State Attorney General, Texas
Executive Vice President, Goldwater Institute
Christina Sandefur is the Executive Vice President at the Goldwater Institute. She develops policies and litigates cases advancing healthcare freedom, free enterprise, private property rights, free speech, and taxpayer rights.
Christina is a co-drafter of the Right to Try initiative, now federal law, which protects terminally ill patients' right to try safe investigational treatments that have been prescribed by their physician but are not yet FDA-approved. She has won important victories for property rights in Arizona and works nationally to promote the Institute's Private Property Rights Protection Act, a state-level reform that requires government to pay owners when regulations destroy property rights and reduce property values.
Christina is the co-author of the book Cornerstone of Liberty: Private Property Rights in 21st Century America (2016). She is a frequent guest on national television and radio programs, has provided expert legal testimony to various legislative committees, and is a frequent speaker at conferences. She is the recipient of the 2018 Buckley Award in recognition of her leadership in the freedom movement, and she is an Advisory Board Member of the Network of enlightened Women. Christina serves on the board of the Phoenix Lawyers Chapter of the Federalist Society and is a member of the executive committee for the Federalist Society's Regulatory Transparency Project: FDA & Health.
Christina is a graduate of Michigan State University College of Law and Hillsdale College.
Founding Partner, Cooper & Kirk PLLC
Charles J. Cooper is a founding member and the chairman of Cooper & Kirk, PLLC, “one of the Nation’s leading litigation boutiques” (Above The Law 2017). The National Law Journal recently wrote that Mr. Cooper’s “brilliant legal career has so far spanned five decades and thrust Cooper into the spotlight in some of the most historic moments of the country’s modern history.” He has argued nine cases before the United States Supreme Court and scores of appeals before each of the 13 federal courts of appeals and several state supreme courts. He has been lead trial counsel in numerous complex, weeks-long trials in federal courts throughout the country. Named by the National Law Journal as one of the 10 best litigators in Washington D.C., Mr. Cooper’s work has been reported in numerous press accounts, and he has been called a “powerhouse attorney” (Fortune 2015), “a hard-nosed litigator” (Washington Post 2017), and “one of the country’s most in-demand civil litigators and a Washington legal institution unto himself” (The American Spectator 2014).
After graduating from the University of Alabama School of Law in 1977, where he ranked first in his class and served as Editor-in-Chief of the Alabama Law Review, Mr. Cooper began his career as a law clerk to Judge Paul Roney on the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals and to Justice William H. Rehnquist in 1978–79. He then practiced law in Atlanta for two years before joining the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice, where he served as the Deputy Assistant Attorney General in charge of, among other things, appellate matters. In 1985 President Reagan appointed him to the position of Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Counsel, which is the office responsible for providing legal opinions and advice to the White House, the Attorney General, and Executive Branch departments and agencies on issues covering the full spectrum of federal constitutional, statutory, and regulatory law.
In 1988 he returned to private practice as a litigation partner in the Washington, D.C. office of McGuireWoods. From 1990 until the founding of Cooper & Kirk in 1996, he was a partner at Shaw Pittman (now Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman), where he headed the firm’s Constitutional and Government Litigation Group.
Mr. Cooper has represented a wide range of public and private clients in highly complex constitutional, civil rights, antitrust, healthcare, banking, intellectual property, elections, campaign finance, administrative, commercial, and government contract cases. He has led trial teams in cases that have won judgments and settlements valued in the billions of dollars and that have established ground-breaking constitutional precedents.
Much of Mr. Cooper’s practice has involved representing high-profile clients in nationally prominent matters, including: the State of Florida in a First Amendment suit brought by the Disney Company concerning its autonomous regulatory authority over its Disney World property; the Commonwealth of Virginia in a suit seeking to enjoin the removal of noncitizens from its voter rolls; 38 members of the Duke Lacrosse team falsely accused of rape by officials of Duke University and the City of Durham; Harper Lee in a copyright dispute with the heirs of Gregory Peck; high-ranking former government officials such as former Attorneys General John Ashcroft, Jeff Sessions, and William Barr, and Ambassador John Bolton; several Governors and United States Senators; over 100 Members of Congress; and many state, territorial, and local government bodies and officials. He has also represented and advised government officials and public figures in connection with sensitive private issues that needed to be, and were, resolved discreetly without becoming matters of public record.
In 1998 Chief Justice Rehnquist appointed Mr. Cooper to the Standing Committee on Rules of Practice and Procedure of the Judicial Conference of the United States, where he served for three terms. He also served as a Public Member, appointed by President George H.W. Bush, of the National Commission on Judicial Discipline and Removal. He is a member of numerous professional associations, including the American Law Institute (since 1993) and the American Academy of Appellate Lawyers (since 1996). He is also an active member of the Federalist Society and the Republican National Lawyers Association, which in 2010 named him Republican Lawyer of the Year and in 2016 honored him with its Edwin Meese III Award.
Mr. Cooper has published scores of articles and spoken extensively on constitutional and legal policy topics. He has appeared before congressional committees on 26 occasions, testifying as an expert on a wide variety of legal issues, including the Chevron doctrine of judicial deference to administrative agencies, the diversity of citizenship jurisdiction of federal courts, statehood bills for Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia, and the impeachment of President Clinton.
Former United States Senator, Utah
Over nearly four decades of public service, Senator Orrin Hatch established himself as a leading conservative voice in the United States Senate. As the upper chamber’s most senior Republican, he served as President Pro Tempore and as Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee. In this capacity, he fought to create jobs and strengthen the economy by repealing and replacing Obamacare, reforming the tax code, and opening up overseas markets to American exports.
As a long-time member and former Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Senator Hatch also fought to check judicial activism and protect our liberties. He was instrumental in confirming conservative judges to the federal bench and played an indispensable role in confirming Supreme Court Justices Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas, and Samuel Alito as well as scores of district and circuit court judges.
One of Senator Hatch’s particularly noteworthy achievements on the Judiciary Committee is the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993—a bill he co-authored with the late Senator Ted Kennedy. This landmark legislation prohibits substantial government burdens on the free exercise of religion, allowing all Americans to live, work, and worship in accordance with their beliefs.
In addition to protecting our individual liberties, Senator Hatch was on the front lines of legislative battles to protect our free-market economy and system of limited government under the Constitution. His reputation as a statesman and his record of fiscal responsibility earned him the nickname “Mr. Balanced Budget” from President Reagan.
By virtually all measures, Senator Hatch was among the most effective and consequential legislators in history. Since he first came to Congress in 1977, no legislator alive today has authored more bills that have become law than Senator Hatch.
Of all Senator Hatch’s achievements, he is proudest of his family, and he credits the love of his wife and children as the key to his success. He and Elaine have been married for more than fifty years. Together, they are the parents of six children, twenty-three grandchildren, and sixteen great-grandchildren.
Former Dean, Yale Law School
Eugene Victor Debs Rostow (August 25, 1913 – November 25, 2002) was an American legal scholar and public servant. He was Dean of Yale Law School and served as Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs under President Lyndon B. Johnson. In the 1970s Rostow was a leader of the movement against détente with Russia and in 1981, President Ronald Reagan appointed him director of the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency.
Professor Emeritus of the Practice of Law, Duke University School of Law; Professor Emeritus of Law, Washington College of Law, American University
Michael E. Tigar is Professor Emeritus of the Practice of Law at Duke University School of Law, and Professor Emeritus of Law at Washington College of Law, American University,Washington, D.C. He has held full-time positions at UCLA and The University of Texas. He has been a lecturer at dozens of law schools and bar associations in the United States, Europe, Africa, and Latin America, including service as Professeur Invité at the Faculty of Law of Université Paul-Cezanne, Aix-en-Provence. He is a 1966 graduate of Boalt Hall, University of California, Berkeley, where he was first in his class, Editor-in-Chief of the law review and Order of the Coif. He has authored or co-authored twelve books, three plays, and scores of articles and essays. He has argued seven cases in the U.S. Supreme Court, about 100 federal appeals, and has tried cases in all parts of the country in state and federal courts. His latest books are Trial Stories (2008) (edited with Angela Jordan Davis), and Thinking About Terrorism: The Threat to Civil Liberties in Times of National Emergency (2007). His clients have included Angela Davis, H. Rap Brown, John Connally, Kay Bailey Hutchison, the Washington Post, Mobil Oil, Fantasy Films, Terry Nichols, Allen Ginsberg, Leonard Peltier, the Charleston Five, Fernando Chavez and Lynne Stewart. He has been chair of the 60,000-member Section of Litigation of the American Bar Association, and chair of the board of directors of the Texas Resource Center for Capital Litigation. In his teaching, he has worked with law students in clinical programs where students are counsel or law clerks in significant human rights litigation. He has made several trips to South Africa, working with organizations of African lawyers engaged in the struggle to end apartheid, and, after the release of Nelson Mandela from prison, to lecture on human rights issues and to advise the African National Congress on issues in drafting a new constitution. He has been actively involved in efforts to bring to justice members of the Chilean junta, including former President Pinochet. Of Mr. Tigar's career, Justice William J. Brennan has written that his "tireless striving for justice stretches his arms towards perfection." In 1999, the California Attorneys for Criminal Justice held a ballot for "Lawyer of the Century." Mr. Tigar was third in the balloting, behind Clarence Darrow and Thurgood Marshall. In 2003, the Texas Civil Rights Project named its new building in Austin, Texas, (purchased with a gift from attorney Wayne Reaud) the "Michael Tigar Human Rights Center."
Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Second Circuit
Judge Winter was appointed United States Circuit Judge for the Second Circuit on December 10, 1981 and entered on duty January 5, 1982. He received a B.A. degree from Yale College in 1957 and an LL.B. degree from Yale Law School in 1960. He served as a law clerk to Judge Caleb M. Wright, Chief Judge, U.S. District Court, Delaware, 1960-61, and to Judge Thurgood Marshall, U.S. Court of Appeals, Second Circuit, 1961-62.
Judge Winter was a full-time member of the Yale Law School Faculty from 1962 until entering judicial service. At the time of his appointment, he was the William K. Townsend Professor of Law. He was also a Consultant to the Subcommittee of Separation of Powers, Committee on the Judiciary, U.S. Senate from 1968 to 1972, a Senior Fellow, The Brookings Institute, Washington, D.C. from 1968 to 1970, a John Simon Guggenheim Fellow from 1971 to 1972 and an Adjutant Scholar, American Enterprise Institute from 1972 to 1981.
He served from 1987 to 1992 as a member of the Judicial Conference Advisory Committee on Civil Rules. He served as Chair of the Judicial Conference Advisory Committee on the Rules of Evidence from 1992 to 1996. From July 1, 1997 to September 30, 2000, Judge Winter served as Chief Judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. In April 1998, he was appointed to the Executive Committee of the U.S. Judicial Conference. From October 1999 to September 2000, he served as Chair of the Executive Committee. On October 1, 2000, he took Senior Judge status.
He served as Chair of the Committee to Review Circuit Council Conduct and Disability Orders from 2005 to 2008. He was a member of the United States Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act Court of Review from 2003 to 2010.
Judge Winter has received the Connecticut Law Review Award, Honorary Doctors of Law from Brooklyn Law School and New York Law School, the Federal Bar Council's Learned Hand Award for Excellence in Federal Jurisprudence, and the Yale Law School's Association's Award of Merit. He is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Founding Partner, Cooper & Kirk PLLC
Charles J. Cooper is a founding member and the chairman of Cooper & Kirk, PLLC, “one of the Nation’s leading litigation boutiques” (Above The Law 2017). The National Law Journal recently wrote that Mr. Cooper’s “brilliant legal career has so far spanned five decades and thrust Cooper into the spotlight in some of the most historic moments of the country’s modern history.” He has argued nine cases before the United States Supreme Court and scores of appeals before each of the 13 federal courts of appeals and several state supreme courts. He has been lead trial counsel in numerous complex, weeks-long trials in federal courts throughout the country. Named by the National Law Journal as one of the 10 best litigators in Washington D.C., Mr. Cooper’s work has been reported in numerous press accounts, and he has been called a “powerhouse attorney” (Fortune 2015), “a hard-nosed litigator” (Washington Post 2017), and “one of the country’s most in-demand civil litigators and a Washington legal institution unto himself” (The American Spectator 2014).
After graduating from the University of Alabama School of Law in 1977, where he ranked first in his class and served as Editor-in-Chief of the Alabama Law Review, Mr. Cooper began his career as a law clerk to Judge Paul Roney on the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals and to Justice William H. Rehnquist in 1978–79. He then practiced law in Atlanta for two years before joining the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice, where he served as the Deputy Assistant Attorney General in charge of, among other things, appellate matters. In 1985 President Reagan appointed him to the position of Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Counsel, which is the office responsible for providing legal opinions and advice to the White House, the Attorney General, and Executive Branch departments and agencies on issues covering the full spectrum of federal constitutional, statutory, and regulatory law.
In 1988 he returned to private practice as a litigation partner in the Washington, D.C. office of McGuireWoods. From 1990 until the founding of Cooper & Kirk in 1996, he was a partner at Shaw Pittman (now Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman), where he headed the firm’s Constitutional and Government Litigation Group.
Mr. Cooper has represented a wide range of public and private clients in highly complex constitutional, civil rights, antitrust, healthcare, banking, intellectual property, elections, campaign finance, administrative, commercial, and government contract cases. He has led trial teams in cases that have won judgments and settlements valued in the billions of dollars and that have established ground-breaking constitutional precedents.
Much of Mr. Cooper’s practice has involved representing high-profile clients in nationally prominent matters, including: the State of Florida in a First Amendment suit brought by the Disney Company concerning its autonomous regulatory authority over its Disney World property; the Commonwealth of Virginia in a suit seeking to enjoin the removal of noncitizens from its voter rolls; 38 members of the Duke Lacrosse team falsely accused of rape by officials of Duke University and the City of Durham; Harper Lee in a copyright dispute with the heirs of Gregory Peck; high-ranking former government officials such as former Attorneys General John Ashcroft, Jeff Sessions, and William Barr, and Ambassador John Bolton; several Governors and United States Senators; over 100 Members of Congress; and many state, territorial, and local government bodies and officials. He has also represented and advised government officials and public figures in connection with sensitive private issues that needed to be, and were, resolved discreetly without becoming matters of public record.
In 1998 Chief Justice Rehnquist appointed Mr. Cooper to the Standing Committee on Rules of Practice and Procedure of the Judicial Conference of the United States, where he served for three terms. He also served as a Public Member, appointed by President George H.W. Bush, of the National Commission on Judicial Discipline and Removal. He is a member of numerous professional associations, including the American Law Institute (since 1993) and the American Academy of Appellate Lawyers (since 1996). He is also an active member of the Federalist Society and the Republican National Lawyers Association, which in 2010 named him Republican Lawyer of the Year and in 2016 honored him with its Edwin Meese III Award.
Mr. Cooper has published scores of articles and spoken extensively on constitutional and legal policy topics. He has appeared before congressional committees on 26 occasions, testifying as an expert on a wide variety of legal issues, including the Chevron doctrine of judicial deference to administrative agencies, the diversity of citizenship jurisdiction of federal courts, statehood bills for Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia, and the impeachment of President Clinton.
Former United States Senator, Utah
Over nearly four decades of public service, Senator Orrin Hatch established himself as a leading conservative voice in the United States Senate. As the upper chamber’s most senior Republican, he served as President Pro Tempore and as Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee. In this capacity, he fought to create jobs and strengthen the economy by repealing and replacing Obamacare, reforming the tax code, and opening up overseas markets to American exports.
As a long-time member and former Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Senator Hatch also fought to check judicial activism and protect our liberties. He was instrumental in confirming conservative judges to the federal bench and played an indispensable role in confirming Supreme Court Justices Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas, and Samuel Alito as well as scores of district and circuit court judges.
One of Senator Hatch’s particularly noteworthy achievements on the Judiciary Committee is the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993—a bill he co-authored with the late Senator Ted Kennedy. This landmark legislation prohibits substantial government burdens on the free exercise of religion, allowing all Americans to live, work, and worship in accordance with their beliefs.
In addition to protecting our individual liberties, Senator Hatch was on the front lines of legislative battles to protect our free-market economy and system of limited government under the Constitution. His reputation as a statesman and his record of fiscal responsibility earned him the nickname “Mr. Balanced Budget” from President Reagan.
By virtually all measures, Senator Hatch was among the most effective and consequential legislators in history. Since he first came to Congress in 1977, no legislator alive today has authored more bills that have become law than Senator Hatch.
Of all Senator Hatch’s achievements, he is proudest of his family, and he credits the love of his wife and children as the key to his success. He and Elaine have been married for more than fifty years. Together, they are the parents of six children, twenty-three grandchildren, and sixteen great-grandchildren.
Former Dean, Yale Law School
Eugene Victor Debs Rostow (August 25, 1913 – November 25, 2002) was an American legal scholar and public servant. He was Dean of Yale Law School and served as Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs under President Lyndon B. Johnson. In the 1970s Rostow was a leader of the movement against détente with Russia and in 1981, President Ronald Reagan appointed him director of the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency.
Professor Emeritus of the Practice of Law, Duke University School of Law; Professor Emeritus of Law, Washington College of Law, American University
Michael E. Tigar is Professor Emeritus of the Practice of Law at Duke University School of Law, and Professor Emeritus of Law at Washington College of Law, American University,Washington, D.C. He has held full-time positions at UCLA and The University of Texas. He has been a lecturer at dozens of law schools and bar associations in the United States, Europe, Africa, and Latin America, including service as Professeur Invité at the Faculty of Law of Université Paul-Cezanne, Aix-en-Provence. He is a 1966 graduate of Boalt Hall, University of California, Berkeley, where he was first in his class, Editor-in-Chief of the law review and Order of the Coif. He has authored or co-authored twelve books, three plays, and scores of articles and essays. He has argued seven cases in the U.S. Supreme Court, about 100 federal appeals, and has tried cases in all parts of the country in state and federal courts. His latest books are Trial Stories (2008) (edited with Angela Jordan Davis), and Thinking About Terrorism: The Threat to Civil Liberties in Times of National Emergency (2007). His clients have included Angela Davis, H. Rap Brown, John Connally, Kay Bailey Hutchison, the Washington Post, Mobil Oil, Fantasy Films, Terry Nichols, Allen Ginsberg, Leonard Peltier, the Charleston Five, Fernando Chavez and Lynne Stewart. He has been chair of the 60,000-member Section of Litigation of the American Bar Association, and chair of the board of directors of the Texas Resource Center for Capital Litigation. In his teaching, he has worked with law students in clinical programs where students are counsel or law clerks in significant human rights litigation. He has made several trips to South Africa, working with organizations of African lawyers engaged in the struggle to end apartheid, and, after the release of Nelson Mandela from prison, to lecture on human rights issues and to advise the African National Congress on issues in drafting a new constitution. He has been actively involved in efforts to bring to justice members of the Chilean junta, including former President Pinochet. Of Mr. Tigar's career, Justice William J. Brennan has written that his "tireless striving for justice stretches his arms towards perfection." In 1999, the California Attorneys for Criminal Justice held a ballot for "Lawyer of the Century." Mr. Tigar was third in the balloting, behind Clarence Darrow and Thurgood Marshall. In 2003, the Texas Civil Rights Project named its new building in Austin, Texas, (purchased with a gift from attorney Wayne Reaud) the "Michael Tigar Human Rights Center."
Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Second Circuit
Judge Winter was appointed United States Circuit Judge for the Second Circuit on December 10, 1981 and entered on duty January 5, 1982. He received a B.A. degree from Yale College in 1957 and an LL.B. degree from Yale Law School in 1960. He served as a law clerk to Judge Caleb M. Wright, Chief Judge, U.S. District Court, Delaware, 1960-61, and to Judge Thurgood Marshall, U.S. Court of Appeals, Second Circuit, 1961-62.
Judge Winter was a full-time member of the Yale Law School Faculty from 1962 until entering judicial service. At the time of his appointment, he was the William K. Townsend Professor of Law. He was also a Consultant to the Subcommittee of Separation of Powers, Committee on the Judiciary, U.S. Senate from 1968 to 1972, a Senior Fellow, The Brookings Institute, Washington, D.C. from 1968 to 1970, a John Simon Guggenheim Fellow from 1971 to 1972 and an Adjutant Scholar, American Enterprise Institute from 1972 to 1981.
He served from 1987 to 1992 as a member of the Judicial Conference Advisory Committee on Civil Rules. He served as Chair of the Judicial Conference Advisory Committee on the Rules of Evidence from 1992 to 1996. From July 1, 1997 to September 30, 2000, Judge Winter served as Chief Judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. In April 1998, he was appointed to the Executive Committee of the U.S. Judicial Conference. From October 1999 to September 2000, he served as Chair of the Executive Committee. On October 1, 2000, he took Senior Judge status.
He served as Chair of the Committee to Review Circuit Council Conduct and Disability Orders from 2005 to 2008. He was a member of the United States Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act Court of Review from 2003 to 2010.
Judge Winter has received the Connecticut Law Review Award, Honorary Doctors of Law from Brooklyn Law School and New York Law School, the Federal Bar Council's Learned Hand Award for Excellence in Federal Jurisprudence, and the Yale Law School's Association's Award of Merit. He is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
David Boies Professor of Law, Yale Law School
Adjunct Professor of Law, University of Pennsylvania
Makan Delrahim is currently an Adjunct Professor of Law at the University of Pennsylvania.
Previously he served as Assistant Attorney General for the Antitrust Division, Deputy Assistant to the President, and Deputy White House Counsel. Mr. Delrahim’s rich antitrust background covers the full range of industries, issues, and institutions touched upon by the work of the Antitrust Division. He is a former partner in the Los Angeles office of a national law firm. He served in the Antitrust Division from 2003 to 2005 as a Deputy Assistant Attorney General, overseeing the Appellate, Foreign Commerce, and Legal Policy sections. During that time, he played an integral role in building the Antitrust Division’s engagement with its international counterparts and was involved in civil and criminal matters. He has served on the Attorney General’s Task Force on Intellectual Property and as Chairman of the Merger Working Group of the International Competition Network. Mr. Delrahim was also a Commissioner on the Antitrust Modernization Commission from 2004 to 2007. Earlier in his career, Mr. Delrahim served as antitrust counsel, and later as the Staff Director and Chief Counsel of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee.
Partner, Sullivan & Cromwell LLP
Andrei Iancu is a partner at Sullivan & Cromwell and one of the leading voices in intellectual property law and innovation policy. He is a former Undersecretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property and Director of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), a position to which he was confirmed unanimously by the Senate. Andrei has decades of experience representing plaintiffs and defendants in IP matters across the technical and scientific spectra, including medical devices, genetic testing, therapeutics, the Internet, telephony, TV broadcasting, video game systems and computer peripherals. He represents clients in litigation and trials before the district courts, the U.S. International Trade Commission and the USPTO, the Federal Circuit and U.S. Supreme Court, and also counsels clients on obtaining, licensing, enforcing and defending against IP rights globally.
Vice President, Edwin Meese III Institute for the Rule of Law, Advancing American Freedom
John G. Malcolm oversees Advancing American Freedom’s work to increase understanding of the Constitution and the rule of law as Vice President of the organization’s Edwin Meese III Institute for the Rule of Law. Malcolm brings to the challenge a wealth of legal expertise and experience in both the public and private sectors.
Prior to joining Advancing American Freedom in 2025, Malcolm was the Vice President of the Institute for Constitutional Government and the Director of the Meese Center for Legal and Judicial Studies at the Heritage Foundation. Prior to joining Heritage in 2012, Malcolm was general counsel at the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, as well as a distinguished practitioner in residence at Pepperdine Law School. From 2004 to 2009, Malcolm was executive vice president and director of worldwide anti-piracy operations for the Motion Picture Association.
Malcolm served as a deputy assistant attorney general in the Department of Justice’s Criminal Division from 2001 to 2004, where he oversaw sections on computer crime and intellectual property, domestic security, child exploitation and obscenity, and special investigations. Immediately prior to that, he was a founding partner in the Atlanta law firm of Malcolm & Schroeder, LLP.
From 1990 to 1997, Malcolm was an assistant U.S. attorney in Atlanta, assigned to the fraud and public corruption section, and also an associate independent counsel, investigating fraud and abuse in the Department of Housing and Urban Development. He was honored with the Director’s Award for Superior Performance for his work in connection with the successful prosecution of Walter Leroy Moody Jr., who assassinated an 11th Circuit judge and the head of the Savannah chapter of the NAACP.
A graduate of Harvard Law School and Columbia College, Malcolm began his career as a law clerk to a federal district court judge and a federal appellate court judge, and as an associate at the Atlanta-based law firm of Sutherland, Asbill & Brennan (new Eversheds Sutherland).
Malcolm, who resides in Washington, D.C., serves on the Board of Trustees of the Washington National Opera and is a Senate-confirmed member of the Board of Directors of the Legal Services Corporation, the largest funder of civil legal aid in the United States.
Former Adjunct Professor of Law; former Special Counsel to the President; former federal prosecutor, Georgetown Law (ret.)
Bill Otis is a former Adjunct Professor of Law at Georgetown University, a one-time federal prosecutor, and a former Special White House Counsel for President George H. W. Bush. After graduating from Stanford Law School, he started his career in the Criminal Division of the Justice Department, then became chief of appeals for the US Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Virginia. In the 1980's he served on the Department's "Train the Trainer" team, which taught US Attorneys Offices across the county how to implement the then-new Sentencing Reform Act. He has held several posts in the federal government, including Special Assistant to the Secretary of Energy and Counselor to the head of the Drug Enforcement Administration, in addition to the White House post. He has testified before Congress on issues in criminal procedure, illegal drugs, the US Sentencing Commission, and the death penalty, and has given numerous media interviews on those and other subjects. He currently teaches a seminar at Georgetown Law titled "Conservatism in Law in America" with his wife, Federalist Society co-founder Lee Liberman Otis.
Emanuel S. Heller Professor of Law, University of California at Berkeley; Senior Research Fellow, School of Civic Leadership, Civitas Institute, University of Texas at Austin; Nonresident Senior Fellow, American Enterprise Institute
John Yoo is the Emanuel Heller Professor of Law. He is also Distinguished Visiting Scholar, School of Civic Leadership and Senior Research Fellow, Civitas Institute, at the University of Texas at Austin. He is also a Nonresident Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.
His most recent book, The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Supreme Court, co-authored with Robert Delahunty, was published in 2023. Professor Yoo’s other books include Defender-in-Chief: Trump’s Fight for Presidential Power; Striking Power: How Cyber, Robots, and Space Weapons Change the Rules for War, Point of Attack: Preventive War, International Law, and Global Welfare, and Crisis and Command: A History of Executive Power from George Washington to George Bush.
Professor Yoo has published more than 100 articles in academic journals on subjects including national security, constitutional law, international law, and the Supreme Court. He also regularly contributes to the editorial pages of the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, and National Review, among others.
Professor Yoo has served in all three branches of government. He was an official in the U.S. Department of Justice, where he worked on national security and terrorism issues after the 9/11 attacks. He served as general counsel of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee. He has been a law clerk for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and federal appeals Judge Laurence Silberman. He has been a visiting professor at Seoul National University in South Korea, the Interdisciplinary Center in Israel, Keio University in Japan, Trento University in Italy, the University of Chicago, and the Free University of Amsterdam.
Professor Yoo supervises the Public Law and Policy Program and the California Constitution Center. He also serves on the boards of the Pacific Legal Foundation, the Federalist Society’s Separation of Powers and Federalism Division, the Universidad Cientifica del Sur Law School, and the Asia-Pacific Law Institute at Seoul National University. He is a winner of the Federalist Society’s Paul Bator award and been the Edwin Meese III Originalism Lecturer at the Heritage Foundation.
Professor Yoo graduated from Yale Law School and summa cum laude from Harvard College.
Wayne A. Abernathy, Wild Bells
Wayne A. Abernathy is a former U.S. Treasury Assistant Secretary for Financial Institutions under President George W. Bush, receiving the Alexander Hamilton Award in recognition of his service. In that office he was also a member of the Board of Directors of the Securities Investor Protection Corporation. Prior to his work at the Treasury, Mr. Abernathy served as Staff Director of the Senate Banking Committee, under Chairman Phil Gramm.
Following his service at the Treasury, Mr. Abernathy worked for 15 years on the staff of the American Bankers Association, as Executive Vice President for Financial Institutions Policy and Regulatory Affairs.
Previous experience with the Senate Banking Committee includes serving as Staff Director of the Subcommittee on Securities during 1995-1998. From 1989 until 1994, Mr. Abernathy was a Republican economist for the committee. He previously worked as a senior legislative assistant for Senator Gramm during 1987-1989 and as an economist for the Banking Committee’s Subcommittee on International Finance and Monetary Policy during 1981-1986, under Chairman Jake Garn.
Mr. Abernathy earned his bachelor’s degree in International Studies from The Johns Hopkins University in 1978. In 1980, he received a master’s degree in International Studies from the School of Advanced International Studies of The Johns Hopkins University.
Senior Advisor, US Policy Metrics and Former U.S. Senator, Texas
Senator Gramm is a Senior Advisor at US Policy Metrics, overseeing our policy advisory team and acting as our Ambassador in Washington DC. Before US Policy Metrics, Senator Gramm was the Vice-Chairman of UBS Investment Bank for 9 years. At UBS he focused on providing strategic economic, political and policy advice to major corporate and institutional clients all around the world. He provided senior leadership on such landmark IPOs as Visa, Bank of China, China Merchants Bank and LGPhillips in Korea. He was instrumental in the follow-on equity offering for the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China and the privatization of Telstra in Australia.
Senator Gramm served six years in the US House and eighteen years in the US Senate. His legislative record includes landmark bills like the Gramm-Latta Budget, which reduced federal spending, rebuilt national defense and mandated the Reagan tax cut and the Gramm-Rudman Act, which placed the first binding constraints on federal spending. As Chairman of the Banking Committee, Senator Gramm steered through legislation modernizing banking, insurance and securities law, which had been languishing in Congress for 60 years. The Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act allowed banks, securities firms and insurance companies to affiliate as part of a financial services holding company. Dodd-Frank did not change Gramm-Leach-Bliley but expanded it by requiring systemically significant non-banks to become financial services holding companies.
Phil Gramm holds a Ph.D. from the University of Georgia in economics, the subject he taught at Texas A&M University for 12 years. He has published numerous articles and books on subjects ranging from monetary theory and policy to private property and the economics of mineral extraction.
He is married to Dr. Wendy Lee Gramm, former Chairman of the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission under Presidents Reagan and Bush. They have two sons, Marshall and Jeff and four grandchildren, Caroline, Will, Joshua and Gilbert.
Chief Legal + Administrative Officer, Waystar Health
Matthew R. A. Heiman leads all legal and corporate governance matters for Waystar. Over the last two decades, he has worked in corporate and government sectors, gaining deep experience in the areas of corporate governance, litigation, risk management, security, and compliance.
Most recently, Matthew was Vice President, Corporate Secretary & Associate General Counsel at Johnson Controls where he helped establish a new corporate secretary department and led the integration of legal departments following the company’s merger with Tyco International. Prior to its merger with Johnson Controls, Matthew held a number of positions with Tyco International including Vice President, Chief Compliance & Audit Officer. Before Tyco, Matthew was a lawyer with the National Security Division at the U.S Department of Justice. He was a legal advisor to the Coalition Provisional Authority in Baghdad, Iraq and practiced as a trial lawyer with the law firm of McGuireWoods.
Matthew holds a BA and JD from Indiana University and is a member of the International Institute for Strategic Studies. He is a Senior Fellow at George Mason University’s National Security Institute.
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On November 6-7, 1987, The Federalist Society held a symposium at the Grand Hyatt Hotel...
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Charles J. Cooper, Orrin Hatch, Eugene V. Rostow, Michael Tigar, Ralph K. Winter
Foreign Affairs and the Constitution
On November 6-7, 1987, The Federalist Society held a symposium at the Grand Hyatt Hotel...
Topics
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