Emilie Kao serves as senior counsel and vice president of advocacy strategy for Alliance Defending Freedom, where she is a member of the U.S. Legal Team. In this role, she supports ADF’s legal and legislative objectives through culture shaping initiatives.
Before joining ADF, Kao served as director of the DeVos Center for Religion and Civil Society at the Heritage Foundation. She led a team of experts who provided strategy, research, and policy recommendations on life, marriage, and religious freedom consistent with Constitutional principles. She convened coalitions of strategic partners to support the protection of religious freedom and launched the Promise to America’s Children, a movement dedicated to the protection of children and parental rights.
Kao also served as senior legal counsel at an international human rights law firm, East Asia team leader in the U.S. Department of State’s Office of International Human Rights, and director of international advocacy at the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty. She was an adjunct professor at Antonin Scalia Law School at George Mason University and is co-editor of the “First Principles on International Human Rights” essay series.
She has testified before the U.S. Congress and spoken at the United Nations in Geneva and New York. She has been interviewed and quoted extensively in the media, including The New York Times, The Washington Post, CNN, C-SPAN, and 60 Minutes+.
Kao earned her A.B. cum laude from Harvard University and her J.D. from Harvard Law School. She is a member of the state bars of California and the District of Columbia and is admitted to practice in the U.S. Supreme Court. She speaks Mandarin Chinese.
*****
A person listed as a contributor has spoken or otherwise participated in Federalist Society events, publications, or multimedia presentations. A person's appearance on this list does not imply any other endorsement or relationship between the person and the Federalist Society. In most cases, the biographical information on a person's "contributor" page is provided directly by the person, and the Federalist Society does not edit or otherwise endorse that information. The Federalist Society takes no position on particular legal or public policy issues. All expressions of opinion by a contributor are those of the contributor.
Panel I: Recent Developments on Parental Rights
Lucas Oil Stadium500 S. Capitol Avenue
Indianapolis, IN 46225
Religious Liberty, Parental Rights, and the Challenges Posed by the Transgender Movement
In Troxel v. Granville, a plurality of the Supreme Court described parental rights as “perhaps the...
Litigation Update: Mahmoud v. McKnight
In Fall 2022 the Montgomery County Board of Education (MCBOE) revised its literature/ language arts...
Litigation Update: Mahmoud v. McKnight
In Fall 2022 the Montgomery County Board of Education (MCBOE) revised its literature/ language arts...
Panel I: Recent Developments on Parental Rights
Anxiety regarding parental rights in American healthcare and education is at an all time high. ...
Panel I: Recent Developments on Parental Rights
Anxiety regarding parental rights in American healthcare and education is at an all time high. ...