Albert A. Walsh Chair in Real Estate, Land Use, and Property Law; Faculty Director, Urban Law Center, Fordham Law School
Nestor Davidson joined Fordham in 2011 and was named the Albert A. Walsh Professor of Real Estate, Land Use and Property Law in 2017. Professor Davidson is an expert in property, urban law, and affordable housing law and policy, and is the co-author of the casebook Property Law: Rules, Policies and Practices (7th ed. 2017). Professor Davidson founded and serves as the faculty director of the law school’s Urban Law Center and previously served as Associate Dean for Academic Affairs.
Professor Davidson practiced with the firm of Latham and Watkins, focusing on commercial real estate and affordable housing, and served as Special Counsel and Principal Deputy General Counsel at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. He currently serves as a Member of the Board of the New York State Housing Finance Agency.
Professor Davidson earned his AB from Harvard College and his JD from Columbia Law School. After law school, he clerked for Judge David S. Tatel of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit and Justice David H. Souter of the Supreme Court of the United States.
Professor of Law and Jamie L. Whitten Chair in Law and Government, University of Mississippi School of Law
Christopher Green (https://law.olemiss.edu/faculty-directory/christopher-green/) is Professor of Law and Jamie L. Whitten Chair in Law and Government at the University of Mississippi, where he has taught since 2006. He is a graduate of Princeton University and Yale Law School, and has a PhD in philosophy from the University of Notre Dame. He clerked for Judge Rhesa H. Barksdale on the Fifth Circuit and is the author of Equal Citizenship, Civil Rights, and the Constitution: The Original Sense of the Privileges or Immunities Clause (2015) and a large number of articles and essays on constitutional theory and the Fourteenth Amendment, including the two-part Original Sense of the (Equal) Protection Clause and Clarity and Reasonable Doubt in Early State-Constitutional Judicial Review. He is an affiliated scholar with the University of San Diego Center for the Study of Constitutional Originalism.
U.S. Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit
Born 1971 in Fort Wayne, IN
Federal Judicial Service:
Judge, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit
Nominated by Donald J. Trump on February 15, 2018, to a seat vacated by Richard Allen Posner. Confirmed by the Senate on May 14, 2018, and received commission on May 21, 2018.
Education:
St. Joseph’s College, Rensselaer, Indiana, B.B.A., 1993
Northwestern University School of Law, J.D., 1998
Professional Career:
Law clerk, Hon. Paul V. Niemeyer, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, 1998-1999
Law clerk, Hon. Anthony M. Kennedy, Supreme Court of the United States, 1999-2000
Private practice, Cleveland, Ohio, 2000-2002
Assistant U.S. attorney, Southern District of New York, 2002-2006
Counselor to the deputy attorney general, U.S. Department of Justice, 2006
Associate counsel, President George W. Bush, 2007
General counsel, National Security Council, and senior associate counsel, President George W. Bush, 2007-2009
Private practice, Chicago, Illinois, 2009-2018
Professor of Law, University of Wisconsin School of Law
Miriam Seifter's research and teaching interests include administrative law, federalism, state and local government law, energy law, and property law. Her recent work focuses on executive power and the separation of powers at the state level, and on the role of states and interest groups in the federal regulatory process. Her publications appear or are forthcoming in the Harvard Law Review, the NYU Law Review, the UCLA Law Review, and the Virginia Law Review, among others. In 2017, UW Law students honored Professor Seifter with the Classroom Teacher of the Year Award, and in 2018, she received one of twelve Distinguished Teaching Awards from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. For her article Gubernatorial Administration, Seifter was named the 2017 winner of the American Constitution Society's Richard D. Cudahy Writing Competition on Regulatory and Administrative Law.
Professor Seifter received a B.A. magna cum laude from Yale University, an M.Sc. with distinction from Oxford University, and a J.D. magna cum laude from Harvard Law School, where she was the Environmental Fellow and an Articles Editor on the Harvard Law Review. After law school, she served as a law clerk for Chief Judge Merrick Garland on the D.C. Circuit and for Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg at the Supreme Court of the United States. Prior to joining the UW Law faculty, she was a Visiting Researcher and Adjunct Professor of Law at Georgetown University Law Center and worked in private practice at Munger, Tolles & Olson LLP in San Francisco.
Chief Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit
JEFFREY S. SUTTON is the Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. He has served as Chair of the Federal Judicial Conference Committee on Rules of Practice and Procedure, Chair of the Advisory Committee on Appellate Rules, and Chair of the Supreme Court Fellows Commission. He currently serves as Chair of the Executive Committee of the Judicial Conference of the United States. Since 1993, Chief Judge Sutton has been an adjunct professor at The Ohio State University College of Law, where he teaches seminars on State Constitutional Law, the United States Supreme Court, and Appellate Advocacy. He also teaches a class on State Constitutional Law at Harvard Law School. Among other publications, he is the author of Who Decides? States as Laboratories of Constitutional Experimentation and 51 Imperfect Solutions: States and the Making of American Constitutional Law. He is the co-author of a casebook, State Constitutional Law: The Modern Experience, as well as The Law of Judicial Precedent. He is also the co-editor of The Essential Scalia: On the Constitution, the Courts, and the Rule of Law. In 2006, Chief Judge Sutton was elected to the American Law Institute, and in 2017 he was elected to its Council.
Albert A. Walsh Chair in Real Estate, Land Use, and Property Law; Faculty Director, Urban Law Center, Fordham Law School
Nestor Davidson joined Fordham in 2011 and was named the Albert A. Walsh Professor of Real Estate, Land Use and Property Law in 2017. Professor Davidson is an expert in property, urban law, and affordable housing law and policy, and is the co-author of the casebook Property Law: Rules, Policies and Practices (7th ed. 2017). Professor Davidson founded and serves as the faculty director of the law school’s Urban Law Center and previously served as Associate Dean for Academic Affairs.
Professor Davidson practiced with the firm of Latham and Watkins, focusing on commercial real estate and affordable housing, and served as Special Counsel and Principal Deputy General Counsel at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. He currently serves as a Member of the Board of the New York State Housing Finance Agency.
Professor Davidson earned his AB from Harvard College and his JD from Columbia Law School. After law school, he clerked for Judge David S. Tatel of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit and Justice David H. Souter of the Supreme Court of the United States.
Professor of Law and Jamie L. Whitten Chair in Law and Government, University of Mississippi School of Law
Christopher Green (https://law.olemiss.edu/faculty-directory/christopher-green/) is Professor of Law and Jamie L. Whitten Chair in Law and Government at the University of Mississippi, where he has taught since 2006. He is a graduate of Princeton University and Yale Law School, and has a PhD in philosophy from the University of Notre Dame. He clerked for Judge Rhesa H. Barksdale on the Fifth Circuit and is the author of Equal Citizenship, Civil Rights, and the Constitution: The Original Sense of the Privileges or Immunities Clause (2015) and a large number of articles and essays on constitutional theory and the Fourteenth Amendment, including the two-part Original Sense of the (Equal) Protection Clause and Clarity and Reasonable Doubt in Early State-Constitutional Judicial Review. He is an affiliated scholar with the University of San Diego Center for the Study of Constitutional Originalism.
U.S. Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit
Born 1971 in Fort Wayne, IN
Federal Judicial Service:
Judge, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit
Nominated by Donald J. Trump on February 15, 2018, to a seat vacated by Richard Allen Posner. Confirmed by the Senate on May 14, 2018, and received commission on May 21, 2018.
Education:
St. Joseph’s College, Rensselaer, Indiana, B.B.A., 1993
Northwestern University School of Law, J.D., 1998
Professional Career:
Law clerk, Hon. Paul V. Niemeyer, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, 1998-1999
Law clerk, Hon. Anthony M. Kennedy, Supreme Court of the United States, 1999-2000
Private practice, Cleveland, Ohio, 2000-2002
Assistant U.S. attorney, Southern District of New York, 2002-2006
Counselor to the deputy attorney general, U.S. Department of Justice, 2006
Associate counsel, President George W. Bush, 2007
General counsel, National Security Council, and senior associate counsel, President George W. Bush, 2007-2009
Private practice, Chicago, Illinois, 2009-2018
Professor of Law, University of Wisconsin School of Law
Miriam Seifter's research and teaching interests include administrative law, federalism, state and local government law, energy law, and property law. Her recent work focuses on executive power and the separation of powers at the state level, and on the role of states and interest groups in the federal regulatory process. Her publications appear or are forthcoming in the Harvard Law Review, the NYU Law Review, the UCLA Law Review, and the Virginia Law Review, among others. In 2017, UW Law students honored Professor Seifter with the Classroom Teacher of the Year Award, and in 2018, she received one of twelve Distinguished Teaching Awards from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. For her article Gubernatorial Administration, Seifter was named the 2017 winner of the American Constitution Society's Richard D. Cudahy Writing Competition on Regulatory and Administrative Law.
Professor Seifter received a B.A. magna cum laude from Yale University, an M.Sc. with distinction from Oxford University, and a J.D. magna cum laude from Harvard Law School, where she was the Environmental Fellow and an Articles Editor on the Harvard Law Review. After law school, she served as a law clerk for Chief Judge Merrick Garland on the D.C. Circuit and for Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg at the Supreme Court of the United States. Prior to joining the UW Law faculty, she was a Visiting Researcher and Adjunct Professor of Law at Georgetown University Law Center and worked in private practice at Munger, Tolles & Olson LLP in San Francisco.
Chief Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit
JEFFREY S. SUTTON is the Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. He has served as Chair of the Federal Judicial Conference Committee on Rules of Practice and Procedure, Chair of the Advisory Committee on Appellate Rules, and Chair of the Supreme Court Fellows Commission. He currently serves as Chair of the Executive Committee of the Judicial Conference of the United States. Since 1993, Chief Judge Sutton has been an adjunct professor at The Ohio State University College of Law, where he teaches seminars on State Constitutional Law, the United States Supreme Court, and Appellate Advocacy. He also teaches a class on State Constitutional Law at Harvard Law School. Among other publications, he is the author of Who Decides? States as Laboratories of Constitutional Experimentation and 51 Imperfect Solutions: States and the Making of American Constitutional Law. He is the co-author of a casebook, State Constitutional Law: The Modern Experience, as well as The Law of Judicial Precedent. He is also the co-editor of The Essential Scalia: On the Constitution, the Courts, and the Rule of Law. In 2006, Chief Judge Sutton was elected to the American Law Institute, and in 2017 he was elected to its Council.
Former President & CEO, The Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies
Eugene B. Meyer, former President and CEO of the Federalist Society, has served as Executive Director, CEO, and/or President of the organization for more than 40 years. He is responsible for shepherding the organization from a small group of law students to a community of 90,000 lawyers, law students, academics, judges, and others interested in the rule of law. The Society now includes a Student Chapter at nearly every ABA-accredited law school in the country and Lawyers Chapters in 220 major cities across the nation. Gene earned his B.A. in history at Yale in 1975 and his M.A. in political science from the London School of Economics in 1976. Gene currently serves on the boards of the U.S. Chess Center, the Holman Foundation, the Sarah Scaife Foundation, and the advisory board of the Adam Smith Society. He holds the title of International Chess Master.
Chief Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit
JEFFREY S. SUTTON is the Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. He has served as Chair of the Federal Judicial Conference Committee on Rules of Practice and Procedure, Chair of the Advisory Committee on Appellate Rules, and Chair of the Supreme Court Fellows Commission. He currently serves as Chair of the Executive Committee of the Judicial Conference of the United States. Since 1993, Chief Judge Sutton has been an adjunct professor at The Ohio State University College of Law, where he teaches seminars on State Constitutional Law, the United States Supreme Court, and Appellate Advocacy. He also teaches a class on State Constitutional Law at Harvard Law School. Among other publications, he is the author of Who Decides? States as Laboratories of Constitutional Experimentation and 51 Imperfect Solutions: States and the Making of American Constitutional Law. He is the co-author of a casebook, State Constitutional Law: The Modern Experience, as well as The Law of Judicial Precedent. He is also the co-editor of The Essential Scalia: On the Constitution, the Courts, and the Rule of Law. In 2006, Chief Judge Sutton was elected to the American Law Institute, and in 2017 he was elected to its Council.
Former President & CEO, The Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies
Eugene B. Meyer, former President and CEO of the Federalist Society, has served as Executive Director, CEO, and/or President of the organization for more than 40 years. He is responsible for shepherding the organization from a small group of law students to a community of 90,000 lawyers, law students, academics, judges, and others interested in the rule of law. The Society now includes a Student Chapter at nearly every ABA-accredited law school in the country and Lawyers Chapters in 220 major cities across the nation. Gene earned his B.A. in history at Yale in 1975 and his M.A. in political science from the London School of Economics in 1976. Gene currently serves on the boards of the U.S. Chess Center, the Holman Foundation, the Sarah Scaife Foundation, and the advisory board of the Adam Smith Society. He holds the title of International Chess Master.
Chief Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit
JEFFREY S. SUTTON is the Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. He has served as Chair of the Federal Judicial Conference Committee on Rules of Practice and Procedure, Chair of the Advisory Committee on Appellate Rules, and Chair of the Supreme Court Fellows Commission. He currently serves as Chair of the Executive Committee of the Judicial Conference of the United States. Since 1993, Chief Judge Sutton has been an adjunct professor at The Ohio State University College of Law, where he teaches seminars on State Constitutional Law, the United States Supreme Court, and Appellate Advocacy. He also teaches a class on State Constitutional Law at Harvard Law School. Among other publications, he is the author of Who Decides? States as Laboratories of Constitutional Experimentation and 51 Imperfect Solutions: States and the Making of American Constitutional Law. He is the co-author of a casebook, State Constitutional Law: The Modern Experience, as well as The Law of Judicial Precedent. He is also the co-editor of The Essential Scalia: On the Constitution, the Courts, and the Rule of Law. In 2006, Chief Judge Sutton was elected to the American Law Institute, and in 2017 he was elected to its Council.
U.S. Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit
Sandra Segal Ikuta was confirmed as a judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit on June 19, 2006. She filled a judgeship vacant since September 1, 2000, when Chief Judge Emeritus James R. Browning took senior status.
Before becoming a U.S. Circuit Judge, California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger appointed her to be deputy secretary and general counsel of the California Resources Agency in January 2004.
Prior to her political appointment, Judge Ikuta was a partner at the Los Angeles office of O'Melveny & Myers LLP. She joined the law firm in 1990 as an associate and became a partner in 1997. She specialized in environmental and natural resources law and co-chaired the firm's environmental practice group. She previously served as a law clerk for U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, 1989-90, and Judge Alex Kozinski of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, 1988-89.
Prior to her legal career, Judge Ikuta took an unorthodox career path, which included serving as the first female editor-in-chief of a national martial arts magazine.
She received her J.D. from the University of California at Los Angeles School of Law and a Master of Science from Columbia University School of Journalism. She earned her undergraduate degree from the University of California at Berkeley in 1976.
In addition to her duties as an active U.S. Circuit Judge, Judge Ikuta was an appointed member of the Judicial Conference of the U.S. Advisory Committee on Bankruptcy Rules.
President, Becket Fund for Religious Liberty; Professor of Law and Co-Director of the Center for Religious Liberty, Catholic University; Visiting Professor, Harvard Law School
Mark joined the Becket team in 2011 and splits his time as Associate Professor at The Catholic University of America, Columbus School of Law, and as Visiting Professor at Harvard Law School. Mark teaches constitutional law, religious liberty, torts, and evidence. He has been voted Teacher of the Year three years in a row by the Law School’s Student Bar Association.
Mark has broad experience litigating First Amendment religious exercise and free speech cases. He has represented the winning parties in a variety of Supreme Court First Amendment cases including Hobby Lobby, Little Sisters, Wheaton College, and Holt. In January 2014, Mark argued before the Supreme Court in McCullen v. Coakley, a First Amendment challenge to a Massachusetts speech restriction outside of abortion clinics. The Justices ruled in favor of his clients 9-0. Mark also led a successful eight-year litigation battle against Governor Blagojevich’s effort to force religious pharmacists to distribute the morning-after and week-after pills.
Mark’s academic writing focuses on the First and Fourteenth Amendments, and has appeared in a variety of prestigious journals, including the Harvard Law Review.
Mark is a widely sought after speaker on constitutional issues, particularly concerning abortion and the First Amendment. Professor Rienzi has been invited to discuss these issues at Harvard Law School, Columbia University Law School, Georgetown University Law Center, Boston College Law School, Notre Dame Law School, the National Press Club, and the Capitol. He has been quoted on constitutional law issues on NPR, in the Washington Times, The New York Daily News, and the Chicago Sun-Times. Mark has also been featured on the Kelly File, Fox News Sunday, Your World with Neil Cavuto, Geraldo at Large, CNN Tonight, CNN Live, Andrea Mitchell Reports, and Wall Street Journal Live.
Prior to joining Becket, Mark served as counsel for the litigation department and the intellectual property litigation practice group of WilmerHale LLP. His practice focused on complex civil and appellate litigation with a particular emphasis on intellectual property and First Amendment issues. Prior to joining WilmerHale, he served as law clerk to the Hon. Stephen F. Williams, senior circuit judge for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. Prior to that, Mark was an editor of the Harvard Law Review, and earned his J.D. from Harvard Law School and B.A. from Princeton University, both with honors.
Associate Professor of Legal Studies & Business Ethics, The University of Pennsylvania Wharton School of Business
Amanda Shanor is an Assistant Professor at the University of Pennsylvania Wharton School, where her scholarship focuses on constitutional and administrative law, and in particular the First Amendment.
Shanor is a graduate of Yale Law School and Yale College, and a PhD candidate in law at Yale University. She served as a law clerk to Judges Cornelia T.L. Pillard and Judith W. Rogers on the D.C. Circuit, and Judge Robert W. Sweet in the Southern District of New York. She has taught at both Yale and Georgetown law schools and has published in the New York University Law Review, the Harvard Law Review Forum, and the Yale Law Journal Forum, among others. She is a contributor to Take Care and the co-author of a textbook on counterterrorism law.
Prior to joining the academy, Amanda worked in the National Legal Department of the American Civil Liberties Union on the organization’s Supreme Court litigation, including Masterpiece Cakeshop. Previously, she litigated a number of constitutional and national security cases with Professor David Cole, including Humanitarian Law Project v. Holder, while a fellow at Georgetown.
Thomas M. Siebel Senior Fellow, The Hoover Institution, Stanford University; Gary T. Schwartz Distinguished Professor of Law Emeritus, UCLA School of Law
Eugene Volokh is the Thomas M. Siebel Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution (Stanford), as well as the Gary T. Schwartz Distinguished Professor of Law Emeritus and Distinguished Research Professor at UCLA School of Law. He recently retired from teaching at UCLA, after 30 years there, and is now focusing on research.
Volokh is the author of the textbooks The First Amendment and Related Statutes (8th ed. 2023), and Academic Legal Writing (5th ed. 2016), as well as over 100 academic law journal articles, mostly on First Amendment law. He is a member of The American Law Institute; the editor-in-chief of the Journal of Free Speech Law; and the creator and coauthor of The Volokh Conspiracy, a leading legal blog founded in 2002 (hosted at the Washington Post from 2014 to 2017 and now at Reason Magazine).
Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit
Judge Carlos Bea serves as a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. He received his Bachelor's Degree from Stanford University in 1956 and his J.D. from Stanford Law School in 1958. Judge Bea was born in San Sebastian, Spain, and immigrated with his family to Cuba in 1939. In 1952, he represented Cuba on the Cuban National basketball team in the Helsinki Olympics. Judge Bea became a naturalized citizen of the United States in 1958. He engaged in private practice in San Francisco, principally in the area of civil trials (jury and non-jury), from 1959-75 at Dunne, Phelps & Mills and from 1975-90 at Carlos Bea, A Law Corporation. He taught courses in civil litigation advocacy at Hastings College of Law and Stanford Law School. From 1990 to 2003, Judge Bea served as a judge of the San Francisco Superior Court. He was nominated by President George W. Bush to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and was confirmed in 2003.
Judge Bea and his wife Louise reside in San Francisco, where they raised their four sons, Sebastian, Alexander, Nicholas, and Dominic.
Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Third Circuit
Judge Hardiman was appointed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit on January 9, 2007 and was confirmed by the Senate (95-0) on March 15, 2007. Prior to becoming an appellate judge, Judge Hardiman served as a trial judge on the United States District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania as of November 1, 2003. In 2008, Chief Justice John Roberts appointed Judge Hardiman to the Information Technology Committee of the Judicial Conference of the United States. Judge Hardiman was appointed Chairman of the IT Committee in 2013 and served in that capacity until September 2021. In 2021 he was appointed by the Director of the Administrative Office of the United States Courts to serve as Chair of the Judiciary IT Security Task Force, which completed its work in fall 2023. Chief Justice Roberts appointed Judge Hardiman to the Board of the Federal Judicial Center to serve from March 2020 until March 2024. As part of his work with the Center, Judge Hardiman now serves as Editor in Chief for the Manual for Complex Civil Litigation, Fifth.
Before entering judicial service, Judge Hardiman handled a wide variety of litigation matters in state and federal trial and appellate courts as a partner at Reed Smith LLP (1999-2003), a partner at Titus & McConomy LLP (1996-1999), and as an associate with its predecessor firm, Cindrich & Titus (1992-1996). Judge Hardiman began his legal career as an associate in the Washington, D.C. office of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom (1990-1992).
A 1987 honors graduate of the University of Notre Dame, Judge Hardiman received his law degree in 1990 from the Georgetown University Law Center, where he served as a Notes and Comments Editor on the Georgetown Law Journal. In 2012, Judge Hardiman was elected as a member of the American Law Institute and was elected to its Council in 2019 and its Executive Committee in 2025. Judge Hardiman regularly teaches a seminar on Advanced Constitutional Law at Duquesne University School of Law and a one-week course entitled “Constitutional Law: the First and Second Amendments” at Georgetown University Law Center.
A native of Waltham, Massachusetts, Judge Hardiman has chambers in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He and his wife Lori married in 1992 and have three children.
Former United States Attorney General
Michael B. Mukasey is the former Attorney General of the United States, the nation’s chief law enforcement officer. As Attorney General from November 2007 to January 2009, he oversaw the U.S. Department of Justice and advised on critical issues of domestic and international law.
From 1988 to 2006, Judge Mukasey served as a district judge in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, becoming Chief Judge in 2000.
From 1972 to 1976, Judge Mukasey served as an Assistant United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, and as Chief of the Official Corruption Unit from 1975 to 1976. His practice consisted of criminal litigation on behalf of the government, including investigation and prosecution of narcotics, bank robbery, interstate theft, securities fraud, fraud on the government and bribery. From 1976 to 1987 and from 2006 to 2007 he was in private practice.
Judge Mukasey has received numerous honors, including the Federal Bar Council’s Learned Hand Medal for Excellence in Federal Jurisprudence. He served as Chairman of the Committee on Public Access to Information and Proceedings of the New York Bar Association from 1984 to 1987. He served on the Federal Courts Committee of the Association of the Bar of the City of New York from 1979 to 1982 and its Communications Law Committee from 1983 to 1986. Judge Mukasey was also a part-time lecturer at Columbia School of Law from January 1993 to May 2007, teaching trial advocacy.
He received his LL.B. from Yale Law School in 1967 and his B.A. from Columbia College in 1963.
Chief Judge, U.S. District Court, District of Rhode Island
William Edward Smith is the Chief United States District Judge of the United States District Court for the District of Rhode Island. Prior to his appointment to the bench, Judge Smith was a partner at Edwards & Angell practicing labor and employment law.
Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit
Amul R. Thapar serves as a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. His judicial career began in 2007 when President George W. Bush nominated him to serve on the Eastern District of Kentucky, making him the first South Asian Article III judge in American history. In 2017, he became President Donald J. Trump’s first appellate court nominee.
Before joining the bench, Judge Thapar served as the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Kentucky. While United States Attorney, Judge Thapar worked on the Attorney General’s Advisory Committee (“AGAC”) and chaired the AGAC’s Controlled Substances and Asset Forfeiture subcommittee. He also served on the Terrorism and National Security subcommittee, the Violent Crime subcommittee, and the Child Exploitation working group.
Judge Thapar has worked in private practice, at Williams & Connolly in Washington, D.C., and Squire, Sanders & Dempsey in Cincinnati, Ohio. He also served as an Assistant United States Attorney in both the Southern District of Ohio and the District of Columbia.
Judge Thapar received his undergraduate degree from Boston College and his law degree from the University of California, Berkeley. After graduating, Judge Thapar worked as a law clerk to the Honorable S. Arthur Spiegel of the United States District Court for the Southern District of Ohio, and the Honorable Nathaniel R. Jones of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit.
Judge Thapar has also published in the Yale Law Journal, Michigan Law Review, and Catholic University Law Review. He teaches courses on originalism, the Federalists and Anti-Federalists, and legal writing at Notre Dame Law School, the University of Virginia School of Law, and Vanderbilt Law School.
Executive Vice President and Strategic Counselor, Blacklake Group
Jim Haynes is Executive Vice President and Strategic Counselor of Blacklake Group (a privately held holding company) and concurrently advises several early and mid-stage privately held emerging technology companies, Nichols Law, and the Torridon Group.
Twice a partner in a major national law firm, Jim also previously served as a corporate executive at four public companies: General Dynamics Corporation (as Staff Vice President and Associate General Counsel from 1996-1999), Chevron Corporation (as Chief Corporate Counsel from 2008-2012); Siga Technologies, Inc. (as EVP & General Counsel from 2012-2016); and CSRA Inc. (as EVP, General Counsel & Corporate Secretary from 2016-2018, at the end of which the company was acquired for $9.7B.)
Jim has held two presidentially appointed offices requiring Senate confirmation: General Counsel of the Department of the Army from 1990-1993, and General Counsel of the Department of Defense from 2001-2008. Chief Legal Officer and Designated Agency Ethics Officer of both departments during highly consequential times, Jim also served as Director of the Defense Legal Services Agency from 2001-2008.
Jim earned degrees from Davidson College and Harvard Law School, and holds an honorary Doctor of Laws from Stetson Law School. After a judicial clerkship with Judge James B. McMillan (USDJ, WDNC), Jim served four years on active duty in the U.S. Army. He is the recipient of a significant number of awards and medals from the Departments of Defense, Justice, Army, Navy, and Air Force. Jim holds a patent issued in 2025: https://patents.justia.com/patent/12367458.
For several months in 1999, Jim worked in Almaty, Kazakhstan, volunteering assistance for Mercy Corps International in managing microcredit services across six countries in Central Asia. A former Eagle Scout, Jim served on the Board of Directors of the Greater New York City Councils of the Boy Scouts of America from 2013-2023. He has served as director or advisor on many other boards.
He currently is a director or trustee of three boards: Labrynth (labrynth.ai), the Supreme Court Historical Society, and the William T. Coleman, Jr. Foundation.
Partner, Sullivan & Cromwell LLP
Eric Kadel is engaged in a wide variety of corporate, transactional and regulatory matters. He is a member of the Firm’s Corporate and Finance, Financial Services, Investment Management, Alternative Investment Management, Cybersecurity, and Commodities, Futures and Derivatives Groups. With regard to financings, Mr. Kadel regularly represents participants in capital markets transactions, and dealers and end users in connection with structuring and documenting a wide variety of swaps and other derivatives, including equity, credit default and commodity swaps, options and forwards. Mr. Kadel’s work in the investment management area includes advising public and private investment companies and investment advisers on a wide variety of transactional, regulatory, compliance and other matters, including registration and regulation. Mr. Kadel also advises clients of the Firm regarding developments in the laws regulating the financial services industry and on cybersecurity issues. Mr. Kadel is currently an adjunct professor at George Washington University Law School.
In addition, Mr. Kadel is one of the principal partners in the Firm’s International Trade and Investment practice. He counsels and represents clients on questions about U.S. economic sanctions, including those administered by the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”), United States antiboycott requirements under the Export Administration Regulations administered and enforced by the Commerce Department’s Office of Antiboycott Compliance within the Bureau of Industry and Security, Bank Secrecy Act/anti‐money laundering laws and the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (“FCPA”). Mr. Kadel’s practice includes analysis of proposed transactions and business relationships; due diligence and design and review of compliance procedures and strategies; and internal investigations, voluntary disclosures and government enforcement actions. Mr. Kadel also regularly advises clients regarding questions arising under Exon-Florio and the transaction review process administered by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (“CFIUS”), and has represented clients before CFIUS on many national security reviews.
Partner, Mayer Brown
Prof. Tim Keeler, an attorney in the Government and International Trade Group, joined Mayer Brown in 2009, and brings an in-depth knowledge of international trade law and economic policy matters, and a history of working in the Executive Branch and Congress on major economic, legislative and regulatory issues.
Prior to joining Mayer Brown, Professor Keeler served in a variety of senior positions in the U.S. Government for almost 12 years. Most recently he was the Chief of Staff in the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) from 2006 - 2009, where he oversaw implementation of U.S. policy, strategy and negotiations involving all aspects of international trade and investment matters. He worked on a number of key issues including: climate change and trade; US and China relations; WTO negotiations and litigation; free trade agreement negotiations and implementation; and CFIUS decisions.
Before working for USTR, Prof. Keeler spent more than five years at the Treasury Department from 2001 – 2006. He joined the Office of Legislative Affairs in 2001 as a Deputy to the Assistant Secretary for International Issues, where he was responsible for Treasury’s legislative strategy on issues including capital market sanctions, foreign exchange rate policy testimony, appropriations for U.S. agreements to replenish the World Bank and other Multilateral Development Banks, multilateral debt relief, and U.S. participation in the International Monetary Fund. He later managed the Office of Legislative Affairs from 2002 - 2006 and assisted on all policy and personnel issues in the Office. This included leading Treasury nominees through the U.S. Senate confirmation process, legislative strategy on Treasury Intelligence and Terrorist Financing matters, and advising on major economic legislative initiatives such as the 2003 tax cuts and social security reform proposals.
Prof. Keeler also served on the Presidential Transition Team in 2000–2001 as a policy coordinator on export control and trade remedy policy, handling the Commerce Department’s Bureau of Export Administration (now called the Bureau of Industry and Security) and the International Trade Commission (ITC).
Earlier in his career, Prof. Keeler served as a professional staff member for international trade on the US Senate Finance Committee under Chairman William V. Roth (R-DE). There he worked on legislation establishing permanent normal trade relations (PNTR) between the U.S. and China, preferential trade programs for Sub-Saharan Africa (the African Growth and Opportunity Act) and the Caribbean basin, the Generalized System of Preferences, legislation to bring the U.S. into compliance with the WTO decision on the Foreign Sales Corporation provisions of the Internal Revenue Code, and the miscellaneous tariff bill.
In recognition of his government service, Prof. Keeler was awarded the USTR Distinguished Service Award, the Treasury Distinguished Service Award, and the Treasury Secretary’s Honor Award twice.
Prof. Keeler is also an adjunct professor at the Georgetown University School of Law, co-teaching a course on U.S. and WTO law, policy, and politics; is a member of the Board of Directors of the Washington International Trade Foundation; and is a term member of the Council on Foreign Relations. Prof. Keeler has spoken at conferences on international trade and economic issues sponsored by, inter alia, the American Bar Association (Climate Change and Trade, March 2009), the Korea Economic Institute (the U.S. – Korea Free Trade Agreement, October 2010), and the U.S.-China Business Council (Sec. 421 tires safeguard case, July 2009; and the U.S. – China Economic and Political Relationship, January 2010).
Co-Chair, NYU Center for Cybersecurity; Distinguished Fellow, Center on Law and Security; Professor of Practice, New York University School of Law
Randal Milch is the Co-Chair of the NYU Center for Cybersecurity, a Distinguished Fellow at the Center on Law and Security, and a Professor of Practice at NYU School of Law. He was most recently executive vice president and strategic policy adviser to Verizon’s chairman and CEO. He served as the company’s general counsel from 2008 to 2014, and before that was general counsel of several business divisions within Verizon. At Verizon, Milch chaired the Verizon Executive Security Council, which was responsible for information security across all Verizon entities. Milch was responsible for national security matters at Verizon beginning in 2006, and has served as the senior cleared executive at Verizon. Earlier in his career, Milch was a partner in the Washington, DC office of Donovan Leisure Newton & Irvine. Milch holds a JD from New York University School of Law and a BA from Yale University.
Executive Vice President, General Counsel, and Corporate Secretary, Qualcomm
Donald J. Rosenberg is executive vice president, general counsel and corporate secretary of Qualcomm Incorporated. Mr. Rosenberg reports directly to CEO Steve Mollenkopf and is a member of the company's Executive Committee. In his role as chief legal officer, he is responsible for overseeing Qualcomm's worldwide legal affairs including litigation, intellectual property and corporate matters. Qualcomm's Government Affairs, Internal Audit and Compliance organizations also report to him.
Prior to joining Qualcomm, Mr. Rosenberg served as senior vice president, general counsel and corporate secretary of Apple Inc. Prior to that, he was senior vice president and general counsel of IBM Corporation where he had also held numerous positions including vice president and assistant general counsel for litigation and counsel to IBM's mainframe division.
Mr. Rosenberg has had extensive experience in corporate governance, compliance, law department management, litigation, securities regulation, intellectual property and competition issues.
Mr. Rosenberg is a board member of NuVasive, Inc., Corporate Directors Forum, CONNECT, La Jolla Music Society, La Jolla Playhouse and a trustee of Rady Children's Hospital San Diego and the Sanford Burnham Prebys Medical Discovery Institute. He is immediate past National Co-Chairman of the Board of the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, where he continues to serve on the Board and the Executive Committee.
Mr. Rosenberg is a member of the International Advisory Board, University of California San Diego (UCSD) School of Global Policy and Strategy. He is also a member of the China Leadership Board for the 21st Century China Center at the UCSD. He has served as an adjunct professor of law at New York's Pace University School of Law, where he taught courses in intellectual property and antitrust law.
Mr. Rosenberg received a Bachelor of Science degree in mathematics from the State University of New York at Stony Brook and his juris doctor from St. John's University School of Law.
Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit
Judge Carlos Bea serves as a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. He received his Bachelor's Degree from Stanford University in 1956 and his J.D. from Stanford Law School in 1958. Judge Bea was born in San Sebastian, Spain, and immigrated with his family to Cuba in 1939. In 1952, he represented Cuba on the Cuban National basketball team in the Helsinki Olympics. Judge Bea became a naturalized citizen of the United States in 1958. He engaged in private practice in San Francisco, principally in the area of civil trials (jury and non-jury), from 1959-75 at Dunne, Phelps & Mills and from 1975-90 at Carlos Bea, A Law Corporation. He taught courses in civil litigation advocacy at Hastings College of Law and Stanford Law School. From 1990 to 2003, Judge Bea served as a judge of the San Francisco Superior Court. He was nominated by President George W. Bush to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and was confirmed in 2003.
Judge Bea and his wife Louise reside in San Francisco, where they raised their four sons, Sebastian, Alexander, Nicholas, and Dominic.
Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Third Circuit
Judge Hardiman was appointed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit on January 9, 2007 and was confirmed by the Senate (95-0) on March 15, 2007. Prior to becoming an appellate judge, Judge Hardiman served as a trial judge on the United States District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania as of November 1, 2003. In 2008, Chief Justice John Roberts appointed Judge Hardiman to the Information Technology Committee of the Judicial Conference of the United States. Judge Hardiman was appointed Chairman of the IT Committee in 2013 and served in that capacity until September 2021. In 2021 he was appointed by the Director of the Administrative Office of the United States Courts to serve as Chair of the Judiciary IT Security Task Force, which completed its work in fall 2023. Chief Justice Roberts appointed Judge Hardiman to the Board of the Federal Judicial Center to serve from March 2020 until March 2024. As part of his work with the Center, Judge Hardiman now serves as Editor in Chief for the Manual for Complex Civil Litigation, Fifth.
Before entering judicial service, Judge Hardiman handled a wide variety of litigation matters in state and federal trial and appellate courts as a partner at Reed Smith LLP (1999-2003), a partner at Titus & McConomy LLP (1996-1999), and as an associate with its predecessor firm, Cindrich & Titus (1992-1996). Judge Hardiman began his legal career as an associate in the Washington, D.C. office of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom (1990-1992).
A 1987 honors graduate of the University of Notre Dame, Judge Hardiman received his law degree in 1990 from the Georgetown University Law Center, where he served as a Notes and Comments Editor on the Georgetown Law Journal. In 2012, Judge Hardiman was elected as a member of the American Law Institute and was elected to its Council in 2019 and its Executive Committee in 2025. Judge Hardiman regularly teaches a seminar on Advanced Constitutional Law at Duquesne University School of Law and a one-week course entitled “Constitutional Law: the First and Second Amendments” at Georgetown University Law Center.
A native of Waltham, Massachusetts, Judge Hardiman has chambers in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He and his wife Lori married in 1992 and have three children.
Former United States Attorney General
Michael B. Mukasey is the former Attorney General of the United States, the nation’s chief law enforcement officer. As Attorney General from November 2007 to January 2009, he oversaw the U.S. Department of Justice and advised on critical issues of domestic and international law.
From 1988 to 2006, Judge Mukasey served as a district judge in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, becoming Chief Judge in 2000.
From 1972 to 1976, Judge Mukasey served as an Assistant United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, and as Chief of the Official Corruption Unit from 1975 to 1976. His practice consisted of criminal litigation on behalf of the government, including investigation and prosecution of narcotics, bank robbery, interstate theft, securities fraud, fraud on the government and bribery. From 1976 to 1987 and from 2006 to 2007 he was in private practice.
Judge Mukasey has received numerous honors, including the Federal Bar Council’s Learned Hand Medal for Excellence in Federal Jurisprudence. He served as Chairman of the Committee on Public Access to Information and Proceedings of the New York Bar Association from 1984 to 1987. He served on the Federal Courts Committee of the Association of the Bar of the City of New York from 1979 to 1982 and its Communications Law Committee from 1983 to 1986. Judge Mukasey was also a part-time lecturer at Columbia School of Law from January 1993 to May 2007, teaching trial advocacy.
He received his LL.B. from Yale Law School in 1967 and his B.A. from Columbia College in 1963.
Chief Judge, U.S. District Court, District of Rhode Island
William Edward Smith is the Chief United States District Judge of the United States District Court for the District of Rhode Island. Prior to his appointment to the bench, Judge Smith was a partner at Edwards & Angell practicing labor and employment law.
Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit
Amul R. Thapar serves as a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. His judicial career began in 2007 when President George W. Bush nominated him to serve on the Eastern District of Kentucky, making him the first South Asian Article III judge in American history. In 2017, he became President Donald J. Trump’s first appellate court nominee.
Before joining the bench, Judge Thapar served as the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Kentucky. While United States Attorney, Judge Thapar worked on the Attorney General’s Advisory Committee (“AGAC”) and chaired the AGAC’s Controlled Substances and Asset Forfeiture subcommittee. He also served on the Terrorism and National Security subcommittee, the Violent Crime subcommittee, and the Child Exploitation working group.
Judge Thapar has worked in private practice, at Williams & Connolly in Washington, D.C., and Squire, Sanders & Dempsey in Cincinnati, Ohio. He also served as an Assistant United States Attorney in both the Southern District of Ohio and the District of Columbia.
Judge Thapar received his undergraduate degree from Boston College and his law degree from the University of California, Berkeley. After graduating, Judge Thapar worked as a law clerk to the Honorable S. Arthur Spiegel of the United States District Court for the Southern District of Ohio, and the Honorable Nathaniel R. Jones of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit.
Judge Thapar has also published in the Yale Law Journal, Michigan Law Review, and Catholic University Law Review. He teaches courses on originalism, the Federalists and Anti-Federalists, and legal writing at Notre Dame Law School, the University of Virginia School of Law, and Vanderbilt Law School.
Executive Vice President and Strategic Counselor, Blacklake Group
Jim Haynes is Executive Vice President and Strategic Counselor of Blacklake Group (a privately held holding company) and concurrently advises several early and mid-stage privately held emerging technology companies, Nichols Law, and the Torridon Group.
Twice a partner in a major national law firm, Jim also previously served as a corporate executive at four public companies: General Dynamics Corporation (as Staff Vice President and Associate General Counsel from 1996-1999), Chevron Corporation (as Chief Corporate Counsel from 2008-2012); Siga Technologies, Inc. (as EVP & General Counsel from 2012-2016); and CSRA Inc. (as EVP, General Counsel & Corporate Secretary from 2016-2018, at the end of which the company was acquired for $9.7B.)
Jim has held two presidentially appointed offices requiring Senate confirmation: General Counsel of the Department of the Army from 1990-1993, and General Counsel of the Department of Defense from 2001-2008. Chief Legal Officer and Designated Agency Ethics Officer of both departments during highly consequential times, Jim also served as Director of the Defense Legal Services Agency from 2001-2008.
Jim earned degrees from Davidson College and Harvard Law School, and holds an honorary Doctor of Laws from Stetson Law School. After a judicial clerkship with Judge James B. McMillan (USDJ, WDNC), Jim served four years on active duty in the U.S. Army. He is the recipient of a significant number of awards and medals from the Departments of Defense, Justice, Army, Navy, and Air Force. Jim holds a patent issued in 2025: https://patents.justia.com/patent/12367458.
For several months in 1999, Jim worked in Almaty, Kazakhstan, volunteering assistance for Mercy Corps International in managing microcredit services across six countries in Central Asia. A former Eagle Scout, Jim served on the Board of Directors of the Greater New York City Councils of the Boy Scouts of America from 2013-2023. He has served as director or advisor on many other boards.
He currently is a director or trustee of three boards: Labrynth (labrynth.ai), the Supreme Court Historical Society, and the William T. Coleman, Jr. Foundation.
Partner, Sullivan & Cromwell LLP
Eric Kadel is engaged in a wide variety of corporate, transactional and regulatory matters. He is a member of the Firm’s Corporate and Finance, Financial Services, Investment Management, Alternative Investment Management, Cybersecurity, and Commodities, Futures and Derivatives Groups. With regard to financings, Mr. Kadel regularly represents participants in capital markets transactions, and dealers and end users in connection with structuring and documenting a wide variety of swaps and other derivatives, including equity, credit default and commodity swaps, options and forwards. Mr. Kadel’s work in the investment management area includes advising public and private investment companies and investment advisers on a wide variety of transactional, regulatory, compliance and other matters, including registration and regulation. Mr. Kadel also advises clients of the Firm regarding developments in the laws regulating the financial services industry and on cybersecurity issues. Mr. Kadel is currently an adjunct professor at George Washington University Law School.
In addition, Mr. Kadel is one of the principal partners in the Firm’s International Trade and Investment practice. He counsels and represents clients on questions about U.S. economic sanctions, including those administered by the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”), United States antiboycott requirements under the Export Administration Regulations administered and enforced by the Commerce Department’s Office of Antiboycott Compliance within the Bureau of Industry and Security, Bank Secrecy Act/anti‐money laundering laws and the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (“FCPA”). Mr. Kadel’s practice includes analysis of proposed transactions and business relationships; due diligence and design and review of compliance procedures and strategies; and internal investigations, voluntary disclosures and government enforcement actions. Mr. Kadel also regularly advises clients regarding questions arising under Exon-Florio and the transaction review process administered by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (“CFIUS”), and has represented clients before CFIUS on many national security reviews.
Partner, Mayer Brown
Prof. Tim Keeler, an attorney in the Government and International Trade Group, joined Mayer Brown in 2009, and brings an in-depth knowledge of international trade law and economic policy matters, and a history of working in the Executive Branch and Congress on major economic, legislative and regulatory issues.
Prior to joining Mayer Brown, Professor Keeler served in a variety of senior positions in the U.S. Government for almost 12 years. Most recently he was the Chief of Staff in the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) from 2006 - 2009, where he oversaw implementation of U.S. policy, strategy and negotiations involving all aspects of international trade and investment matters. He worked on a number of key issues including: climate change and trade; US and China relations; WTO negotiations and litigation; free trade agreement negotiations and implementation; and CFIUS decisions.
Before working for USTR, Prof. Keeler spent more than five years at the Treasury Department from 2001 – 2006. He joined the Office of Legislative Affairs in 2001 as a Deputy to the Assistant Secretary for International Issues, where he was responsible for Treasury’s legislative strategy on issues including capital market sanctions, foreign exchange rate policy testimony, appropriations for U.S. agreements to replenish the World Bank and other Multilateral Development Banks, multilateral debt relief, and U.S. participation in the International Monetary Fund. He later managed the Office of Legislative Affairs from 2002 - 2006 and assisted on all policy and personnel issues in the Office. This included leading Treasury nominees through the U.S. Senate confirmation process, legislative strategy on Treasury Intelligence and Terrorist Financing matters, and advising on major economic legislative initiatives such as the 2003 tax cuts and social security reform proposals.
Prof. Keeler also served on the Presidential Transition Team in 2000–2001 as a policy coordinator on export control and trade remedy policy, handling the Commerce Department’s Bureau of Export Administration (now called the Bureau of Industry and Security) and the International Trade Commission (ITC).
Earlier in his career, Prof. Keeler served as a professional staff member for international trade on the US Senate Finance Committee under Chairman William V. Roth (R-DE). There he worked on legislation establishing permanent normal trade relations (PNTR) between the U.S. and China, preferential trade programs for Sub-Saharan Africa (the African Growth and Opportunity Act) and the Caribbean basin, the Generalized System of Preferences, legislation to bring the U.S. into compliance with the WTO decision on the Foreign Sales Corporation provisions of the Internal Revenue Code, and the miscellaneous tariff bill.
In recognition of his government service, Prof. Keeler was awarded the USTR Distinguished Service Award, the Treasury Distinguished Service Award, and the Treasury Secretary’s Honor Award twice.
Prof. Keeler is also an adjunct professor at the Georgetown University School of Law, co-teaching a course on U.S. and WTO law, policy, and politics; is a member of the Board of Directors of the Washington International Trade Foundation; and is a term member of the Council on Foreign Relations. Prof. Keeler has spoken at conferences on international trade and economic issues sponsored by, inter alia, the American Bar Association (Climate Change and Trade, March 2009), the Korea Economic Institute (the U.S. – Korea Free Trade Agreement, October 2010), and the U.S.-China Business Council (Sec. 421 tires safeguard case, July 2009; and the U.S. – China Economic and Political Relationship, January 2010).
Co-Chair, NYU Center for Cybersecurity; Distinguished Fellow, Center on Law and Security; Professor of Practice, New York University School of Law
Randal Milch is the Co-Chair of the NYU Center for Cybersecurity, a Distinguished Fellow at the Center on Law and Security, and a Professor of Practice at NYU School of Law. He was most recently executive vice president and strategic policy adviser to Verizon’s chairman and CEO. He served as the company’s general counsel from 2008 to 2014, and before that was general counsel of several business divisions within Verizon. At Verizon, Milch chaired the Verizon Executive Security Council, which was responsible for information security across all Verizon entities. Milch was responsible for national security matters at Verizon beginning in 2006, and has served as the senior cleared executive at Verizon. Earlier in his career, Milch was a partner in the Washington, DC office of Donovan Leisure Newton & Irvine. Milch holds a JD from New York University School of Law and a BA from Yale University.
Executive Vice President, General Counsel, and Corporate Secretary, Qualcomm
Donald J. Rosenberg is executive vice president, general counsel and corporate secretary of Qualcomm Incorporated. Mr. Rosenberg reports directly to CEO Steve Mollenkopf and is a member of the company's Executive Committee. In his role as chief legal officer, he is responsible for overseeing Qualcomm's worldwide legal affairs including litigation, intellectual property and corporate matters. Qualcomm's Government Affairs, Internal Audit and Compliance organizations also report to him.
Prior to joining Qualcomm, Mr. Rosenberg served as senior vice president, general counsel and corporate secretary of Apple Inc. Prior to that, he was senior vice president and general counsel of IBM Corporation where he had also held numerous positions including vice president and assistant general counsel for litigation and counsel to IBM's mainframe division.
Mr. Rosenberg has had extensive experience in corporate governance, compliance, law department management, litigation, securities regulation, intellectual property and competition issues.
Mr. Rosenberg is a board member of NuVasive, Inc., Corporate Directors Forum, CONNECT, La Jolla Music Society, La Jolla Playhouse and a trustee of Rady Children's Hospital San Diego and the Sanford Burnham Prebys Medical Discovery Institute. He is immediate past National Co-Chairman of the Board of the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, where he continues to serve on the Board and the Executive Committee.
Mr. Rosenberg is a member of the International Advisory Board, University of California San Diego (UCSD) School of Global Policy and Strategy. He is also a member of the China Leadership Board for the 21st Century China Center at the UCSD. He has served as an adjunct professor of law at New York's Pace University School of Law, where he taught courses in intellectual property and antitrust law.
Mr. Rosenberg received a Bachelor of Science degree in mathematics from the State University of New York at Stony Brook and his juris doctor from St. John's University School of Law.
U.S. Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit
Sandra Segal Ikuta was confirmed as a judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit on June 19, 2006. She filled a judgeship vacant since September 1, 2000, when Chief Judge Emeritus James R. Browning took senior status.
Before becoming a U.S. Circuit Judge, California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger appointed her to be deputy secretary and general counsel of the California Resources Agency in January 2004.
Prior to her political appointment, Judge Ikuta was a partner at the Los Angeles office of O'Melveny & Myers LLP. She joined the law firm in 1990 as an associate and became a partner in 1997. She specialized in environmental and natural resources law and co-chaired the firm's environmental practice group. She previously served as a law clerk for U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, 1989-90, and Judge Alex Kozinski of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, 1988-89.
Prior to her legal career, Judge Ikuta took an unorthodox career path, which included serving as the first female editor-in-chief of a national martial arts magazine.
She received her J.D. from the University of California at Los Angeles School of Law and a Master of Science from Columbia University School of Journalism. She earned her undergraduate degree from the University of California at Berkeley in 1976.
In addition to her duties as an active U.S. Circuit Judge, Judge Ikuta was an appointed member of the Judicial Conference of the U.S. Advisory Committee on Bankruptcy Rules.
President, Becket Fund for Religious Liberty; Professor of Law and Co-Director of the Center for Religious Liberty, Catholic University; Visiting Professor, Harvard Law School
Mark joined the Becket team in 2011 and splits his time as Associate Professor at The Catholic University of America, Columbus School of Law, and as Visiting Professor at Harvard Law School. Mark teaches constitutional law, religious liberty, torts, and evidence. He has been voted Teacher of the Year three years in a row by the Law School’s Student Bar Association.
Mark has broad experience litigating First Amendment religious exercise and free speech cases. He has represented the winning parties in a variety of Supreme Court First Amendment cases including Hobby Lobby, Little Sisters, Wheaton College, and Holt. In January 2014, Mark argued before the Supreme Court in McCullen v. Coakley, a First Amendment challenge to a Massachusetts speech restriction outside of abortion clinics. The Justices ruled in favor of his clients 9-0. Mark also led a successful eight-year litigation battle against Governor Blagojevich’s effort to force religious pharmacists to distribute the morning-after and week-after pills.
Mark’s academic writing focuses on the First and Fourteenth Amendments, and has appeared in a variety of prestigious journals, including the Harvard Law Review.
Mark is a widely sought after speaker on constitutional issues, particularly concerning abortion and the First Amendment. Professor Rienzi has been invited to discuss these issues at Harvard Law School, Columbia University Law School, Georgetown University Law Center, Boston College Law School, Notre Dame Law School, the National Press Club, and the Capitol. He has been quoted on constitutional law issues on NPR, in the Washington Times, The New York Daily News, and the Chicago Sun-Times. Mark has also been featured on the Kelly File, Fox News Sunday, Your World with Neil Cavuto, Geraldo at Large, CNN Tonight, CNN Live, Andrea Mitchell Reports, and Wall Street Journal Live.
Prior to joining Becket, Mark served as counsel for the litigation department and the intellectual property litigation practice group of WilmerHale LLP. His practice focused on complex civil and appellate litigation with a particular emphasis on intellectual property and First Amendment issues. Prior to joining WilmerHale, he served as law clerk to the Hon. Stephen F. Williams, senior circuit judge for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. Prior to that, Mark was an editor of the Harvard Law Review, and earned his J.D. from Harvard Law School and B.A. from Princeton University, both with honors.
Associate Professor of Legal Studies & Business Ethics, The University of Pennsylvania Wharton School of Business
Amanda Shanor is an Assistant Professor at the University of Pennsylvania Wharton School, where her scholarship focuses on constitutional and administrative law, and in particular the First Amendment.
Shanor is a graduate of Yale Law School and Yale College, and a PhD candidate in law at Yale University. She served as a law clerk to Judges Cornelia T.L. Pillard and Judith W. Rogers on the D.C. Circuit, and Judge Robert W. Sweet in the Southern District of New York. She has taught at both Yale and Georgetown law schools and has published in the New York University Law Review, the Harvard Law Review Forum, and the Yale Law Journal Forum, among others. She is a contributor to Take Care and the co-author of a textbook on counterterrorism law.
Prior to joining the academy, Amanda worked in the National Legal Department of the American Civil Liberties Union on the organization’s Supreme Court litigation, including Masterpiece Cakeshop. Previously, she litigated a number of constitutional and national security cases with Professor David Cole, including Humanitarian Law Project v. Holder, while a fellow at Georgetown.
Thomas M. Siebel Senior Fellow, The Hoover Institution, Stanford University; Gary T. Schwartz Distinguished Professor of Law Emeritus, UCLA School of Law
Eugene Volokh is the Thomas M. Siebel Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution (Stanford), as well as the Gary T. Schwartz Distinguished Professor of Law Emeritus and Distinguished Research Professor at UCLA School of Law. He recently retired from teaching at UCLA, after 30 years there, and is now focusing on research.
Volokh is the author of the textbooks The First Amendment and Related Statutes (8th ed. 2023), and Academic Legal Writing (5th ed. 2016), as well as over 100 academic law journal articles, mostly on First Amendment law. He is a member of The American Law Institute; the editor-in-chief of the Journal of Free Speech Law; and the creator and coauthor of The Volokh Conspiracy, a leading legal blog founded in 2002 (hosted at the Washington Post from 2014 to 2017 and now at Reason Magazine).
Showcase Panel III: The States & Administrative Law
Nestor Davidson, Christopher R. Green, Michael Scudder, Miriam Seifter, Jeffrey S. Sutton
2018 National Lawyers Convention
We live in a system where regulators make the rules, investigate alleged violations of the...
Showcase Panel III: The States & Administrative Law
Nestor Davidson, Christopher R. Green, Michael Scudder, Miriam Seifter, Jeffrey S. Sutton
2018 National Lawyers Convention
We live in a system where regulators make the rules, investigate alleged violations of the...
18th Annual Barbara K. Olson Memorial Lecture
Eugene B. Meyer, Jeffrey S. Sutton
2018 National Lawyers Convention
On September 11, 2001, at the age of 45 and at the height of her...
18th Annual Barbara K. Olson Memorial Lecture
Eugene B. Meyer, Jeffrey S. Sutton
2018 National Lawyers Convention
On September 11, 2001, at the age of 45 and at the height of her...
Say What You Will?: Government Compelled Speech
Sandra Segal Ikuta, Mark L. Rienzi, Amanda Shanor, Eugene Volokh
2018 National Lawyers Convention
When can the government require you to speak, or to host speech on your property,...
Evolution of the District Courts
Carlos T. Bea, Thomas M. Hardiman, Michael B. Mukasey, William E. Smith, Amul R. Thapar
2018 National Lawyers Convention
Over the past several decades, the workload of federal district courts has changed significantly. On...
National Security Law & Doing Business Abroad
William J. Haynes, Eric J. Kadel, Timothy J. Keeler, Randal S. Milch, Donald J. Rosenberg
2018 National Lawyers Convention
U.S. businesses operating in the global economy, and non-U.S. businesses operating or looking to invest...
Evolution of the District Courts
Carlos T. Bea, Thomas M. Hardiman, Michael B. Mukasey, William E. Smith, Amul R. Thapar
2018 National Lawyers Convention
Over the past several decades, the workload of federal district courts has changed significantly. On...
National Security Law & Doing Business Abroad
William J. Haynes, Eric J. Kadel, Timothy J. Keeler, Randal S. Milch, Donald J. Rosenberg
2018 National Lawyers Convention
U.S. businesses operating in the global economy, and non-U.S. businesses operating or looking to invest...
Say What You Will?: Government Compelled Speech
Sandra Segal Ikuta, Mark L. Rienzi, Amanda Shanor, Eugene Volokh
2018 National Lawyers Convention
When can the government require you to speak, or to host speech on your property,...