Professor of Law, University of Cincinnati College of Law
Professor Stephanie Hunter McMahon has taught courses in tax law and legal history at the University of Cincinnati College of Law since 2008, and while doing so has won two of the law school’s teaching awards, its faculty excellence award, and its award for scholarship.
To date, much of her scholarship explores the relationship between taxation and the public’s perception of taxation with respect to families and the application of administrative law to tax. Her interest in the development of tax policy led her to write Principles of Tax Policy for West’s Concise Hornbook Series. In the last two years, she has begun scholarship focusing on the tax treatment of disadvantaged groups, both women seeking abortions in states that do not provide access to care and the discriminatory tax treatment of inmate labor.
Her writings have been published in peer-reviewed journals, The Tax Lawyer (ABA journal), Florida Tax Review, and the Virginia Tax Review, as well as student-reviewed journals, such as Northwestern Law Review, Washington Law Review, and Michigan State Law Review. Professor McMahon received her J.D. from Harvard Law School and PhD in American history from the University of Virginia. Following law school, Professor McMahon practiced in the New York offices of Cravath, Swaine & Moore and Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom.
Partner, Jones Day
Ray Wiacek is one of the world’s leading international tax lawyers. He represents multinational corporations on cross-border financings, international acquisitions and reorganizations, and transfer pricing. He is particularly skilled at global planning involving intellectual property. Ray also defends his advice, favorably resolving tax disputes ranging from the proper pricing of foreign autos to the effectiveness of an agreement to share R&D costs worldwide. He is currently challenging the IRS’ anti-inversion regulations in court.
Ray negotiated and closed billions of dollars of cross-border financings for Bank of America against many of the leading banks in Europe. He led the worldwide team integrating Warner-Lambert and Pharmacia with Pfizer after Pfizer’s overhaul of those companies. This included the disposition of nonstrategic assets, such as Schick and Wilkinson Sword to Energizer and Chiclets and Dentyne to Cadbury. Ray also led the team that implemented a worldwide business and tax plan for Halliburton.
In addition to Bank of America, Pfizer, and Halliburton, representative clients have included Bridgestone/Firestone, Celgene, Dow Corning, H.J. Heinz, Isuzu Motors, JP Morgan, Transworld Oil, and United Coal.
Ray has testified many times on international tax matters before Congress and the Internal Revenue Service. He has been listed every year in the Chambers guide to best lawyers, with clients describing him as “pragmatic and deal oriented,” “an excellent negotiator,” with “superb technical skills and analytic ability.”
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.
Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General, Office of Legal Policy, United States Department of Justice
GianCarlo Canaparo serves as the Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the Office of Legal Policy at the Department of Justice. He oversees the Office's regulatory work, assists the White House in the process of selecting nominees for federal judgeships and advises Department leadership on policy and legal matters.
Before joining the Department, Canaparo was a senior legal fellow at The Heritage Foundation’s Edwin Meese III Center for Legal and Judicial Studies where he researched constitutional law, administrative law, and civil rights.
Canaparo’s scholarship has appeared in various law reviews and periodicals. His research has been cited by Justice Neil Gorsuch and featured in the Wall Street Journal and Washington Post.
Canaparo co-hosted The Heritage Foundation’s SCOTUS 101 podcast, which followed the Supreme Court’s arguments and opinions and featured interviews with judges, advocates, and scholars.
After graduating Georgetown law, Canaparo spent three years at the law firm of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom and two years as a federal law clerk. He earned his bachelor’s degree in economics from the University of California at Davis.
Canaparo is a classical pianist.
Counsel, Liberty Justice Center
Reilly Stephens is Counsel at Liberty Justice Center, a national nonprofit public-interest litigation firm that brings cases around the country to protect economic liberty, educational freedom, property rights, free speech, and other fundamental rights..
Prior to joining LJC, Reilly was a legal associate in the Cato Institute’s Center for Constitutional Studies. During law school, he served as a law clerk at the Institute for Justice and for the Competitive Enterprise Institute’s Center for Class Action Fairness.
A native of Baltimore, Reilly holds a J.D. from the Georgetown University Law Center, where he served as Senior Articles Editor of the Georgetown Journal of Law & Public Policy, and an M.A. in International Relations from the University of St. Andrews, Scotland.
Managing Partner, Boyden Gray PLLC
Michael Buschbacher is the managing partner of Boyden Gray PLLC. He represents public and private companies, trade associations, non-profits, and individuals in high-stakes litigation and administrative proceedings, with a particular focus on environmental and energy matters.
In addition to trial-level work, Mr. Buschbacher maintains an active appellate practice, both as merits counsel and as counsel for amici curiae. He has written amicus briefs quoted by the Seventh and Ninth Circuits. And his Supreme Court advocacy has been cited by The New Yorker, The New York Times, and E&E News. Mr. Buschbacher’s commentary on legal issues has been published in The Wall Street Journal, Newsweek, and The American Conservative.
Before joining the firm, Mr. Buschbacher served at the U.S. Department of Justice as counsel to the Assistant Attorney General for the Environment and Natural Resources Division. There, he advised senior Department leadership, served as the lead attorney on several lawsuits, and helped draft policy memoranda for the Department on the proper scope and procedure for environmental enforcement. Prior to serving in the government, Mr. Buschbacher was an associate in the D.C. office of Sidley Austin.
Mr. Buschbacher is a former clerk to Judge Alice M. Batchelder of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit and to Magistrate Judge Paul R. Cherry of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Indiana.
Mr. Buschbacher holds a B.A. in Music and Germanic Studies from Indiana University and a J.D., magna cum laude, from Notre Dame Law School.
2L, Notre Dame Law School
Managing Partner and Co-Founder, EducationCounsel
With extensive background in providing legal, policy, strategic planning, and advocacy services to educators throughout the country, Mr. Coleman focuses principally on issues of access, diversity, inclusion, and institutional quality in post-secondary education.
Mr. Coleman is a 1984 honors graduate of Duke University School of Law and a 1981 Phi Beta Kappa graduate of the University of Virginia. Mr. Coleman served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights from June 1997 until January 2000, following his tenure as Senior Policy Advisor to the Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights. He has testified before the U.S. Senate and the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights; he has served as an adjunct professor at two law schools and at two graduate schools of education. He currently teaches at the USC Rossier School of Education.
He is a current member of GLSEN’s Board of Directors; a Board member of the National Council for State Authorization Reciprocity (NC-SARA); and a Board member of the Lab School of Washington, which serves students with learning differences. He is a past Chairperson of the Board of Directors for the Institute for Higher Education Policy. Mr. Coleman leads the legal and policy work of the College Board's Access and Diversity Collaborative that he helped establish in 2004, and has been a principal author of numerous amicus briefs filed in federal courts on issues associated with the educational benefits of student diversity and the consideration of race in admissions, as well as the rights of transgender students to a non-discriminatory school environments.
State District Judge, Austin, Texas
Cory Liu is a state district judge in Austin, Texas. He previously served as assistant general counsel to Texas Governor Greg Abbott. Mr. Liu clerked for Judge Andrew Oldham on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and Judge Danny Boggs on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. He was Editor-in-Chief of the Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy and is a graduate of Harvard Law School and the University of Chicago.
Founder, Chairman, and CEO, Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law
Hon. Kenneth L. Marcus is an internationally recognized expert in civil and human rights, as well as a leader in the fight against anti-Semitism on and off university campuses. He is the Founder, Chairman, and CEO of The Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law, the leading civil rights legal organization fighting against anti-Semitism. The New York Times has called him “The Man Who Helped Redefine Campus Anti-Semitism.” He been described, in that paper, as “the single most effective and respected force” to combat anti-Semitism.
During his public service career, Marcus served as Assistant U.S. Secretary of Education for Civil Rights; Staff Director at the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights; and General Deputy Assistant U.S. Secretary of Housing and Urban Development for Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity.
In academia, he serves as Professorial Lecturer in Law at George Washington University. He formerly held the Lillie and Nathan Ackerman Chair in Equality and Justice in America at the City University of New York’s Bernard M. Baruch College, served as Visiting Research Professor of Political Science at Yeshiva University, and was a Board of Visitors member George Mason University and Distinguished Senior Fellow at that university’s law school. He is a member of the editorial board of the Journal of Contemporary Antisemitism and previously served as Associate Editor of the Journal for the Study of Anti-Semitism.
Marcus is also author of The Definition of Anti-Semitism (Oxford University Press) and Jewish Identity and Civil Rights in America (Cambridge University Press). He has published widely in academic journals as well as in more popular venues such as The Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Newsweek, USA Today, and Politico. He is a graduate of Williams College and the University of California at Berkeley School of Law.
Earlier in his career, he was a litigation partner in two major law firms, where he conducted complex commercial and constitutional litigation. He also serves as Chairman emeritus of the Executive Committee of the Federalist Society for Law & Public Policy Civil Rights Practice Group.
General Counsel, Mountain States Legal Foundation
William E. Trachman is General Counsel for Mountain States Legal Foundation, where he protects the rights of individuals to live freely and securely under the U.S. Constitution. Previously, he was appointed to serve in the Department of Education as Deputy Assistant Secretary in the Office for Civil Rights. Prior to his appointment, he served as General Counsel to the Douglas County School District, where he helped litigate the fight for school choice in the school district. Presently, Mr. Trachman serves as Chair of the Colorado Federalist Society and the Vice Chair of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights’ Colorado Advisory Board. He previously taught as an Adjunct Professor at the University of Denver, Sturm College of Law. He attended U.C. Berkeley for both undergraduate and law school, and then clerked for the Honorable Harris Hartz on the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals. Mr. Trachman is licensed in Colorado, California, and Washington, D.C.
Managing Partner and Co-Founder, EducationCounsel
With extensive background in providing legal, policy, strategic planning, and advocacy services to educators throughout the country, Mr. Coleman focuses principally on issues of access, diversity, inclusion, and institutional quality in post-secondary education.
Mr. Coleman is a 1984 honors graduate of Duke University School of Law and a 1981 Phi Beta Kappa graduate of the University of Virginia. Mr. Coleman served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights from June 1997 until January 2000, following his tenure as Senior Policy Advisor to the Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights. He has testified before the U.S. Senate and the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights; he has served as an adjunct professor at two law schools and at two graduate schools of education. He currently teaches at the USC Rossier School of Education.
He is a current member of GLSEN’s Board of Directors; a Board member of the National Council for State Authorization Reciprocity (NC-SARA); and a Board member of the Lab School of Washington, which serves students with learning differences. He is a past Chairperson of the Board of Directors for the Institute for Higher Education Policy. Mr. Coleman leads the legal and policy work of the College Board's Access and Diversity Collaborative that he helped establish in 2004, and has been a principal author of numerous amicus briefs filed in federal courts on issues associated with the educational benefits of student diversity and the consideration of race in admissions, as well as the rights of transgender students to a non-discriminatory school environments.
State District Judge, Austin, Texas
Cory Liu is a state district judge in Austin, Texas. He previously served as assistant general counsel to Texas Governor Greg Abbott. Mr. Liu clerked for Judge Andrew Oldham on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and Judge Danny Boggs on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. He was Editor-in-Chief of the Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy and is a graduate of Harvard Law School and the University of Chicago.
Founder, Chairman, and CEO, Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law
Hon. Kenneth L. Marcus is an internationally recognized expert in civil and human rights, as well as a leader in the fight against anti-Semitism on and off university campuses. He is the Founder, Chairman, and CEO of The Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law, the leading civil rights legal organization fighting against anti-Semitism. The New York Times has called him “The Man Who Helped Redefine Campus Anti-Semitism.” He been described, in that paper, as “the single most effective and respected force” to combat anti-Semitism.
During his public service career, Marcus served as Assistant U.S. Secretary of Education for Civil Rights; Staff Director at the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights; and General Deputy Assistant U.S. Secretary of Housing and Urban Development for Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity.
In academia, he serves as Professorial Lecturer in Law at George Washington University. He formerly held the Lillie and Nathan Ackerman Chair in Equality and Justice in America at the City University of New York’s Bernard M. Baruch College, served as Visiting Research Professor of Political Science at Yeshiva University, and was a Board of Visitors member George Mason University and Distinguished Senior Fellow at that university’s law school. He is a member of the editorial board of the Journal of Contemporary Antisemitism and previously served as Associate Editor of the Journal for the Study of Anti-Semitism.
Marcus is also author of The Definition of Anti-Semitism (Oxford University Press) and Jewish Identity and Civil Rights in America (Cambridge University Press). He has published widely in academic journals as well as in more popular venues such as The Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Newsweek, USA Today, and Politico. He is a graduate of Williams College and the University of California at Berkeley School of Law.
Earlier in his career, he was a litigation partner in two major law firms, where he conducted complex commercial and constitutional litigation. He also serves as Chairman emeritus of the Executive Committee of the Federalist Society for Law & Public Policy Civil Rights Practice Group.
General Counsel, Mountain States Legal Foundation
William E. Trachman is General Counsel for Mountain States Legal Foundation, where he protects the rights of individuals to live freely and securely under the U.S. Constitution. Previously, he was appointed to serve in the Department of Education as Deputy Assistant Secretary in the Office for Civil Rights. Prior to his appointment, he served as General Counsel to the Douglas County School District, where he helped litigate the fight for school choice in the school district. Presently, Mr. Trachman serves as Chair of the Colorado Federalist Society and the Vice Chair of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights’ Colorado Advisory Board. He previously taught as an Adjunct Professor at the University of Denver, Sturm College of Law. He attended U.C. Berkeley for both undergraduate and law school, and then clerked for the Honorable Harris Hartz on the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals. Mr. Trachman is licensed in Colorado, California, and Washington, D.C.
U.S. Attorney, Middle District of Tennessee, U.S. Department of Justice
Braden Boucek was sworn in on December 24, 2025, as the United States Attorney for the Middle District of Tennessee. Prior to becoming United States Attorney, Mr. Boucek served as the senior vice president of litigation at the Southeastern Legal Foundation having previously served as the vice president of legal affairs at the Beacon Center. Mr. Boucek has extensive experience as a prosecutor, starting his career at the Tennessee Attorney General’s Office before serving for two years as an Assistant District Attorney General in Williamson County. He was a federal prosecutor for ten years, first serving as an Assistant United States Attorney in the Western District of Tennessee from 2005 to 2011. From 2011 to 2015, Mr. Boucek was an Assistant United States Attorney in the Middle District of Tennessee, the district he now leads as the United States Attorney.
Professor, Cleveland State University College of Law
Professor Christa Laser comes to Cleveland Marshall after nearly a decade of practice experience as an intellectual property litigator at the law firms WilmerHale and Kirkland & Ellis LLP. She has deep expertise in patents, trademarks, copyrights, false advertising, pharmaceutical litigation and regulation, and technology law. She has represented leading life sciences and technology companies in all stages of trial and appellate matters and consulted on legislative changes to intellectual property laws.
Professor Laser's research focuses on intellectual property and innovation. Her patent law scholarship has been cited by numerous scholars, by judges of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, and in briefs to the U.S. Supreme Court. Her research envisions an intellectual property system that supports innovation, investment, and competition across all technology areas.
Professor Laser was the World Champion of the Lachs Space Law Moot Court Competition. Prior to law school, she worked as a scientific researcher, where her work studying protein dynamics of photosynthesis using genetically modified bacteria and laser spectroscopy was published in the prestigious journal Science.
Senior Associate, Intellectual Property Litigation, WilmerHale; Associate, Kirkland & Ellis LLP; judicial intern for Chief Judge Randall R. Rader, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, and Judge Roger W. Titus, U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland; Scientific Researcher, The BioDesign Institute at Arizona State University, Department of BioOptical Nanotechnology.
J.D., The George Washington University Law School (World Champion, International & North American Lachs Space Law Moot Court Competition; Research Assistant, Professor Lawrence Cunningham; Notes Editor, American Intellectual Property Law Association Quarterly Journal); B.S., Arizona State University, Barrett Honors College (Beckman Scholar; Biochemistry Award).
Associate Attorney, Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP
Laura Stanley is an associate in the Washington, D.C. office of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher. She practices in the firm’s Litigation Department and is a member of the Environmental Litigation and Mass Tort Practice Group. Laura previously served as an economist at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency where she developed regulations under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act and the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act.
Laura graduated with high honors from The George Washington University Law School and was awarded Order of the Coif. Laura served as an Articles Editor of the George Washington Law Review, and she was awarded the ABA Gellhorn-Sargentich Award for the best student essay in administrative law. Laura received a Master of Arts degree in Economics from George Mason University and a Bachelor of Arts degree in Economics from James Madison University.
She previously served as a law clerk to the Honorable Ryan D. Nelson of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and the Honorable Stephen S. Schwartz of the United States Court of Federal Claims.
She is admitted to practice law in the District of Columbia and before the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.
Senior Legal Fellow, Advancing American Freedom
Amy Swearer is a leading national expert on a wide range of public policy, legal, and constitutional issues, including the Second Amendment, criminal justice, and mental health policy. She has long been a respected conservative voice on gun policy and is routinely asked to testify before state and federal legislative bodies. Her work on birthright citizenship, meanwhile, has been featured extensively in litigation over the meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment’s Citizenship Clause.
Swearer was formerly a Senior Legal Fellow in the Edwin Meese III Center for Legal & Judicial Studies at the Heritage Foundation. At Heritage, she ran the Defensive Gun Use Database and was the primary author of the e-book “The Essential Second Amendment.” She was also a driving force behind the organization’s School Safety Initiative.
She was the 2022 recipient of the Heritage Foundation’s Joseph Shattan Award for “writing that presents conservative ideas in a powerful and compelling fashion to policymakers and the American people.” She was also named the Second Amendment Institute’s 2022 Gun Rights Champion.
Swearer received her law degree from the University of Nebraska College of Law and was a member of the Nebraska Law Review. She holds a B.S. in Criminology & Criminal Justice from the University of Nebraska, where she was a Chancellor’s Scholar and a goalkeeper on the women’s soccer team
Deputy Counsel, the President
Gary currently is the Deputy Counsel to the President. He was previously a partner at the Dhillon Law Group and worked at the Department of the Interior and Federal Election Commission. He is a native of Virginia, and earned his B.A. and J.D. from the University of Virginia.
Regulation and Red Tape: Tax Inversions: Unpacking the Pfizer Case
Stephanie McMahon, Raymond Wiacek, Paul J. Ray
A Regulatory Transparency Project Fourth Branch Video
In 2014, the pharmaceutical company Pfizer initiated a restructuring, only to encounter impediments from the...
The Original Meaning of "Maliciously" at the Florida Supreme Court
GianCarlo Canaparo
In Tomlinson v. Florida, Justice John Couriel wrote for a unanimous Florida Supreme Court exploring...
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The Second Amendment, From Bruen to Rahimi
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Constitutional Bar on Retrospective Laws Limits Claims Under Colorado's Child Sex Abuse Statute
Reilly Stephens
The Colorado Supreme Court recently issued a decision in Aurora Public Schools v. A.S. finding...
Utah Supreme Court Grapples With Public Recreational Access to Public Waters via Private Property
Michael Buschbacher, Andrew Olson
In Utah Stream Access Coalition v. VR Acquisitions, LLC (USAC II), the Utah Supreme Court...
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Andy McCarthy on the Roots of Hamas
Andrew McCarthy, as Assistant United States Attorney in New York, successfully prosecuted the Blind Sheikh,...
College Admissions After SFFA
Art Coleman, Cory R. Liu, Kenneth L. Marcus, William E. Trachman
On Thursday, June 29, 2023, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its decision in Students for...
College Admissions After SFFA
Art Coleman, Cory R. Liu, Kenneth L. Marcus, William E. Trachman
On Thursday, June 29, 2023, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its decision in Students for...
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Ethics and the U.S. Supreme Court: Originalist Perspectives
On Thursday, November 8, 2023, from 1:45 to 3:15 pm, in the Grand Ballroom at...
A Seat at the Sitting - November 2023
Braden H. Boucek, Christa Laser, Laura Stanley, Amy E. Swearer, Gary Lawkowski
The November Docket in 90 Minutes or Less
Each month, a panel of constitutional experts convenes to discuss the Court’s upcoming docket sitting...