Partner, Johns & Counsel PLLC
Chris Johns advocates for people and causes he believes in. He represents individuals and businesses as they confront powerful interests on the other side: property owners in eminent-domain cases, people and organizations seeking to exercise constitutional rights, and others with a just cause in a civil trial or appeal.
Chris has won cases for clients in courts across the country—from state and federal trial and appellate courts to the United States Supreme Court. He is also an adjunct professor at the University of Texas School of Law, where he teaches the course on eminent domain and private-property rights.
Chris grew up and attended public schools in Buckhannon, West Virginia. He went to Brigham Young University on academic and piano scholarships and, after his first year of college, served for two years as a full-time volunteer for his church in Oakland and San Francisco. Chris spent most of his time in neighborhoods unlike anything he’d ever seen in rural West Virginia. Still, he can’t imagine a better education: speaking with thousands of people about life, hopes, fears, and spiritual paths; becoming fluent in Spanish; observing communities that thrived and others that failed; and making friends with individuals from many countries and many walks of life, from gang members to high-level government officials. Chris decided during his volunteer service that he eventually wanted to become a lawyer and advocate. He studied English upon return to BYU, graduating magna cum laude in 1997.
Chris received his J.D. with high honors from the University of Texas School of Law. There, he was editor in chief of the Texas Law Review, a member of the Chancellors honor society, and a member of the Order of the Coif. He received Dean’s Achievement Awards in several of his classes. After graduation, Chris clerked for the Honorable Phyllis A. Kravitch of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit.
He then attended the University of Oxford, where he received a postgraduate law degree and authored a frequently cited dissertation analyzing the relationship between property and the law of obligations.
Chris entered private practice at Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP, where he worked with former Texas Solicitor General Greg Coleman in the firm’s national Supreme Court and appellate practice. He and three of his law-school classmates founded Johns Marrs Ellis & Hodge LLP, a trial and appellate boutique, and practiced together for nearly nine years.
In March 2018, Chris opened Johns & Counsel PLLC with a small, elite team dedicated to the clients and causes that mean most to him and the other members of the firm.
Chris appears on the 2018 and 2019 list of The Best Lawyers in America, a peer-selected honor. Texas Super Lawyers Magazine named him to its 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018 lists of “Super Lawyers” and to its 2013 and 2014 lists of “Rising Stars.” He is also a barrister in the Lloyd Lochridge American Inn of Court. Chris has testified about property rights on invitation from the Texas Legislature, is a regular speaker at national and state CLE conferences, has received multiple pro bono service awards, helped train UT’s moot-court teams, and has appeared as a legal commentator on television news programs.
Chris is licensed in Texas and New York and is admitted to practice before the Supreme Court of the United States, the U.S. Courts of Appeals for the Fourth, Fifth, and Federal Circuits, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, the U.S. District Courts for the Eastern, Southern, and Western Districts of Texas, the U.S. Court of Federal Claims, several other federal courts across the country, and all state courts in Texas.
Partner, Foley & Lardner LLP
Jeffrey A. Simmons is a partner and member of Foley & Lardner’s Business Litigation & Dispute Resolution Practice, where he focuses on complex litigation matters. Mr. Simmons was lead counsel in one of the largest insurance rehabilitations in U.S. history, In the Matter of the Rehabilitation of Segregated Account of Ambac Assurance Corporation, Case No. 10-cv-1576 (Dane Co., Wis.). A large portion of his practice is also devoted to trademark, copyright, patent and trade secret disputes. He currently serves on the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals’ subcommittee responsible for rewriting the circuit’s pattern jury instructions for trademark and copyright cases.
Prior to joining Foley, Mr. Simmons served as a law clerk to the Hon. John W. Reynolds, U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin.
Director of Property Rights Litigation, Pacific Legal Foundation
Robert Thomas is Pacific Legal Foundation’s director of its Property Rights practice group. He is an expert on property rights, takings, land use, and eminent domain issues.
After more than three decades in private practice in Hawaii and California representing property owners in takings, eminent domain, and land use cases, Robert joined PLF’s team of freedom fighters in 2021.
He has litigated cases in both state and federal court. As counsel for the property owners in County of Hawaii v. C&J Coupe Family Limited Partnership, he helped establish the rule that courts are not mere “rubber stamps” when a local government is taking property by eminent domain. Another case, Hamilton ex rel. Lethem v. Lethem, held that a parent’s liberty interest in raising and disciplining his child included a right to fair procedures, including notice and a judicial hearing before the family court could restrict parent-child contact.
Robert is a frequent speaker on property rights, takings, land use, and eminent domain issues nationwide. He also regularly publishes scholarly and practical articles in his area of practice, most recently including, “Hoist the Yellow Flag and Spam® Up: The Separation of Powers Limitation on Hawaii’s Emergency Authority”, 43 U. Haw. L. Rev. 71 (2020) and “Evaluating Emergency Takings: Flattening the Economic Curve”, 29 Wm. & Mary Bill Rts. J. 1145 (2021).
An elected member of the American Law Institute, Robert received his LLM, with honors, from Columbia Law School, where he was a Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar, and his JD from the University of Hawaii School of Law, where he served as editor of the Law Review. He also serves as the inaugural Joseph T. Waldo Visiting Chair in Property Rights Law at William & Mary Law School in Williamsburg, Virginia, where he teaches upper-division courses in eminent domain, land use, property rights, and property law.
When he’s not working, you might find Robert writing and publishing his blog on land use, property, and takings law, inversecondemnation.com, one of the most widely read blogs on those subjects.
Tazewell Taylor Professor of Law and William H. Cabell Research Professor, William & Mary Law School
Jonathan H. Adler joined the William & Mary law faculty as the Tazwell Taylor Professor of Law and William H. Cabell Research Professor in 2025. Prior to joining the faculty, he was the inaugural Johan Verheij Memorial Professor of Law and the founding Director of the Coleman P. Burke Center for Environmental Law at the Case Western Reserve University School of Law.
Professor Adler is the author or editor of seven books, including Climate Liberalism: Perspectives on Liberty, Property and Pollution (Palgrave, 2023), Marijuana Federalism: Uncle Sam and Mary Jane (Brookings Institution Press, 2020), Business and the Roberts Court (Oxford University Press, 2016) and Rebuilding the Ark: New Perspectives on Endangered Species Act Reform (AEI Press, 2011).
His articles have appeared in publications ranging from the Harvard Environmental Law Review and Yale Journal on Regulation to the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, and Washington Post. He has testified before Congress a dozen times, and his work has been cited in the U.S. Supreme Court. A 2024 study identified Professor Adler as the seventh most cited legal academic in administrative and environmental law from 2019 to 2023.
Professor Adler is a contributing editor to Civitas Outlook and a regular contributor to the popular legal blog, The Volokh Conspiracy. A regular commentator on constitutional and regulatory issues, he has appeared on numerous radio and television programs, ranging from the PBS Newshour and National Public Radio to the Fox News Channel and Entertainment Tonight.
Professor Adler is a senior fellow at the Property & Environment Research Center in Bozeman, Montana. In 2018, Professor Adler was elected to membership in the American Law Institute and helped co-found the organization Checks and Balances. In 2024, Professor Adler was appointed a public member of the Administrative Conference of the United States.
Professor Adler clerked for the Honorable David B. Sentelle on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.
Distinguished Professor of Law, Widener University Delaware Law School
James R. May is Distinguished Professor of Law, and Chief Sustainability Officer, Widener University (USA). He also serves as co-Director of the Environmental Rights Institute and co-Director of the Dignity Rights Project at Widener University Delaware Law School. May is also an Adjunct Professor of Graduate Engineering, and founded and co-chairs a program on marine policy. May is the editor of Principles of Constitutional Environmental Law (American Bar Association), and co-editor of Shale Gas and the Future of Energy (Edward Elgar), Global Environmental Constitutionalism (Cambridge), Environmental Constitutionalism in Context (Edward Elgar), New Frontiers in Environmental Constitutionalism (United National Environment Programme, forthcoming), Implementing Environmental Constitutionalism(Cambridge, forthcoming), Standards of Environmental Constitutionalism (Cambridge, forthcoming), and Human Rights and the Environment: Indivisibility, Dignity and Legality (Edward Elgar, forthcoming). May is also author or co-author of more than 100 articles and book chapters, and numerous amicus briefs to the U.S. Supreme Court and U.S. federal courts of appeal on issues including environmental law, constitutional law, comparative constitutional, international environmental law, environmental rights, and human dignity.
May founded two non-profit environmental organizations (the Mid-Atlantic and the Eastern Environmental Law Centers), and has litigated more than 200 public interest environmental claims, including cases throughout the Mid-Atlantic to restore water and air quality, conserve rare species and habitats, and protect biodiversity.
May is a Member of Faculty to the National Judicial College, and a Fellow of the American College of Environmental Lawyers, for whom he has served as a delegate to Haiti and China. May has also served as a consultant to the U.S. Embassy on legal education in the Philippines, and to the Hungarian Embassy and the Moroccan Human Rights Council on constitutional reform. May is a member of Phi Kappa Phi, serves on numerous boards, and has won numerous awards, including from Pace University, Sierra Club, and the American Canoe Association. He earned his B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Kansas (Bowman Scholar), J.D. from the University of Kansas (Appellate Advocacy Scholar and national moot court champion), and LL.M. in Environmental Law from Pace University, where he was the Feldshuh Fellow and graduated first in class.
May is a member of the bar in the State of Pennsylvania, several federal courts of appeal, and the U.S. Supreme Court.
Senior Attorney, Pacific Legal Foundation
Damien Schiff is a senior attorney at Pacific Legal Foundation. He leads its environmental practice group, a unique initiative that draws broadly from PLF’s expertise and success in property rights and separation of powers litigation. Over the years, Damien has represented hundreds of landowners and property rights advocates to defend their liberties against heavy-handed and unwarranted environmental and land-use regulation. His litigation experience includes Sackett v. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, a groundbreaking decision in which the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the right of landowners to challenge Clean Water Act compliance orders issued by EPA, and Contoski v. Norton, PLF’s successful effort to force the federal government to make good on its promise to delist the bald eagle from the Endangered Species Act.
Besides litigation, Damien has written academic articles on a variety of subjects, including the Endangered Species Act, the Clean Water Act, greenhouse gas torts, the duty to rescue, and international water law. He has appeared on a variety of television and radio programs and has been quoted in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Harper’s Magazine, and The Economist, among other publications.
He obtained his law degree magna cum laude from the University of San Diego School of Law, and his undergraduate degree magna cum laude from Georgetown University. While at USD, he was a research assistant for Professor Bernard Siegan, a leading constitutional theorist and advocate for property rights and economic liberty. Immediately prior to joining PLF, Damien clerked for Judge (and former PLF attorney) Victor Wolski of the United States Court of Federal Claims. Damien credits the mentoring and examples of Professor Siegan and Judge Wolski for his decision to pursue a career in liberty-based public interest litigation.
Damien lives in Sacramento with his wife, two young sons, four chickens, and a cat named Princess. In his off hours he enjoys stamp collecting, Gregorian chant, and martinis—preferably at the same time.
Senior Vice President for Legal Studies, Cato Institute
Clark Neily is senior vice president for legal studies at the Cato Institute. His areas of interest include constitutional law, overcriminalization, civil forfeiture, police accountability, and gun rights. Neily is the author of Terms of Engagement: How Our Courts Should Enforce the Constitution’s Promise of Limited Government. His writing has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, Forbes, and National Review Online, as well as various law reviews, including the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy, George Mason Law Review, Georgetown Journal of Law and Public Policy, NYU Journal of Law and Liberty, and Texas Review of Law and Politics. Neily is a frequent guest speaker and lecturer for the Federalist Society, Institute for Humane Studies, and American Constitution Society.
Before joining Cato in 2017, Neily was a senior attorney and constitutional litigator at the Institute for Justice and director of the Institute’s Center for Judicial Engagement. He is also an adjunct professor at the University of Texas School of Law, where he teaches constitutional litigation and public-interest law.
Neily served as co-counsel in District of Columbia v. Heller, the historic case in which the Supreme Court held for the first time that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to own a gun for self-defense.
Neily began his legal career as a law clerk to Judge Royce Lamberth on the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. After that he spent four years in the trial department of the Dallas-based firm Thompson & Knight. Neily received his undergraduate and law degrees from the University of Texas, where he was Chief Articles Editor of the Texas Law Review.
Tazewell Taylor Professor of Law and William H. Cabell Research Professor, William & Mary Law School
Jonathan H. Adler joined the William & Mary law faculty as the Tazwell Taylor Professor of Law and William H. Cabell Research Professor in 2025. Prior to joining the faculty, he was the inaugural Johan Verheij Memorial Professor of Law and the founding Director of the Coleman P. Burke Center for Environmental Law at the Case Western Reserve University School of Law.
Professor Adler is the author or editor of seven books, including Climate Liberalism: Perspectives on Liberty, Property and Pollution (Palgrave, 2023), Marijuana Federalism: Uncle Sam and Mary Jane (Brookings Institution Press, 2020), Business and the Roberts Court (Oxford University Press, 2016) and Rebuilding the Ark: New Perspectives on Endangered Species Act Reform (AEI Press, 2011).
His articles have appeared in publications ranging from the Harvard Environmental Law Review and Yale Journal on Regulation to the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, and Washington Post. He has testified before Congress a dozen times, and his work has been cited in the U.S. Supreme Court. A 2024 study identified Professor Adler as the seventh most cited legal academic in administrative and environmental law from 2019 to 2023.
Professor Adler is a contributing editor to Civitas Outlook and a regular contributor to the popular legal blog, The Volokh Conspiracy. A regular commentator on constitutional and regulatory issues, he has appeared on numerous radio and television programs, ranging from the PBS Newshour and National Public Radio to the Fox News Channel and Entertainment Tonight.
Professor Adler is a senior fellow at the Property & Environment Research Center in Bozeman, Montana. In 2018, Professor Adler was elected to membership in the American Law Institute and helped co-found the organization Checks and Balances. In 2024, Professor Adler was appointed a public member of the Administrative Conference of the United States.
Professor Adler clerked for the Honorable David B. Sentelle on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.
Distinguished Professor of Law, Widener University Delaware Law School
James R. May is Distinguished Professor of Law, and Chief Sustainability Officer, Widener University (USA). He also serves as co-Director of the Environmental Rights Institute and co-Director of the Dignity Rights Project at Widener University Delaware Law School. May is also an Adjunct Professor of Graduate Engineering, and founded and co-chairs a program on marine policy. May is the editor of Principles of Constitutional Environmental Law (American Bar Association), and co-editor of Shale Gas and the Future of Energy (Edward Elgar), Global Environmental Constitutionalism (Cambridge), Environmental Constitutionalism in Context (Edward Elgar), New Frontiers in Environmental Constitutionalism (United National Environment Programme, forthcoming), Implementing Environmental Constitutionalism(Cambridge, forthcoming), Standards of Environmental Constitutionalism (Cambridge, forthcoming), and Human Rights and the Environment: Indivisibility, Dignity and Legality (Edward Elgar, forthcoming). May is also author or co-author of more than 100 articles and book chapters, and numerous amicus briefs to the U.S. Supreme Court and U.S. federal courts of appeal on issues including environmental law, constitutional law, comparative constitutional, international environmental law, environmental rights, and human dignity.
May founded two non-profit environmental organizations (the Mid-Atlantic and the Eastern Environmental Law Centers), and has litigated more than 200 public interest environmental claims, including cases throughout the Mid-Atlantic to restore water and air quality, conserve rare species and habitats, and protect biodiversity.
May is a Member of Faculty to the National Judicial College, and a Fellow of the American College of Environmental Lawyers, for whom he has served as a delegate to Haiti and China. May has also served as a consultant to the U.S. Embassy on legal education in the Philippines, and to the Hungarian Embassy and the Moroccan Human Rights Council on constitutional reform. May is a member of Phi Kappa Phi, serves on numerous boards, and has won numerous awards, including from Pace University, Sierra Club, and the American Canoe Association. He earned his B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Kansas (Bowman Scholar), J.D. from the University of Kansas (Appellate Advocacy Scholar and national moot court champion), and LL.M. in Environmental Law from Pace University, where he was the Feldshuh Fellow and graduated first in class.
May is a member of the bar in the State of Pennsylvania, several federal courts of appeal, and the U.S. Supreme Court.
Senior Attorney, Pacific Legal Foundation
Damien Schiff is a senior attorney at Pacific Legal Foundation. He leads its environmental practice group, a unique initiative that draws broadly from PLF’s expertise and success in property rights and separation of powers litigation. Over the years, Damien has represented hundreds of landowners and property rights advocates to defend their liberties against heavy-handed and unwarranted environmental and land-use regulation. His litigation experience includes Sackett v. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, a groundbreaking decision in which the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the right of landowners to challenge Clean Water Act compliance orders issued by EPA, and Contoski v. Norton, PLF’s successful effort to force the federal government to make good on its promise to delist the bald eagle from the Endangered Species Act.
Besides litigation, Damien has written academic articles on a variety of subjects, including the Endangered Species Act, the Clean Water Act, greenhouse gas torts, the duty to rescue, and international water law. He has appeared on a variety of television and radio programs and has been quoted in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Harper’s Magazine, and The Economist, among other publications.
He obtained his law degree magna cum laude from the University of San Diego School of Law, and his undergraduate degree magna cum laude from Georgetown University. While at USD, he was a research assistant for Professor Bernard Siegan, a leading constitutional theorist and advocate for property rights and economic liberty. Immediately prior to joining PLF, Damien clerked for Judge (and former PLF attorney) Victor Wolski of the United States Court of Federal Claims. Damien credits the mentoring and examples of Professor Siegan and Judge Wolski for his decision to pursue a career in liberty-based public interest litigation.
Damien lives in Sacramento with his wife, two young sons, four chickens, and a cat named Princess. In his off hours he enjoys stamp collecting, Gregorian chant, and martinis—preferably at the same time.
Executive Vice President of Policy, Information Technology Industry Council
Rob Strayer serves as the Executive Vice President of Policy at the Information Technology Industry Council (ITI). He leads ITI’s efforts to shape technology policy around the globe to enable innovation, competition, and economic growth, while supporting governments efforts to achieve their public policy objectives. With a team of experienced professionals at ITI, he is responsible for developing and executing policy strategies in every region of the world and on a wide range of digital technology issues, including privacy and data protection, cybersecurity, trade and market access, standards, artificial intelligence, and taxation.
Prior to joining ITI, Strayer served as the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Cyber and International Communications and Information Policy at the U.S. State Department. In that role, he led dozens of bilateral and multilateral dialogues with foreign governments on digital economy regulatory and cybersecurity issues. He was named as an ambassador by the President to lead the 90-plus person U.S. delegation to the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) Plenipotentiary Conference in Dubai, United Arab Emirates in 2018.
Before joining the State Department, Strayer was the general counsel for the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He also practiced telecommunications law at WilmerHale, and clerked for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit.
Strayer received a law degree from Vanderbilt University Law School, and earned his B.A. in Economics, summa cum laude, from Denison University.
Professor of Law, Notre Dame Law School
Professor Derek Muller is a nationally-recognized scholar in the field of election law. His research focuses on the role of states in the administration of federal elections, the constitutional contours of voting rights and election administration, the limits of judicial power in the domain of elections, and the Electoral College.
He has published more than two dozen academic works, and his op-eds have appeared in the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, and the Wall Street Journal. He has testified before Congress, and he is a contributor at the Election Law Blog. He is a co-author on a Federal Courts casebook published by Carolina Academic Press. He is also the co-reporter on a new Restatement of the Law, Election Litigation, an effort led by the American Law Institute.
Professor Muller teaches Election Law, Civil Procedure, and Evidence.
Republican Staff Director, Worker and Family Support Subcommittee, Committee on Ways and Means, US House of Representatives
Anne DeCesaro has been the Republican Staff Director since 2016 of what is now the Worker and Family Support subcommittee, formerly Human Resources, of the Committee on Ways and Means. The subcommittee has jurisdiction over a range of domestic social programs including foster care and adoption, home visiting, Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, and the others. She previously served as professional staff for the subcommittee from 2011 to 2014, covering unemployment insurance, child support enforcement, and Supplemental Security Income. In between, she was the lead staffer on the House Agriculture Committee subcommittee on nutrition which oversees the nation’s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, formerly known as food stamps. Earlier in her career she spent a number of years at the Office of Management and Budget and the Social Security Administration, working on programs for low-income individuals and families. She received her bachelor’s degree from Saint Mary’s College and her master’s degree from The John Hopkins University.
Vice President, Networks, The Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies
Nathan Kaczmarek is Vice President for Networks at the Federalist Society. He began his legal career in Detroit representing nationwide clients in all phases of healthcare litigation and complex medical malpractice claims. He has since served as a Senior Legal and Policy Advisor in the U.S. House of Representatives and as Counsel for the Subcommittee on Regulatory Affairs and Federal Management in the U.S. Senate. Prior to overseeing the Networks, he was Director of the Practice Groups, the Regulatory Transparency Project, and the Article I Initiative for the Federalist Society.
Nathan holds degrees from Hillsdale College and Thomas M. Cooley Law School. He is a Liaison Representative for The Administrative Conference of the United States. He also serves as Vice President of the Associates of St. John Bosco, a Virginia based non-profit dedicated to Catholic high school and college students.
Professorial Lecturer in Public Policy and Public Administration, George Washington University
Steve Redburn is a distinguished lecturer, budget advisor, and authority on financial management, government performance, and public policy with over 25 years of experience as a senior government official in the U.S. Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.
Since 2004, Professor Redburn has been a professorial lecturer in the Trachtenberg School of Public Policy, where he teaches a course on the institutions and processes of federal budgeting. Dr. Redburn has directed fiscal studies for the Center of the Public Service in the Schar School of Policy and Government, George Mason University. As a participant in deliberations of the National Budgeting Roundtable since 2014, he has helped to lead research on reform of the federal government’s budget process. In 2017 and 2018, he consulted on budget processes in Indonesia for the World Bank. He co-authored a 2018 National Academy of Public Administration (NAPA) white paper presenting a long-term strategy and recommendations to strengthen the federal government’s capacity to perform.
In 2010 and 2011, Redburn directed a project on budget process reform for the Peterson-Pew Commission on Budget Reform at the New America Foundation in Washington, D.C., where he supervised preparation of the Commission’s December, 2010, report, Getting Back in the Black, recommending comprehensive reform of the U.S. federal government budget process, and edited a series of papers on additional reform options in 2011. From January to August 2007 Dr. Redburn served as Senior Budget Advisor on the USAID Kosovo V project, where he assisted the Ministry of Finance and Economy on a range of issues and advised the budget director and staff. From 2008 to May 2014, he was a scholar and study director for the National Academy of Sciences in Washington, D.C. He directed a study of high rates of incarceration in the U.S. in 2013-2014 and co-edited the final report. In 2008 – 2009, he directed a study of the fiscal future of the U.S. for NAS and NAPA, developing and assessing spending, revenue, and process reform options to put the U.S. on a sustainable budget path; the final study report, Choosing the Nation’s Fiscal Future, was published in November, 2009.
Dr. Redburn is an elected fellow and member of the board of directors (2013 – 2018) of the National Academy of Public Administration. As a Senior Executive in the Executive Office of the President (OMB) until his retirement from the federal service in 2006, Steve Redburn advised the President's senior staff on all aspects of budget, policy, legislation, program design and performance, and regulations concerning major Federal agencies and programs.
Senior Fellow - Governance Studies, Brookings Institution
Molly Reynolds is a senior fellow in Governance Studies at Brookings. She studies Congress, with an emphasis on how congressional rules and procedure affect domestic policy outcomes.
She is the author of the book, "Exceptions to the Rule: The Politics of Filibuster Limitations in the U.S. Senate," which explores creation, use, and consequences of the budget reconciliation process and other procedures that prevent filibusters in the U.S. Senate. Current research projects include work on oversight in the House of Representatives, congressional reform, and the congressional budget process. She also supervises the maintenance of "Vital Statistics on Congress," Brookings’s long-running resource on the first branch of government.
Reynolds received her Ph.D. in political science and public policy from the University of Michigan and her A.B. in government from Smith College, and previously served as a senior research coordinator in the Governance Studies program at Brookings. In addition, she has served as an instructor at George Mason University.
Republican Staff Director, Worker and Family Support Subcommittee, Committee on Ways and Means, US House of Representatives
Anne DeCesaro has been the Republican Staff Director since 2016 of what is now the Worker and Family Support subcommittee, formerly Human Resources, of the Committee on Ways and Means. The subcommittee has jurisdiction over a range of domestic social programs including foster care and adoption, home visiting, Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, and the others. She previously served as professional staff for the subcommittee from 2011 to 2014, covering unemployment insurance, child support enforcement, and Supplemental Security Income. In between, she was the lead staffer on the House Agriculture Committee subcommittee on nutrition which oversees the nation’s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, formerly known as food stamps. Earlier in her career she spent a number of years at the Office of Management and Budget and the Social Security Administration, working on programs for low-income individuals and families. She received her bachelor’s degree from Saint Mary’s College and her master’s degree from The John Hopkins University.
Vice President, Networks, The Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies
Nathan Kaczmarek is Vice President for Networks at the Federalist Society. He began his legal career in Detroit representing nationwide clients in all phases of healthcare litigation and complex medical malpractice claims. He has since served as a Senior Legal and Policy Advisor in the U.S. House of Representatives and as Counsel for the Subcommittee on Regulatory Affairs and Federal Management in the U.S. Senate. Prior to overseeing the Networks, he was Director of the Practice Groups, the Regulatory Transparency Project, and the Article I Initiative for the Federalist Society.
Nathan holds degrees from Hillsdale College and Thomas M. Cooley Law School. He is a Liaison Representative for The Administrative Conference of the United States. He also serves as Vice President of the Associates of St. John Bosco, a Virginia based non-profit dedicated to Catholic high school and college students.
Professorial Lecturer in Public Policy and Public Administration, George Washington University
Steve Redburn is a distinguished lecturer, budget advisor, and authority on financial management, government performance, and public policy with over 25 years of experience as a senior government official in the U.S. Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.
Since 2004, Professor Redburn has been a professorial lecturer in the Trachtenberg School of Public Policy, where he teaches a course on the institutions and processes of federal budgeting. Dr. Redburn has directed fiscal studies for the Center of the Public Service in the Schar School of Policy and Government, George Mason University. As a participant in deliberations of the National Budgeting Roundtable since 2014, he has helped to lead research on reform of the federal government’s budget process. In 2017 and 2018, he consulted on budget processes in Indonesia for the World Bank. He co-authored a 2018 National Academy of Public Administration (NAPA) white paper presenting a long-term strategy and recommendations to strengthen the federal government’s capacity to perform.
In 2010 and 2011, Redburn directed a project on budget process reform for the Peterson-Pew Commission on Budget Reform at the New America Foundation in Washington, D.C., where he supervised preparation of the Commission’s December, 2010, report, Getting Back in the Black, recommending comprehensive reform of the U.S. federal government budget process, and edited a series of papers on additional reform options in 2011. From January to August 2007 Dr. Redburn served as Senior Budget Advisor on the USAID Kosovo V project, where he assisted the Ministry of Finance and Economy on a range of issues and advised the budget director and staff. From 2008 to May 2014, he was a scholar and study director for the National Academy of Sciences in Washington, D.C. He directed a study of high rates of incarceration in the U.S. in 2013-2014 and co-edited the final report. In 2008 – 2009, he directed a study of the fiscal future of the U.S. for NAS and NAPA, developing and assessing spending, revenue, and process reform options to put the U.S. on a sustainable budget path; the final study report, Choosing the Nation’s Fiscal Future, was published in November, 2009.
Dr. Redburn is an elected fellow and member of the board of directors (2013 – 2018) of the National Academy of Public Administration. As a Senior Executive in the Executive Office of the President (OMB) until his retirement from the federal service in 2006, Steve Redburn advised the President's senior staff on all aspects of budget, policy, legislation, program design and performance, and regulations concerning major Federal agencies and programs.
Senior Fellow - Governance Studies, Brookings Institution
Molly Reynolds is a senior fellow in Governance Studies at Brookings. She studies Congress, with an emphasis on how congressional rules and procedure affect domestic policy outcomes.
She is the author of the book, "Exceptions to the Rule: The Politics of Filibuster Limitations in the U.S. Senate," which explores creation, use, and consequences of the budget reconciliation process and other procedures that prevent filibusters in the U.S. Senate. Current research projects include work on oversight in the House of Representatives, congressional reform, and the congressional budget process. She also supervises the maintenance of "Vital Statistics on Congress," Brookings’s long-running resource on the first branch of government.
Reynolds received her Ph.D. in political science and public policy from the University of Michigan and her A.B. in government from Smith College, and previously served as a senior research coordinator in the Governance Studies program at Brookings. In addition, she has served as an instructor at George Mason University.
Is “Possess Now, Pay Later” Constitutional in Private Pipeline Takings?
Chris Johns, Jeffrey A. Simmons, Robert H. Thomas
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Deep Dive Episode 60 – Juliana v. United States
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Courthouse Steps Decision Teleforum: Gamble v. United States
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Criminal Law & Procedure Practice Group Teleforum
In Gamble v. United States, Terance Gamble received two sentences and two convictions for the...
Litigation Update: Juliana v. United States
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On June 4, 2019, a Ninth Circuit panel heard oral argument in a high-profile interlocutory...
Thacker v. Tennessee Valley Authority - Post-Decision SCOTUScast
SCOTUScast featuring Richard Peltz-Steele
On April 29, 2019, the Supreme Court decided Thacker v. Tennessee Valley Authority, a case...
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“To protect the environment, our health, and promote the social good we have to live...
Cyber Strategy Update with Robert L. Strayer
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Join us for a teleforum with Robert L. Strayer, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Cyber and...
Rucho v. Common Cause and Lamone v. Benisek - Post-Argument SCOTUScast
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On March 26, 2019, the Supreme Court heard argument in Rucho v. Common Cause and...
All the President's Budgets: Who should be setting federal budget priorities?
Anne DeCesaro, Nathan Kaczmarek, Steve Redburn, Molly Reynolds
Article I Initiative
On May 30, 2019, the Federalist Society's Article I Initiative hosted a panel at the...
All the President's Budgets: Who should be setting federal budget priorities?
Anne DeCesaro, Nathan Kaczmarek, Steve Redburn, Molly Reynolds
Article I Initiative
On May 30, 2019, the Federalist Society's Article I Initiative hosted a panel at the...