognized thought leader in the field, Mr. DeMarco was frequently asked to counsel prosecutors and law enforcement agents regarding novel investigative and surveillance techniques and methodologies, and regularly provided advice to the United States Attorney concerning the Office’s most sensitive computer-related investigations. In 2001, Mr. DeMarco also served as a visiting Trial Attorney at the Department of Justice Computer Crimes and Intellectual Property Section in Washington, D.C., where he focused his work on Internet privacy, gaming, and theft of intellectual property.
Since 2002, Mr. DeMarco has served as an Adjunct Professor at Columbia Law School, where he teaches the upper-class Internet and Computer Crimes seminar. He has been invited to speak throughout the world on cybercrime, e-commerce, and IP enforcement. He has lectured on the subject of cybercrime at Harvard Law School, the Practicing Law Institute, the National Advocacy Center, and at the FBI Academy in Quantico, Virginia, and has served as an instructor on cybercrime to judges attending the New York State Judicial Institute.
Prior to joining the United States Attorney’s Office, Mr. DeMarco was a litigation associate at Cravath, Swaine & Moore in New York City, where he concentrated his work on intellectual property, antitrust, and securities law issues for various high-technology clients. Prior to that, Mr. DeMarco served as law clerk to the Honorable J. Daniel Mahoney, United States Circuit Judge for the Second Circuit Court of Appeals.
Mr. DeMarco holds a J.D. magna cum laude from New York University School of Law. At NYU he was a member of the NYU Law Review. He received his B.S.F.S. summa cum laude from the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University.
Executive Vice President & Head of Litigation, Thomas More Society
Peter Breen serves as Executive Vice President and Head of Litigation at Thomas More Society, leading the firm's litigation team in federal and state courts across the country. Before joining TMS, he left private practice in Chicago to pursue full-time public service. Peter also served two terms in the Illinois House of Representatives, rising to Republican Floor Leader. He holds a B.E. in Electrical Engineering from Vanderbilt University and a J.D. from the University of Notre Dame Law School. He and his wife Margie have two sons.
Senior Counsel and VP, Appellate Advocacy, Alliance Defending Freedom
John Bursch is senior counsel and vice president of appellate advocacy with Alliance Defending Freedom. Bursch has argued 12 U.S. Supreme Court cases and more than 30 state supreme court cases since 2011, and a recent study concluded that among all frequent Supreme Court advocates who did not work for the federal government, he had the 3rd highest success rate for persuading justices to adopt his legal position.
Bursch served as solicitor general for the state of Michigan from 2011-2013. He has argued multiple Michigan Supreme Court cases in eight of the last ten terms and has successfully litigated hundreds of matters nationwide, including six with at least $1 billion at stake. As part of his private firm, Bursch Law PLLC, he has represented Fortune 500 companies, foreign and domestic governments, top public officials, and industry associations in high-profile cases, primarily on appeal. He was inducted into the American Academy of Appellate Lawyers and serves as a member of the American Law Institute. His work has resulted in repeated listings in Michigan Super Lawyers and Best Lawyers.
Before entering private practice, Bursch served as a law clerk to the Honorable James B. Loken on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit. He received his J.D. magna cum laude in 1997 from the University of Minnesota Law School, where he served as Chief Note & Comment Editor for the Minnesota Law Review. Prior to that, he attended Western Michigan University, where he received degrees in mathematics and music performance summa cum laude.
Vice President & Senior Legal Fellow, Defending Education
Sarah Parshall Perry is vice president and senior legal fellow at Defending Education.
Before coming to Defending Education, Sarah served as a Senior Legal Fellow for the Edwin Meese III Center for Legal and Judicial Studies, part of the Institute for Constitutional Government at Heritage, where her work centered on civil rights and the proper role of the courts.
Sarah joined Heritage after serving as Senior Counsel to the Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights at the U.S. Department of Education where she focused on policy reform, technical guidance, and the Office for Civil Rights’ (OCR) annual report to Congress. While at OCR, she was appointed by the Acting Assistant Secretary to co-chair the Employment Engagement, Diversity, & Inclusion Council and, in coordination with the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Enforcement oversee the hiring of dozens of attorneys for OCR’s 12 regional offices nationwide. Prior to her tenure at the Department of Education, she spent six years at the Family Research Council in Washington, D.C. where she was Senior Fellow for Education Reform and later, became the regular substitute host for the “Washington Watch” radio show. Her work at the Family Research Council also included the building and oversight of multiple policy coalitions geared toward the fight against antisemitism in academia, curbing tech censorship, and protecting religious liberty.
Before joining FRC, Sarah was in-house counsel and director of development for a Baltimore advertising agency, providing management of all new business transactions from pitch to contract execution for the multi-million-dollar enterprise. She began her practice at the litigation firm of Simms Showers, LLP where her work included Title VII employment discrimination, maritime/admiralty, and False Claims Act (“Qui Tam”) law. Sarah has a law degree from the University of Virginia School of Law, where she was an editor of the Virginia Journal of International Law, a recipient of the American Jurisprudence award, a Phi Delta Phi honor society member, and a student practitioner in the appellate litigation clinic where she argued before the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals. She holds a B.S. in Journalism with honors from Liberty University.
Her commentary and analysis have appeared in media outlets across the country, including the AP, BBC, Fox News, NPR, The Hill, Washington Post, Washington Times, and the New York Times. She is the mother of three children, and the author of just as many books on the trials and triumphs of parenting children on the autism spectrum. Sarah is a member of the Kirkpatrick Society at the American Enterprise Institute, and makes her home north of Baltimore, Maryland.
Vice President and Senior Counsel, The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty
Eric Rassbach is Vice President and Senior Counsel at the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, where he has served since 2003. He has briefed over 90 cases at the United States Supreme Court and has led or been a part of Becket litigation teams in each of Becket’s pathbreaking victories there, including Hosanna-Tabor, Hobby Lobby, Holt v. Hobbs, Zubik v. Burwell, Agudath Israel of America v. Cuomo, and Fulton v. Philadelphia. In 2020, Eric argued Our Lady of Guadalupe School v. Morrissey-Berru to the Supreme Court, garnering a 7-2 win for his Catholic school clients. Eric has also briefed and argued cases in federal appeals courts and state supreme courts across the nation. Eric has also represented clients in appeals to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, France and in the highest courts of several other countries.
Eric believes passionately in the right of all people to the full measure of religious liberty and has represented members of almost every religious group present in the United States, including Buddhists, Christians, Hindus, Jains, Jews, Muslims, Native Americans, Santeros, and Sikhs, as well as many governmental entities targeted for accommodating religion.
Eric frequently comments on church-state issues in the media, including the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, and other major press outlets. He has published legal scholarship in the Harvard Law Review Forum, the Tennessee Law Review, the Illinois Law Review, the Cato Supreme Court Review, and other legal journals, and often speaks to law school audiences.
Before joining Becket, Eric worked at Baker Botts LLP in Houston, where he worked in international project finance. He also served as a law clerk to United States District Court Judge Lee Rosenthal in Houston, Texas.
Eric graduated from Haverford College with a degree in Comparative Literature, is a member of Fitzwilliam College, University of Cambridge, and is a graduate of Harvard Law School. Eric was a 2012-2013 Wasserstein Public Interest Fellow at Harvard Law School. He is Visiting Professor and Executive Director of The Hugh and Hazel Darling Foundation Religious Liberty Clinic at Pepperdine University Caruso School of Law in Malibu, where he leads students in litigating cases in American courts. He is also an Associated Scholar with the Centre for Religious Freedom at Jagiellonian University in Kraków, Poland. Eric is admitted in Texas, DC, California, and Ireland.
E.I. White Chair and Distinguished Professor of Law and Kauffman Professor of Entrepreneurship and Innovation, Syracuse University College of Law
Professor Robin Paul Malloy is the E.I. White Chair and Distinguished Professor of Law, and the Kauffman Professor of Entrepreneurship and Innovation. He is a leading expert on property, real estate transactions, land use law and zoning, and on law, markets, and marketization. He has pioneered work on land use and disability law. He is also recognized as a leading legal scholar on the jurisprudence of Adam Smith. Several of his works on market theory and law are translated into Chinese, Spanish, and Japanese. Professor Malloy has published twenty books (four with Cambridge University Press) and over 30 scholarly articles, in addition to numerous book chapters and essays. His latest book is titled Law and the Invisible Hand; A Theory of Adam Smith’s Jurisprudence (Cambridge 2021). He is a series editor on collections for Cambridge University Press, Routledge, and Edward Elgar. Malloy’s casebook on Real Estate Transactions (with Smith, now in its 6th edition) is the leading book on the subject and is used at law schools across the country. His casebook on Land Use Law and Zoning is now in its second edition (with Malagrino). Malloy has been the Sun Life Research Fellow at Oxford University, U.K.; the Dickenson Dees Fellow at University of Durham, U.K.; and for three consecutive summers served as a teaching fellow in China (Beijing and Shanghai) with the Committee on Legal Education Exchange with China. He currently serves on the International Advisory Board for the Law and Economics Program at St. Gallens University, Switzerland, and is a member of the Turin School of Local Regulation, Turin, Italy.
Malloy is the founding president of the Association for Law, Property, and Society. He currently serves on the Board of the Veterans Health Research Institute of CNY. He served on the Board of the National Italian American Bar Association for 20 years and was Vice Chair of the Zoning Board of Appeal for the Town of DeWitt, NY for 10 years. He has also served on numerous committees of the Association of American Law Schools.
Professor of Economics, Trinity University
I am an enthusiastic teacher, and I bring my passion for learning in the classroom. In my research, I work in the history of economic thought, specializing in the 18th century. My focus is on Adam Smith, David Hume, monetary theories, and the Scottish Enlightenment.
I analyze how self-interest interacts with other motivational drives, with systematic biases, and with the surrounding institutional environment. I also explore the links between the Scottish Enlightenment and the results from behavioral economics, evolutionary biology, and neuroeconomics.
I regularly publish in History of Political Economy (HOPE), The Journal of the History of Economic Thought (JHET), and History of Economic Ideas (HEI). I wrote the Routledge Guidebook of Smith's Wealth of Nations (2020).
The European Society for the History of Economic Thought awarded my HOPE 2008 "The Adam Smith Problem in Reverse: Self-Interest in Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations, and Theory of Moral Sentiments" the prize of Best Article of Year (2009). I was the book review editor for the Journal of the History of Economic Thought, the vice-president of the History of Economics Society, and i am the current president of the International Adam Smith Society and the current president of the History of Economics Society.
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.
Professor Emeritus, George Mason University
Vernon L. Smith, often called the "father of experimental economics", is a leading scholar celebrated for transforming economics into an experimental science. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences in 2002 for his pioneering work in using laboratory experiments to test economic theories, particularly regarding market mechanisms and price formation.
Smith served as Professor of Economics and Law from 2001 to 2008 at George Mason University. He founded the Interdisciplinary Center for Economic Science (ICES) at Mason, and served as a fellow of the Mercatus Center. He remains a Professor Emeritus at Mason, where a building on the Arlington campus is named in his honor.
Currently, Smith is a professor at Chapman University within the Argyros School of Business and Economics and the Fowler School of Law. At Chapman, he established the Economic Science Institute, a research center dedicated to the continued study of experimental methods in economics and across other disciplines.
An alum of Caltech (B.S.), the University of Kansas (M.A.), and Harvard University (Ph.D.), Smith has held previous appointments at universities including Purdue, Brown, and the University of Arizona.
Formalism and the Fate of the Republic—Defending the Judiciary from Itself
Jonathan Green, Mark V. Holmes, Ilan Wurman
2026 National Student Symposium
Featuring: Prof. Jonathan A. Green, Associate Professor of Law, Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law Prof....
The Federalist’s Quill: A Mighty Tool—But Only If You Know How to Use It! A Mini-Session on Legal Writing
Tessa Dysart, Timothy Sandefur
2026 National Student Symposium
Featuring: Prof. Tessa L. Dysart, Assistant Director of Legal Writing and Clinical Professor of Law, James...
Panel III: When Free Speech and Free Markets Intersect
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2026 National Student Symposium
Featuring: Prof. Adam Candeub, Professor of Law, Michigan State University (currently serving as FCC General Counsel)...
Panel II: Federalism and Subsidiarity: Decentralizing Decisions and Balancing Power from Nation to Neighborhood
Clint Bolick, Jonathan Green, Anthony Johnstone, Justin Reed Walker, Evan A. Young
2026 National Student Symposium
Featuring: Hon. Clint Bolick, Justice, Arizona Supreme Court Hon. Anthony Johnstone, United States Court of Appeals...
Panel I: Laboratories of Liberty: State Deregulation and Economic Freedom
Paul Avelar, Michael T. Liburdi, Danny B. Seiden, Jennifer Selin, James William Uthmeier
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FACE Act
Matthew P. Cavedon, Jeremy G. Dys, Erin M. Hawley, Casey Mattox
Friend or Foe?
Is the FACE Act being enforced as Congress originally intended or has its selected application...
FACE Act
Matthew P. Cavedon, Jeremy G. Dys, Erin M. Hawley, Casey Mattox
Friend or Foe?
Is the FACE Act being enforced as Congress originally intended or has its selected application...
Cybercrime and AI: Emerging Dangers and Opportunities
Mark Cluse, Joseph V. DeMarco
Presented by the In-House Counsel Networkand DeMarco Law, PLLC Few topics dominate the news...
Are Secret Gender Transition Policies Unconstitutional? Mirabelli v. Bonta and the New Frontier in Parental Rights
Peter Breen, John J. Bursch, Sarah Parshall Perry, Eric Rassbach
Parental rights advocates celebrate the recent victory in Mirabelli v. Bonta, where the Supreme Court granted...
Why Adam Smith Still Matters: 250 Years of The Wealth of Nations
Robin P. Malloy, Maria P. Paganelli, Dean Reuter, Vernon L. Smith
Published in the same pivotal year as the Declaration of Independence, An Inquiry into the...