President and General Counsel, Public Interest Legal Foundation
Biography
J. Christian Adams is the President and General Counsel of the Public Interest Legal Foundation. He served from 2005 to 2010 in the Voting Section at the United States Department of Justice Voting Section. President Trump appointed Adams to the Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity. President Trump also appointed Adams as a Commissioner to the United States Commission on Civil Rights where he also now serves with a term through 2025. He has been involved in election law lawsuits in 33 states and the territory of Guam. He has represented multiple presidential campaigns in election litigation. He has a law degree from the University of South Carolina School of Law. He is a member of the South Carolina and Virginia Bars.
Welpton & Wise Professor of Law, University of Nebraska College of Law
Biography
Professor Rick Duncan is the Welpton & Wise Professor of Law at the University Of Nebraska College Of Law. He is a graduate of the Cornell Law School and served as an editor of the Cornell Law Review. He teaches Constitutional Law with a special emphasis on the law of religious freedom, free speech, and federalism. Duncan has written numerous books, articles, and commentaries on a wide variety of legal topics. His recent publications include an article on Justice Scalia’s legacy, another on Kermit Gosnell and Roe v. Wade, a piece on the Electoral College and Federalism, a 2019 piece on Masterpiece Cakeshop and the First Amendment, and three recent articles on the “no compelled speech” doctrine as a First Amendment defense against authoritarianism and tyranny. His most recent article, on School Choice and the First Amendment, will be published in 2023 in Case Western Law Review. He is also the co-author of a book on Secured Transactions under Article 9 of the UCC. He served as Chairman of the Nebraska Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights during the Reagan Administration. He also loves to speak at Federalist Society meetings around the country on life, liberty, and the pursuit of federalism.
Duncan has five children, five grandchildren, and a wonderful wife who help him pursue happiness. He loves lifting weights (particularly going heavy on the incline bench press), attending Broadway musicals and plays, including Hamilton: An American Musical which he has seen 12 times (possibly a Nebraska record). He regularly reads both the Bible and the New York Times because it is important to keep up with what both sides have to say. He loves following major league baseball, especially the San Diego Padres. And his favorite legal aphorism is “first come rights then comes government to secure those rights.”
Senior Vice President for Legal Studies, Cato Institute
Biography
Clark Neily is senior vice president for legal studies at the Cato Institute. His areas of interest include constitutional law, overcriminalization, civil forfeiture, police accountability, and gun rights. Neily is the author of Terms of Engagement: How Our Courts Should Enforce the Constitution’s Promise of Limited Government. His writing has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, Forbes, and National Review Online, as well as various law reviews, including the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy, George Mason Law Review, Georgetown Journal of Law and Public Policy, NYU Journal of Law and Liberty, and Texas Review of Law and Politics. Neily is a frequent guest speaker and lecturer for the Federalist Society, Institute for Humane Studies, and American Constitution Society.
Before joining Cato in 2017, Neily was a senior attorney and constitutional litigator at the Institute for Justice and director of the Institute’s Center for Judicial Engagement. He is also an adjunct professor at the University of Texas School of Law, where he teaches constitutional litigation and public-interest law.
Neily served as co-counsel in District of Columbia v. Heller, the historic case in which the Supreme Court held for the first time that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to own a gun for self-defense.
Neily began his legal career as a law clerk to Judge Royce Lamberth on the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. After that he spent four years in the trial department of the Dallas-based firm Thompson & Knight. Neily received his undergraduate and law degrees from the University of Texas, where he was Chief Articles Editor of the Texas Law Review.
Scott K. Ginsburg Professor of Health Law & Policy, Georgetown University
Biography
David A. Hyman, M.D., J.D., is the Scott K. Ginsburg Professor of Health Law & Policy at Georgetown University. Professor Hyman focuses his research and writing on the regulation and financing of health care. He teaches or has taught health care regulation, civil procedure, insurance, medical malpractice, law & economics, professional responsibility, and tax policy.
While serving as Special Counsel to the Federal Trade Commission, Professor Hyman was principal author and project leader for the first joint report ever issued by the Federal Trade Commission and Department of Justice, “Improving Health Care: A Dose of Competition” (2004). He is also the author of Medicare Meets Mephistopheles, which was selected by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce/National Chamber Foundation as one of the top ten books of 2007, and the co-author (with Charles Silver) of Overcharged: Why Americans Pay Too Much for Health Care (2018). He has published widely in student-edited law reviews and peer-reviewed medical, health policy, law, and economics journals.
He invests in and advises companies and entrepreneurs in SAAS, Defense, AI, and entertainment. The companies he founded or serves on the corporate board of have raised over $100 million in funding with his direct participation in the process. Those investors include Microsoft, Flexport, Sony, Qualcomm, Rakuten, Baidu, Airbus, and top global financial services and venture capital funds including Greycroft, Social Capital, General Catalyst, Lux Capital, Bullpen Capital, Bay Bridge Ventures, Teamworthy Ventures, Operate Studio, TenOneTen, Temasek, Macquarie Group, Graph Ventures and many others. The companies he advises have raised substantially more funding, in part due to his advice and mentorship.
He is a tenured Professor of Law and Public Policy at Pepperdine University and a faculty member with the Palmer Center for Entrepreneurship and the Law and teaches courses in technology, public policy, internet, and privacy law.
As a public policy and legal expert, Greg has worked with the White House, the Department of Defense, the State Department, and independent regulatory agencies on matters related to technology, law and policy. He has on multiple occasions testified before Congress and state legislatures about entrepreneurship and emerging technology and has aided state legislators, cities, municipalities, and executive branch officials in drafting legislation and ordinances related to technological advances and has been appointed by Cabinet officials to serve on Federal Rulemaking Committees.
He is a frequent keynote speaker at industry events and academic conferences related to technology, law, and public policy. He advises venture capital firms and other investors, start-ups, law enforcement, consulting firms, and Fortune 500 companies about the legal and regulatory issues associated with emerging technologies.
He regularly appears on television and radio to discuss technology and business, wrote a column on business and technology for Forbes and has authored Op-Eds for the New York Times, the Washington Post, and The Washington Times, among others. In his early career he worked on national security, international criminal law and counterterrorism matters and served as an Army officer.
Chairman and Founder, Institute for Free Speech; Josiah H. Blackmore II/Shirley M. Nault Designated Professor of Law, Capital University Law School
Biography
Bradley Smith is one of the nation’s foremost experts on campaign finance law. He served as a Commissioner on the Federal Election Commission, resigning as of Aug. 21, 2005. Smith was elected as Vice Chairman of the Commission in 2003 and Chairman of the Commission in 2004.
Smith has authored over 40 articles on campaign finance reform, appearing in academic publications such as the Yale Law Journal and Georgetown Law Journal, and popular publications such as The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, and National Review. He has appeared on The O’Reilly Factor, Hardball with Chris Matthews, Bill Moyers Journal, the Lehrer News Hour, Fox News Special Report, ABC News, Washington Journal, and numerous other national and local television and radio programs.
As an FEC Commissioner, Smith won plaudits for his integrity and refusal to put partisan interests ahead of his duties, as well as his steadfast support for free speech. For his honesty and integrity, the Wall Street Journal dubbed him, “the only honorable man in this bordello.” Smith now serves as the Josiah H. Blackmore II/Shirley M. Nault Designated Professor of Law at Capital University Law School. He has won numerous awards for his scholarship and teaching, and is a past member of the Advisory Committee to the American Bar Association’s Standing Committee on Election Law. He currently serves on the Editorial Board of the Election Law Journal, and the Editorial Advisory Board of the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy. Smith also serves on the Board of Trustees of the Buckeye Institute for Public Policy Studies, is a senior fellow at the Goldwater Institute and is a member of the Board of Scholars of the Mackinac Center for Public Policy. Smith is a cum laude graduate of Harvard Law School and Kalamazoo College and holds an honorary doctorate from Augustana College.
Ryan T. Anderson, Ph.D., is the President of the Ethics and Public Policy Center. In May 2025, Anderson was appointed by President Trump to the Religious Liberty Commission.
He is the author or co-author of five books, including the just-released Tearing Us Apart: How Abortion Harms Everything and Solves Nothing. Previous books include When Harry Became Sally: Responding to the Transgender Moment, Truth Overruled: The Future of Marriage and Religious Freedom, What Is Marriage? Man and Woman: A Defense, and Debating Religious Liberty and Discrimination. He is the co-editor of A Liberalism Safe for Catholicism? Perspectives from “The Review of Politics.”
Anderson’s research has been cited by two U.S. Supreme Court justices, Justice Samuel Alito and Justice Clarence Thomas, in two Supreme Court cases.
He received his bachelor of arts degree from Princeton University, graduating Phi Beta Kappa and magna cum laude, and he received his doctoral degree in political philosophy from the University of Notre Dame. His dissertation was titled: “Neither Liberal Nor Libertarian: A Natural Law Approach to Social Justice and Economic Rights.”
Anderson has made appearances on ABC, CNN, CNBC, MSNBC, and Fox News. His work has been published by the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, Oxford University Press, Cambridge University Press, the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy, the Harvard Health Policy Review, the Georgetown Journal of Law and Public Policy, First Things, the Claremont Review of Books, and National Review.
He is the John Paul II Teaching Fellow in Social Thought at the University of Dallas, a member of the James Madison Society at Princeton University, and a Fellow of the Institute for Human Ecology at the Catholic University of America, as well as the Founding Editor of Public Discourse, the online journal of the Witherspoon Institute of Princeton, New Jersey.
For 9 years he was the William E. Simon senior research fellow at The Heritage Foundation, and has served as an adjunct professor of philosophy and political science at Christendom College, and a Visiting Fellow at the Veritas Center at Franciscan University. He has also served as an assistant editor of First Things.
Senior Vice President for Legal Studies, Cato Institute
Biography
Clark Neily is senior vice president for legal studies at the Cato Institute. His areas of interest include constitutional law, overcriminalization, civil forfeiture, police accountability, and gun rights. Neily is the author of Terms of Engagement: How Our Courts Should Enforce the Constitution’s Promise of Limited Government. His writing has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, Forbes, and National Review Online, as well as various law reviews, including the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy, George Mason Law Review, Georgetown Journal of Law and Public Policy, NYU Journal of Law and Liberty, and Texas Review of Law and Politics. Neily is a frequent guest speaker and lecturer for the Federalist Society, Institute for Humane Studies, and American Constitution Society.
Before joining Cato in 2017, Neily was a senior attorney and constitutional litigator at the Institute for Justice and director of the Institute’s Center for Judicial Engagement. He is also an adjunct professor at the University of Texas School of Law, where he teaches constitutional litigation and public-interest law.
Neily served as co-counsel in District of Columbia v. Heller, the historic case in which the Supreme Court held for the first time that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to own a gun for self-defense.
Neily began his legal career as a law clerk to Judge Royce Lamberth on the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. After that he spent four years in the trial department of the Dallas-based firm Thompson & Knight. Neily received his undergraduate and law degrees from the University of Texas, where he was Chief Articles Editor of the Texas Law Review.
Former Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit
Biography
Judge Kozinski served as a United States Circuit Judge for the Ninth Circuit from November 1985 until December 2017. He served as Chief Judge from 2007 to 2014. He graduated from UCLA, receiving an A.B. degree in 1972, and from UCLA Law School, receiving a J.D. degree in 1975.
Prior to his appointment to the appellate bench, Judge Kozinski served as Chief Judge of the United States Claims Court, 1982-85; Special Counsel, Merit Systems Protection Board, 1981-82; Assistant Counsel, Office of Counsel to the President, 1981; Deputy Legal Counsel, Office of President-Elect Reagan, 1980-81; Attorney, Covington & Burling, 1979-81; Attorney, Forry Golbert Singer & Gelles, 1977-79; Law Clerk to Chief Justice Warren E. Burger, 1976-77; and Law Clerk to Circuit Judge Anthony M. Kennedy, 1975-76.
Judge Kozinski is married to Marcy Jane Tiffany and has three children: Yale, Wyatt and Clayton, and three grandchildren: Quinn, Owen and Anna.
Welpton & Wise Professor of Law, University of Nebraska College of Law
Biography
Professor Rick Duncan is the Welpton & Wise Professor of Law at the University Of Nebraska College Of Law. He is a graduate of the Cornell Law School and served as an editor of the Cornell Law Review. He teaches Constitutional Law with a special emphasis on the law of religious freedom, free speech, and federalism. Duncan has written numerous books, articles, and commentaries on a wide variety of legal topics. His recent publications include an article on Justice Scalia’s legacy, another on Kermit Gosnell and Roe v. Wade, a piece on the Electoral College and Federalism, a 2019 piece on Masterpiece Cakeshop and the First Amendment, and three recent articles on the “no compelled speech” doctrine as a First Amendment defense against authoritarianism and tyranny. His most recent article, on School Choice and the First Amendment, will be published in 2023 in Case Western Law Review. He is also the co-author of a book on Secured Transactions under Article 9 of the UCC. He served as Chairman of the Nebraska Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights during the Reagan Administration. He also loves to speak at Federalist Society meetings around the country on life, liberty, and the pursuit of federalism.
Duncan has five children, five grandchildren, and a wonderful wife who help him pursue happiness. He loves lifting weights (particularly going heavy on the incline bench press), attending Broadway musicals and plays, including Hamilton: An American Musical which he has seen 12 times (possibly a Nebraska record). He regularly reads both the Bible and the New York Times because it is important to keep up with what both sides have to say. He loves following major league baseball, especially the San Diego Padres. And his favorite legal aphorism is “first come rights then comes government to secure those rights.”