Christopher Mills is the founder of Spero Law LLC. He was previously a partner at a national law firm and a Constitutional Law Fellow at the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty. He served as a law clerk to Justice Clarence Thomas on the U.S. Supreme Court during October Term 2018. He also clerked for the Honorable David B. Sentelle, then-Chief Judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. He has authored briefs and motions in the Supreme Court, courts of appeals, and trial courts, and successfully argued before the D.C. Circuit. He has served as special counsel to South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster, and is an Adjunct Professor at the Charleston School of Law.
A 2012 magna cum laude graduate of Harvard Law School, Christopher was a senior editor of the Harvard Law Review, an editor of the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy, and served on the Executive Board of the Harvard Federalist Society. In 2009, he graduated Phi Beta Kappa and summa cum laude with a degree in economics from Furman University.
Christopher lives in Charleston, South Carolina with his wife, children, and golden retriever.
Senior Fellow and Director of Constitutional Studies, Manhattan Institute
Biography
Ilya Shapiro is a senior fellow and director of constitutional studies at the Manhattan Institute and a contributing editor of City Journal. Previously he was executive director and senior lecturer at the Georgetown Center for the Constitution, and before that a vice president of the Cato Institute.
Shapiro has testified many times before Congress and state legislatures and has filed more than 500 amicus curiae “friend of the court” briefs in the Supreme Court. He lectures regularly on behalf of the Federalist Society, is a member of the board of fellows of the Jewish Policy Center, was an inaugural Washington Fellow at the National Review Institute, and has been an adjunct law professor at the George Washington University and University of Mississippi. He is also the chairman of the board of advisers of the Mississippi Justice Institute, a barrister in the Edward Coke Appellate Inn of Court, and a former member of the Virginia Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights.
Earlier in his career, Shapiro was a special assistant/adviser to the Multi-National Force in Iraq on rule-of-law issues and practiced at Patton Boggs and Cleary Gottlieb. Before entering private practice, he clerked for Judge E. Grady Jolly of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. He holds an AB from Princeton University, an MSc from the London School of Economics, and a JD from the University of Chicago Law School.
Robert Alt is the President and Chief Executive Officer of The Buckeye Institute where he has catalyzed exponential growth since he took the organization’s helm in 2012. He has since founded Buckeye’s renowned Economic Research Center and established its impactful Legal Center.
Alt is a distinguished scholar and attorney with particular expertise in legal policy, criminal justice, national security, and constitutional law. He previously worked for former U.S. Attorney General Edwin Meese III, regularly provides commentary on television and radio programs, and his writings have appeared in countless outlets.
In 2004, Alt spent five months in Iraq as an embedded war correspondent.
Alt has testified before Congress multiple times—including at the confirmation hearings for U.S. Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan—the Federal Election Commission regarding matters of constitutional and administrative law, and numerous state legislatures.
Alt serves as an officer on the boards of The Philadelphia Society and the Federalist Society’s Columbus Lawyers Chapter. He taught national security law, criminal law, and legislation at Case Western Reserve University School of Law, as well as constitutional law and political parties and interest groups at Ashland University.
Alt earned his Doctor of Law degree from The University of Chicago Law School, where he was Symposium Editor and the winner of the Mulroy Prize for Excellence in Appellate Advocacy as well as research assistant to Professor Richard Epstein. Following law school, he clerked for Judge Alice Batchelder on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. Alt graduated with his Bachelor of Arts in philosophy and political science magna cum laude from Azusa Pacific University where he also won the Outstanding Senior Award in Political Science.
Alt is an accomplished high-altitude alpinist and endurance athlete who has successfully climbed 6.75 of the famed Seven Summits of the World including Mount Everest. He is the creator of PROFOUND CLIMBING™ and a frequent speaker across the country and around the world on legal and public policy topics as well as effective leadership, management, decision-making, and teamwork in contexts ranging from extraordinary life/death situations to ordinary professional/business settings.
Vice President, Edwin Meese III Institute for the Rule of Law, Advancing American Freedom
Biography
John G. Malcolm oversees Advancing American Freedom’s work to increase understanding of the Constitution and the rule of law as Vice President of the organization’s Edwin Meese III Institute for the Rule of Law. Malcolm brings to the challenge a wealth of legal expertise and experience in both the public and private sectors.
Prior to joining Advancing American Freedom in 2025, Malcolm was the Vice President of the Institute for Constitutional Government and the Director of the Meese Center for Legal and Judicial Studies at the Heritage Foundation. Prior to joining Heritage in 2012, Malcolm was general counsel at the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, as well as a distinguished practitioner in residence at Pepperdine Law School. From 2004 to 2009, Malcolm was executive vice president and director of worldwide anti-piracy operations for the Motion Picture Association.
Malcolm served as a deputy assistant attorney general in the Department of Justice’s Criminal Division from 2001 to 2004, where he oversaw sections on computer crime and intellectual property, domestic security, child exploitation and obscenity, and special investigations. Immediately prior to that, he was a founding partner in the Atlanta law firm of Malcolm & Schroeder, LLP.
From 1990 to 1997, Malcolm was an assistant U.S. attorney in Atlanta, assigned to the fraud and public corruption section, and also an associate independent counsel, investigating fraud and abuse in the Department of Housing and Urban Development. He was honored with the Director’s Award for Superior Performance for his work in connection with the successful prosecution of Walter Leroy Moody Jr., who assassinated an 11th Circuit judge and the head of the Savannah chapter of the NAACP.
A graduate of Harvard Law School and Columbia College, Malcolm began his career as a law clerk to a federal district court judge and a federal appellate court judge, and as an associate at the Atlanta-based law firm of Sutherland, Asbill & Brennan (new Eversheds Sutherland). Malcolm, who resides in Washington, D.C., serves on the Board of Trustees of the Washington National Opera and is a Senate-confirmed member of the Board of Directors of the Legal Services Corporation, the largest funder of civil legal aid in the United States.
Senior Fellow and Director of Constitutional Studies, Manhattan Institute
Biography
Ilya Shapiro is a senior fellow and director of constitutional studies at the Manhattan Institute and a contributing editor of City Journal. Previously he was executive director and senior lecturer at the Georgetown Center for the Constitution, and before that a vice president of the Cato Institute.
Shapiro has testified many times before Congress and state legislatures and has filed more than 500 amicus curiae “friend of the court” briefs in the Supreme Court. He lectures regularly on behalf of the Federalist Society, is a member of the board of fellows of the Jewish Policy Center, was an inaugural Washington Fellow at the National Review Institute, and has been an adjunct law professor at the George Washington University and University of Mississippi. He is also the chairman of the board of advisers of the Mississippi Justice Institute, a barrister in the Edward Coke Appellate Inn of Court, and a former member of the Virginia Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights.
Earlier in his career, Shapiro was a special assistant/adviser to the Multi-National Force in Iraq on rule-of-law issues and practiced at Patton Boggs and Cleary Gottlieb. Before entering private practice, he clerked for Judge E. Grady Jolly of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. He holds an AB from Princeton University, an MSc from the London School of Economics, and a JD from the University of Chicago Law School.
Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit
Biography
John K. Bush is a Circuit Judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. His chambers are in Louisville, Kentucky. Prior to joining the court, Judge Bush was a partner in the Louisville office of the firm Bingham Greenebaum Doll (now Dentons Bingham Greenebaum), where he also was co-chair of the firm’s litigation department. He began his legal practice in the Washington, D.C. office of Gibson Dunn & Crutcher.
Judge Bush served as a law clerk for Judge J. Smith Henley of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit. He was graduated summa cum laude from Vanderbilt University, and cum laude from Harvard Law School. He is an adjunct lecturer at The George Washington University Law School and the Brandeis School of Law at the University of Louisville.
General Counsel & Wealth Advisor, Ullmann Wealth Partners
Biography
Patrick Kilbane is the General Counsel and a Wealth Advisor for Ullmann Wealth Partners headquartered in Jacksonville Beach, FL. Ullmann Wealth Partners is an independent wealth management firm that manages half a billion dollars of client assets in custody at Fidelity. Before joining Ullmann Wealth Partners, Pat was a Shareholder at Gray Robinson, P.A. where he had a thriving specialty litigation practice. Pat was recognized multiple times by Florida Trend and Super Lawyers Magazine for his skills and professionalism.
Pat serves the Northeast Florida Region in several roles. He’s received five gubernatorial appointments to the Judicial Nominating Commission for Florida’s Fourth Judicial Circuit and the Jacksonville Aviation Authority Board of Directors. His fellow board members elected him Chairman of both boards. Further, Pat is the President of the Jacksonville Lawyers Chapter of the Federalist Society. In 2014-2015, Pat was elected President of the Young Lawyers Section of the Jacksonville Bar Association.
In 2005, Pat received his Juris Doctor degree from the University of Notre Dame. He received his Bachelor of Business Administration degree, summa cum laude, from Adrian College, where he earned the full-ride, merit-based Dawson Scholarship and was named the Outstanding Graduate by faculty vote for the Class of 2002.
Head of Corporate Governance, Strive Asset Management
Biography
Justin Danhof is the Head of Corporate Governance at Strive Asset Management. Previously, he served as General Counsel for the National Center for Public Policy Research, as well as Director of the Center’s Free Enterprise Project. He also worked in the Miami-Dade State’s Attorney’s Office in the Economic Crimes and Cybercrimes Division, for the Massachusetts Alliance for Economic Development and at the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
Mr. Danhof’s work has been widely published and quoted in major newspapers, including the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, Politico, USA Today, the Los Angeles Times, the San Francisco Chronicle, the Boston Globe, the Christian Science Monitor, and the Washington Post. He has also appeared on the Fox News Channel, One America News Network, and the Fox Business Channel, among others.
Mr. Danhof is a member of the Federalist Society and Christian Legal Society.
Mr. Danhof is a graduate of Bentley University (Waltham, MA), where he received a Bachelor of Science in economics and finance and pitched for three seasons on the school’s NCAA Division II baseball team. Mr. Danhof completed his graduate studies at the University of Miami School of Law where he received his Juris Doctor and Master of Laws in Taxation.
Mr. Danhof is licensed to practice law in New York and Washington, D.C.
Executive Director, North America, Quilliam International
Biography
Dr. Muhammad Fraser-Rahim is the Executive Director, North America for Quilliam International.
He is an expert on violent extremism issues and a scholar on Africa. Prior to his current role, he served as a Senior Program Officer at the U.S. Institute of Peace, where he led their Horn of Africa program and served as an expert on violent extremism issues globally.
Dr. Fraser-Rahim’s areas of specialty are on transnational terrorist movements, Islamic intellectual history, Muslim communities in the West and Africa affairs. In addition, Dr. Fraser-Rahim worked for the United States Government for more than a decade for the Department of Homeland Security, Director of National Intelligence, and the National Counter-terrorism Center. There, he provided strategic advice and executive branch analytical support on violent extremism issues to the White House and the National Security Council, where he was the author or co-author of Presidential Daily Briefs and strategic assessments on extremist ideology.
Dr. Fraser-Rahim has conducted research in more than 40 countries on the African continent, and has worked and studied throughout the Middle East. He completed advanced level Arabic language certificates at various higher education institutions in the U.S., West Africa and the Middle East and he earned his Ph.D. in 2017 from Howard University in African Studies, with a focus on Islamic thought and on violent extremism issues.
Dr. Fraser-Rahim provided one of the first doctoral dissertations on the intellectual thought of African American Muslims and its nexus to the broader Islamic world using original primary sources in both Arabic and English. and focused on the American Muslim thinker, WD Mohammed, titled, ” The Making of American Islam and the Emergence of Western Islamic Intellectual Thought to Counter Violent Extremism: A Case Study of American Muslim Revivalist, Imam WD Mohammed (1933-2008.) Finally, he is also a security fellow at the Truman National Security Project.
Co-Founder and Senior Counsel, American Freedom Law Center
Biography
Robert J. Muise is an expert in constitutional law. Since 2000, his law practice has been dedicated to defending religious liberties, the freedom of speech, and the right to life in state and federal trial and appellate courts all across the country. More recently, Mr. Muise has been involved in numerous cases defending American freedoms against the growing threat of sharia.
In 2012, Mr. Muise, along with David Yerushalmi, co-founded the American Freedom Law Center, a national public interest law firm dedicated to fighting for faith and freedom and defending our Judeo-Christian heritage and moral values.
Through his work, Mr. Muise has appeared on national television programs such as The Kelly File with Megyn Kelly, the O’Reilly Factor, Hannity and Colmes, Freedom Watch, Fox and Friends, and the Glenn Beck Program, among others. He has also been interviewed on numerous local and national radio shows and for many national and local newspapers and periodicals, including the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the San Francisco Chronicle, and many others. He was named the “Appellate Lawyer of the Week” by the National Law Journal on August 10, 2011. Mr. Muise is also co-author of a scholarly article published in the Duke University Press’s Journal of Health Politics, Policy, and Law, entitled, “Wearing the Crown of Solomon? Chief Justice Roberts and the Affordable Care Act ‘Tax.'”
Mat Staver is the Founder and Chairman of Liberty Counsel, an international nonprofit litigation, education, and policy organization dedicated to advancing religious freedom, the sanctity of human life, and the family; Chairman of Liberty Counsel Action, Freedom Federation, The Salt & Light Council, and National House of Hope; Chairman of Christians in Defense of Israel; Founder and Chairman of Liberty Relief International; Vice President and Chief Counsel of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference-CONEL; Director of the Hispanic Israel Leadership Coalition; former Vice President of Liberty University; former Dean and tenured professor of law at Liberty University School of Law; Trustee of The Timothy Plan, a New York and Tel-Aviv Stock Exchange-traded family of mutual funds; Trustee of the Supreme Court Historical Society; Board of Reference of The Christian Film and Television Commission; Board of Advisors of Care for Pastors; Founder and former President of Staver & Associates; and Founder and former President of The Staver Group.
Mat has over 230 published legal opinions. He has authored eight scholarly law review publications and 10 books, including Faith & Freedom: A Complete Handbook for Defending Your Religious Rights, Same-Sex Marriage: Putting Every Household at Risk, and Eternal Vigilance: Knowing and Protecting Your Religious Freedom. He has authored many booklets and brochures, along with hundreds of articles.
Mat is the host and producer of Faith and Freedom, an 11-minute daily radio program, and Freedom's Call, a 60-second daily radio program. He is a frequent guest on international and many national network and cable television and radio programs, including print and electronic media.
Mat has filed numerous briefs and argued in many federal and state courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court and has argued two landmark cases before the Supreme Court, Madsen v. Women's Health Center and McCreary County v. ACLU of Kentucky.
Mat has a B.A., Theology, cum laude, Southern Missionary College; M.A., Religion, summa cum laude, Andrews University; J.D., University of Kentucky; LL.D., honoris causa, Liberty University; D.D., honoris causa, South Florida Bible College.
Senior Counsel, Senior Vice President of Corporate Engagement, Alliance Defending Freedom
Biography
Jeremy Tedesco serves as senior counsel and senior vice president of corporate engagement for Alliance Defending Freedom. In this role, Tedesco leads ADF’s efforts to combat corporate cancel culture and build a business ethic that respects free speech, religious freedom, and human dignity.
Immediately preceding his current role, Tedesco served as senior vice president for communications, during which time he was a lead convener of the Philadelphia Statement, a movement dedicated to restoring free speech and civil discourse. Tedesco also launched a regular video series called Freedom Matters, profiling ADF clients, cases, and issues. The program included 24 videos in its first year, which more than 31 million people viewed.
Previously, Tedesco litigated First Amendment cases at the highest levels. He was part of the legal team that represented cake artist Jack Phillips in Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission before the U.S. Supreme Court and argued Phillips’ case at the Colorado Court of Appeals. He was also the lead brief writer in two other U.S. Supreme Court wins, Reed v. Town of Gilbert and Arizona Christian School Tuition Organization v. Winn. Tedesco has also argued six times before five different federal appellate courts and founded and directed the ADF Center for Conscience Initiatives, where he led efforts to protect individuals from government-coerced speech.
Numerous media outlets, including The Wall Street Journal, Fox News, CNN, The New York Times, USA Today, PBS, NPR, and National Review, have interviewed Tedesco or published his comments.
Tedesco earned his Juris Doctor in 2004 from the Regent University School of Law.