Rogue or Righteous? Debating the Role of Prosecutors in Today's Legal Landscape
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Chief Judge, Florida Eleventh Judicial Circuit
Chief Judge Ariana Fajardo Orshan was appointed to the Circuit Court of the Eleventh Judicial Circuit of Florida in April 2012 and was sworn in as the Court's Chief Judge in July 2025. She has also served as a judge in the Criminal Division. Prior to her appointment, Judge Fajardo Orshan was a partner in her law firm where she specialized in the area of Family and Matrimonial Law. Judge Fajardo Orshan began her legal career as an Assistant State Attorney in Miami-Dade County and also worked in the area of civil litigation with the firm of Wilson Elser Moskowitz Edelman & Dicker LLP.
Throughout her legal and judicial career, Judge Fajardo Orshan has been involved with numerous civic and professional organizations, and in many, she assumed leadership positions. She continues to remain involved with Big Brothers Big Sisters, the Cuban American Bar Association, the Dade County Bar Association, the Federalist Society and Kidside. As a member of the judiciary, Judge Fajardo Orshan is also involved with the Eleventh Judicial Circuit Professionalism Committee, the Florida Conference of Circuit Judges, the Florida Bar Family Law Rules Committee, and the Florida Supreme Court Steering Committee on Families and Children.
Judge Fajardo Orshan also enjoys grooming future lawyers as adjunct professor at Florida International University College of Law where she teaches Family Law.
Judge Fajardo Orshan has been a member of the Florida Bar since 1996 and is a member of the Federal Bar for the Southern District of Florida. Judge Fajardo Orshan graduated from Nova Southeastern University Shepard Broad Law Center and received a Bachelor's in Science degree from Florida International University.
Legal Fellow and Manager, Supreme Court and Appellate Advocacy Program, The Heritage Foundation
Zack is a Legal Fellow and Manager of the Supreme Court and Appellate Advocacy Program in the Edwin Meese III Center for Legal and Judicial Studies at The Heritage Foundation.
He previously served for several years as an Assistant United States Attorney in the Northern District of Florida. Prior to that, he spent two years as an associate in the Washington, D.C. office of Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton, which he joined after clerking for the Hon. Emmett R. Cox on the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit.
Smith received his undergraduate, master’s, and law degrees from the University of Florida. During law school, Smith served as the Editor in Chief of the Florida Law Review and served on the executive boards of several student organizations, including the UF Chapter of the Federalist Society.
Chief Assistant State Attorney, Miami-Dade County State Attorney's Office
Stephen K. Talpins is a Chief Assistant State Attorney at the Miami-Dade County (Florida) State Attorney’s Office. He reports directly to the State Attorney and participates on the executive and other key teams. He is responsible for supervising the Felony Divisions in Unit IV, Gang Prosecutions Unit, Treatment Courts Unit, Community Outreach Division, and Media Team. He also serves as the office lead on Smart Justice programming.
Mr. Talpins is a nationally recognized author, advocate, and speaker on Smart Justice and other criminal justice related issues. He has worked collaboratively and diplomatically with public, private, and non-profit stakeholders, published dozens of articles, given well over 150 presentations, served on multiple expert panels, and participated on the Boards of three non-profit associations. His efforts have been recognized by numerous organizations and agencies, including Citizens Against Drunk Impaired Drivers, Mothers Against Drunk Driving, and the National Commission Against Drunk Driving. During the past decade, The Century Council identified Mr. Talpins as “One of the 20 People to Watch,” the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration gave him a Public Safety Award, the Office of National Drug Control Policy (the office of the United States Drug Czar) named him an Advocate for Action, and the International Association of Chiefs of Police recognized him as an Ambassador of the Drug Recognition Expert (DRE) Program. Most recently, the National Institute of Justice (NIJ) selected him as a member of the 2021 Law Enforcement Advancing Data and Science (LEADS) program cohort.
Legal Director, ACLU Florida
Daniel Tilley is legal director of the ACLU of Florida since April 2019. He joined the organization in 2012 as a staff attorney whose work primarily focused on the LGBT community. Among his other work, he served as lead counsel in the ACLU’s federal-court litigation that, as part of a pair of consolidated cases and a team of lawyers, brought marriage equality to Florida in January 2015. Daniel studied classical piano and German language and literature at New York University before returning to his home state for law school at the University of Georgia.
During law school, Daniel received the Spurgeon Public Interest Fellowship, was a member of the Georgia Law Review and the Order of the Coif, and interned in Arusha, Tanzania at the U.N. International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda. Before joining the ACLU, Daniel clerked in Atlanta at the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia and in Washington, D.C. at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces. While in D.C., he served on the D.C. Lawyer Chapter board of the American Constitution Society.
General Counsel, U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commissioin
Tyler Badgley is the General Counsel at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. In that role, Mr. Badgley leads the agency’s Legal Division and serves as the Commission’s chief legal advisor. He was appointed General Counsel in January 2026.
Prior to joining the CFTC, Mr. Badgley served as the Deputy General Counsel at the U.S. Department of the Treasury and was the first Executive Secretary under Secretary Scott K.H. Bessent. Mr. Badgley was previously a Senior Counsel at the U.S. Chamber Litigation Center, the litigation arm of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. There, he focused on complex litigation and regulatory issues, particularly in connection with capital markets.
Mr. Badgley also practiced law at Sullivan & Cromwell LLP, served as a Special Counsel to the U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary, and began his legal career as a law clerk for the Honorable Edith H. Jones of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. Mr. Badgley graduated Order of the Coif from the University of Virginia School of Law, where he served as Articles Editor for the Virginia Law Review. He also received his undergraduate degree in Economics and Government from the University of Virginia.
Partner, Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP
Julian W. Kleinbrodt is a partner in the San Francisco office of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher. He practices in the firm’s Litigation Department and is a member of the firm’s Antitrust and Competition Practice Group.
Mr. Kleinbrodt has experience handling a wide variety of antitrust matters through trial and appeal. He has particular experience with claims involving price-fixing, monopolization, attempted monopolization, refusals to deal, tying, bundling, exclusive dealing, disparagement, market allocation and division, and no-poach provisions. For example, Mr. Kleinbrodt was part of a team that defended a major technology company in a multi-week bench trial dubbed the “Super Bowl of Antitrust.” Mr. Kleinbrodt prevailed on behalf of that same company in multiple federal appeals, including successfully arguing before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. Mr. Kleinbrodt also has obtained dismissals on the pleadings of major putative antitrust class actions, won denial of class certification in sweeping nationwide cases, and prevailed at trial and after trial on behalf of multiple clients—including matters recognized by the Dailey Journal as its Top Verdicts of 2018, 2019, and 2021.
Mr. Kleinbrodt has additional experience representing clients in civil and criminal investigations by the U.S. Department of Justice and Federal Trade Commission. Mr. Kleinbrodt also regularly counsels clients on antitrust compliance and has authored multiple articles on competition issues.
In addition to his competition practice, Mr. Kleinbrodt is a member of the firm’s Labor & Employment Practice Group. He has represented clients across the country, with a particular focus on discrimination and class action claims. As a representative example, Mr. Kleinbrodt helped to secure denial of class certification on behalf of UPS in a putative state-wide class action of Kentucky workers alleging disability discrimination and then secured affirmance of that order on appeal, Hughes v. UPS Supply Chain Sols., Inc., 2021 WL 3008755 (Ky. Ct. App. July 16, 2021).
Mr. Kleinbrodt received his law degree magna cum laude from the University of Michigan School of Law in 2014, where he was elected to the Order of the Coif and served on the Michigan Law Review’s editorial board. Before joining the firm, Julian served as a law clerk to the Honorable Stephen V. Wilson of the United States District Court for the Central District of California. He graduated magna cum laude from the University of California, Los Angeles in 2011 and was a member of Phi Beta Kappa.
Former NAAG Antitrust Task Force Chair and Former Assistant Attorney General at Wisconsin Department of Justice
As former Chair of the NAAG Multistate Antitrust Task Force and as Wisconsin's Assistant Attorney General for Antitrust from 2005-2024, Gwendolyn has extensive experience litigating antitrust cases on behalf of the State of Wisconsin- including merger enforcement, cartel prosecutions. She was the lead attorney in State of Wisconsin v. Indivior, where she led 42 Attorneys General in their successful case against the manufacturer of Suboxone, resulting in a $102.5 million settlement. Gwendolyn was also on the trial team for the States' challenge to the T-Mobile/Sprint merger.
Gwendolyn was co-chair of the Pharmaceutical Industry Working Group in the National Association of Attorneys General Antitrust Task Force, and was a delegate to the “Future of Pharma Mergers” international initiative spearheaded by the FTC, and lead the Reimagining Pharma Attorney Generals Advisory Group.
Active in the American Bar Association, she is a member of the Antitrust Section Council. Gwendolyn was also the 2023 recipient of the NAAG (nationwide) Attorney General Career Staff Award, and was named as a “Woman Making History” by Wisconsin Lawyer magazine in 2024.
Director, Bureau of Consumer Protection, Federal Trade Commission
Chris Mufarrige served in the first Trump Administration as a Senior Adviser to the Director and Deputy Director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, advising on enforcement, rulemaking, and supervisory exams relating to the country’s largest banks and nonbank financial institutions. Most recently, he was Commissioner Melissa Holyoak’s Chief of Staff and Attorney Adviser. He has also worked at private law firms and as an in-house lawyer. In his free time, Mufarrige taught a class on financial services and consumer protection at George Mason University’s Antonin Scalia Law School.
Chair, Global Antitrust Law Practice Group, Morrison Foerster
Alex Okuliar is Co-Chair of Morrison Foerster’s Global Antitrust Law Practice Group. He is the former Deputy Assistant Attorney General for Civil Antitrust Enforcement at the U.S. Department of Justice and a former advisor at the Federal Trade Commission.
Alex’s practice spans merger review, civil litigation, and criminal investigations. Over his twenty-five-year career, Alex has worked on nearly one thousand deals. He has deep experience guiding clients through the complex global merger clearance process and has litigated agency merger challenges through trial. He has also helped clients succeed in a wide range of federal and state cases, including class actions and private party disputes alleging price fixing, monopolization, group boycotts, market allocation, and tying. His understanding of the agency processes from the inside allows him to offer expert, timely, and practical advice to clients navigating merger and conduct investigations by the U.S. Department of Justice, the Federal Trade Commission, state Attorneys General, and foreign agencies. Alex’s work has been recognized by leading industry publications such as Chambers, The Legal 500 U.S., and Global Competition Review.
Outside of client work, Alex is a prolific thought leader and was recognized as a 2024 Top Author for Antitrust & Trade Regulation by JD Supra’s Readers’ Choice Awards. He currently serves as the co-chair of the ABA Antitrust Law Section’s Joint Conduct Committee and is the former chair of the Section’s Intellectual Property Committee and co-chair of the 2023 Antitrust Fall Forum on Artificial Intelligence. He is also a member of the Corporations, Securities & Antitrust Executive Committee of The Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies.
Before law school, Alex co-founded and sold an online technology company. Alex received his B.S. in economics and B.A. with distinction in history from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and his J.D. from Vanderbilt University Law School.
Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit
James C. Ho is a Circuit Judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. Before taking the bench on January 4, 2018, he was a partner and co-chair of the national Appellate and Constitutional Law practice group of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP.
As an appellate litigator for over a decade, including three years as the Solicitor General of Texas, Judge Ho presented 50 oral arguments in federal and state courts nationwide. He won numerous appeals, including three merits cases at the U.S. Supreme Court. He was routinely ranked among the nation’s leading lawyers by Benchmark, Chambers, Law360, The Legal 500, and The National Law Journal, among other publications. His work has been cited favorably by courts at every level of both the federal and state judiciaries. He won a Best Brief Award from the National Association of Attorneys General for every year that he served as solicitor general, and he is the only state solicitor general in history to be invited by the U.S. Supreme Court to express the views of a state.
Judge Ho has served in all three branches of the federal government. On the Senate Judiciary Committee, he served as chief counsel of the Subcommittees on the Constitution and Immigration under Senator John Cornyn. At the Justice Department, he served as Special Assistant to the Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights and an attorney-advisor at the Office of Legal Counsel. He clerked for Judge Jerry E. Smith of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and Justice Clarence Thomas of the U.S. Supreme Court.
His record of public service also includes appointments as vice chair of the Federal Judicial Evaluation Committee in Texas and co-chair of the National Asian Pacific American Bar Association Judiciary Committee, and as a member of the U.S. Magistrate Judge Merit Selection Panel for the Northern District of Texas, the U.S. delegation to the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, and the Continuity of Government Commission.
In addition, Judge Ho has served as an Adjunct Professor of Law at the University of Texas School of Law, where he taught seminars on U.S. Supreme Court Litigation and Religious Liberty. He has authored numerous articles in respected law reviews nationwide, including an annual feature on exemplary judicial writing for The Green Bag Almanac & Reader. He previously served as senior editor of The Green Bag and as co-editor of Pub. L. Misc.
Judge Ho graduated from Stanford University with honors and a B.A. in Public Policy in 1995, and the University of Chicago Law School with high honors in 1999. Before law school, he was a legislative aide to California State Senator Quentin Kopp. He and his wife Allyson live in Dallas, Texas, with their twin daughter and son.
Partner, Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher
Bradley J. Hamburger is a litigation partner in the Los Angeles office of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher. His practice focuses on class actions and complex litigation in both trial courts and on appeal. He is a member of the firm’s Class Actions, Appellate and Constitutional Law, and Labor and Employment practice groups.
Mr. Hamburger has represented clients in class actions and appeals across many areas of law, including employment, insurance, antitrust, consumer fraud, products liability, legal malpractice, and administrative law. He has briefed dozens of appeals, including cases in the United States Supreme Court, the Ninth Circuit, and the California Supreme Court, and has argued before the Ninth Circuit and the California Court of Appeal.
Mr. Hamburger has significant expertise in seeking interlocutory appellate review of class certification orders under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23(f), obtaining enforcement of arbitration agreements, and defending clients against representative actions under California’s Labor Code Private Attorneys General Act. Mr. Hamburger also regularly represents technology companies, and he has substantial experience litigating the application of Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act.
In 2023, Mr. Hamburger was ranked in the California Appellate Litigation category of the Chambers USA guide. In 2022, Law360 recognized Mr. Hamburger as a Rising Star in the Class Action category; BTI Consulting Group included him on its Client Service All-Stars list; and the Los Angeles Business Journal named him to its “Thriving In Their 40’s: LA’s Leaders of Influence” list. The Daily Journal named Mr. Hamburger as one of the top 40 lawyers in California under 40 in 2021. Mr. Hamburger also was part of the team that obtained one of the Daily Journal’s Top Appellate Reversals of 2021, Magadia v. Wal-Mart Associates, Inc., 999 F.3d 668 (9th Cir. 2021).
Partner, Horvitz & Levy LLP
Jeremy Rosen is nationally renowned for his proficiency in numerous issues arising under the First Amendment and California’s anti-SLAPP law. Using that knowledge, Jeremy has helped a wide variety of clients – including churches, private businesses, and individuals – defeat lawsuits that seek to impose liability on clients for exercising their rights of petition, free speech, and free exercise of religion. He has also handled hundreds of appeals in numerous appellate courts, including the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, the California Supreme Court, and California’s intermediate appellate courts. In addition to First Amendment and anti-SLAPP cases, his cases have involved numerous important issues regarding anti-trust, class actions, wage and hour law, employment law, breach of contract, California’s Unfair Competition Law, CEQA, the enforceability of arbitration clauses, hospital peer review, the scope of public employee whistleblower protection, and the application of the primary assumption of risk doctrine.
Jeremy is a partner at the firm, which he joined in 2001. He is a California State Bar Certified Appellate Specialist and a member of the California Academy of Appellate Lawyers.
Jeremy directed the Pepperdine University School of Law Ninth Circuit Appellate Advocacy Clinic for 6 years. The Clinic represents individuals in the Ninth Circuit who are identified by the court as needing pro bono counsel. Jeremy also previously served a three-year term where he was appointed by the Ninth Circuit to serve as one of 18 appellate lawyer representatives to the court.
Jeremy is a member of the National Chamber Litigation Center’s California Litigation Advisory Committee. Before joining the firm, Jeremy was a Litigation Associate with Munger, Tolles & Olson.
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.
Professor Emeritus of Strategic Management and Public Policy, School of Business, The George Washington University
Howard Beales teaches in the School of Business at the George Washington University, where he has been since 1988. His research interests include a wide variety of consumer protection regulatory issues, including privacy, law and economics, and the regulation of advertising. He has published numerous articles addressing these issues in academic journals.
From 2001 through 2004, Dr. Beales served as the Director of the Bureau of Consumer Protection at the Federal Trade Commission. In that capacity, he was instrumental in redirecting the FTC’s privacy agenda to focus on the consequences of the use and misuse of consumer information. During his tenure, the Commission proposed, promulgated, and implemented the national Do Not Call Registry. He also worked with Congress and the Administration to develop and implement the Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act of 2003, and testified before Congress on numerous occasions. His aggressive law enforcement program produced the largest redress orders in FTC history and attacked high volume frauds promoted through heavy television advertising.
Dr. Beales also worked at the FTC from 1977 to 1987, as a staff economist, Assistant to the Director of the Bureau of Consumer Protection, Associate Director for Policy and Evaluation, and Acting Deputy Director. In 1987-88, he was the Chief of the Human Resources and Housing Branch of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs in the Office of Management and Budget.
Howard Beales received his Ph.D. in economics from the University of Chicago in 1978. He graduated magna cum laude from Georgetown University with a B.A. in Economics in 1972.
Partner, Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, LLP
Svetlana S. Gans is a partner in the Washington, D.C. office of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, LLP where she helps clients navigate complex consumer protection, privacy, and competition related regulatory proceedings before the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC), , U.S. Department of Justice Antitrust Division, State Attorneys General and other enforcement bodies. Ms. Gans also assists on litigation matters and provides strategic counseling and advice related to public policy issues.
Before joining Gibson Dunn, she served as the Vice President & Associate General Counsel at NCTA, the Internet & Television Association, where she helped lead the association’s consumer protection and competition policy work. Prior to joining NCTA, Ms. Gans served with distinction as Chief of Staff to Acting Chairman Maureen K. Ohlhausen at the FTC. As the agency chief of staff, Ms. Gans managed and oversaw agency operations, including bureau and office heads reporting to the Chairman, a seven-member office staff, and an agency budget of over $300 million. She also served as the Acting Chairman’s key advisor on consumer protection and competition investigations and litigation, working with a diverse team of attorneys and economists to preserve competition and protect U.S. consumers. She created, executed, and oversaw several strategic initiatives for the agency, including the agency process reform, regulatory reform, and data security transparency initiatives. Previously, Ms. Gans had the unique experience of serving in both litigating bureaus of the FTC: the Bureau of Competition and the Bureau of Consumer Protection.
Prior to her time in government, Ms. Gans worked as an antitrust associate at major law firms. Her practice focused on defending consumer product, financial services, and trade association clients in regulatory and private investigations alleging conspiracy and violations of antitrust and consumer protection laws.
Ms. Gans has been an active leader in the ABA Antitrust Law Section (“Section”) for two decades, and currently serves as the Section’s Marketing Officer. Ms. Gans helped create the Section’s Young Lawyer Representative Program, now in its 10th year, and the Section’s Law Ambassador Program, each aimed at developing and promoting the next generation of consumer protection and competition attorneys. Ms. Gans is also active in the Federal Communications Bar Association, currently serving as Co-Chair of the Diversity Pipeline Initiative and the Women’s Leadership Committee.
Ms. Gans received her law degree with high honors from the University of Denver College of Law. During law school, Ms. Gans served as a Judicial Intern to the Honorable John L. Kane, Jr. and as an Honors Program Paralegal for the United States Department of Justice Antitrust Division, Merger Taskforce. Ms. Gans earned her undergraduate degree cum laude from Boston University.
George Mason University Foundation Professor of Law
Professor Timothy J. Muris, a George Mason University Foundation Professor of Law, served from 2000-2004 as Chairman of the Federal Trade Commission. During his tenure at the FTC, he created the highly popular National Do Not Call Registry that has allowed millions of consumers to block unwanted telemarketing calls. In addition to his current position at the Antonin Scalia Law School, Muris is Senior Counsel at Sidley Austin LLP.
Professor Muris has held three previous positions at the Commission: Assistant Director of the Planning Office (1974-1976), Director of the Bureau of Consumer Protection (1981-1983), and Director of the Bureau of Competition (1983-1985). After leaving the FTC in 1985, Muris served with the Executive Office of the President, Office of Management and Budget for three years. He was also Of Counsel with the law firm of Collier, Shannon, Rill & Scott (1992-2000), Howrey Simon Arnold & White (2000-2001), O’Melveny & Myers (2004-2011), Kirkland & Ellis LLP (2011-2017), and Senior Counsel, Sidley Austin LLP (2017- present).
Professor Muris joined the Antonin Scalia Law School, George Mason University as a Foundation Professor in 1988 and was interim dean of the law school from 1996 to 1997.
Professor Muris graduated with high honors from San Diego State University in 1971 and received his JD from UCLA in 1974. He was awarded Order of the Coif and was associate editor of the UCLA Law Review. A member of the American Bar Association's Antitrust Section, Muris has written widely on antitrust, consumer protection, regulatory, and budget issues.
Partner, Antitrust and Competition, Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati
Maureen Ohlhausen is a partner in the Washington, D.C., office of Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, where she advises industry-leading clients on complex antitrust and litigation matters, with a focus on high-profile cases. Sought after for her depth of experience on antitrust and Federal Trade Commission (FTC)-related issues, Maureen is known for her relationships with officials in the U.S. and abroad.
After finishing law school and clerking at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, Maureen joined the FTC in 1997. She held a series of roles at the agency over the next 12 years, rising to the position of Director of the FTC Office of Policy Planning, where she led the agency’s work on e-commerce and headed the FTC’s Internet Access Task Force, which produced an influential report analyzing competition and consumer protection legal issues in the broadband and internet sectors. She then went into private practice at a leading telecommunications law firm, where she headed the FTC practice group.
In 2012, Maureen was confirmed by the Senate as a Commissioner of the FTC and was appointed Acting Chairman in January 2017, a role she held until May 2018. As Acting Chairman, Maureen directed all aspects of the agency’s antitrust work, including merger review, conduct enforcement, and all consumer protection enforcement, with an emphasis on privacy and technology issues. Under her leadership, the FTC won several influential merger challenges in court and reached a number of key digital privacy settlements.
To date, Maureen is the only FTC Commissioner to have received the Robert Pitofsky Lifetime Achievement Award in recognition of her contributions to the FTC.
Following the end of her term at the FTC, and immediately prior to joining Wilson Sonsini, Maureen was chair of the global antitrust and competition practice at Baker Botts, based in that firm’s Washington, D.C., office.
A recognized thought leader, Maureen is a frequent author and speaker, and is often quoted by leading print and broadcast media on antitrust, FTC, and privacy and data security matters. She has published dozens of articles on antitrust, privacy, intellectual property, regulation, FTC litigation, telecommunications, and international law issues in prestigious publications. During her tenure at the FTC and in private practice, she testified more than two dozen times before Congress, including before the Senate Commerce Committee and the House Energy and Commerce Antitrust Sub-Committee. She also testified before the Antitrust Modernization Commission.
Solicitor General, Montana Attorney General's Office
Christian is currently Solicitor General of Montana, where he serves as the chief litigator and principal legal advisor to Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen. In that capacity, he manages litigation before the federal district courts, courts of appeal, and the United States Supreme Court, as well as the Montana Supreme Court. He previously served in the Trump Administration as Senior Counsel to the Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights at the U.S. Department of Education. Prior to government service, he was a public interest constitutional litigator at Mountain States Legal Foundation and a fellow at the Institute for Justice. He clerked for Justice Caleb Stegall on the Kansas Supreme Court. He also served as Director of Publications for the Federalist Society's national headquarters.
Christian earned his B.A. in Political Science in 2009 from the University of Pennsylvania before attending the University of Kansas School of Law. Christian is admitted to practice law in Kansas and Montana. A Kansas native, he is a die-hard fan of the Kansas Jayhawks, Kansas City Chiefs, and Kansas City Royals.
Christian is a member of the Federalism & Separation of Powers Practice Group's Executive Committee.
Co-Founder and President, Defense of Freedom Institute
Bob is a co-founder and President of DFI. He previously served as Senior Counselor to the Secretary of Education from 2017 through 2020 and Deputy General Counsel of the U.S. Department of Education from 2005 until 2009.
During his most recent tenure at the Department, Bob served on the Secretary’s Leadership Team as a strategic and legal adviser on higher education, civil rights, and congressional oversight matters. As the Department’s Regulatory Reform Officer, he also supervised the implementation of the Secretary’s regulatory agenda and was an architect of the Secretary’s reforms concerning Title IX and the Higher Education Act. As Deputy General Counsel, Bob advised on a wide variety of regulatory, legislative, and oversight matters.
Prior to joining the Department in 2017, Bob was vice president for regulatory compliance matters for several postsecondary institutions and practiced education and employment law in Washington, D.C. Before coming to the Department in 2005, he practiced law in New Orleans, litigating commercial, employment, and bankruptcy cases in Louisiana, Texas, and Mississippi.
Bob earned his A.B. in History from Georgetown University, studied British government and international politics at the London School of Economics and Political Science, and received his law degree from Tulane University Law School. His articles have been published by National Review, Real Clear Education, Washington Examiner, and other media outlets. Fox News has featured his work.
Bob is a member of the District of Columbia and Louisiana Bars and the Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies.
Former Acting Assistant Secretary and Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary, U.S. Department of Education, Office for Civil Rights
Kimberly M. Richey served as acting assistant secretary and principal deputy assistant secretary in the Office for Civil Rights (OCR) at the U.S Department of Education (DOE). Earlier, Richey served as the acting assistant secretary and deputy assistant secretary in the Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services at the DOE. Richey was the managing director of federal advocacy and public policy at the National School Boards Association, and earlier she represented the Oklahoma State Department of Education, the State Board of Education, and the state superintendent of public instruction as their general counsel.
Richey was general counsel and associate director of the Oklahoma Council on Law Enforcement Education and Training, a postsecondary education agency focused on peace officer training, and also served the DOE as counselor to the assistant secretary in the Office for Civil Rights. During that time, Richey was also acting chief of staff in the Office of Legislation and Congressional Affairs.
Richey is a certified teacher and is licensed to practice law in Oklahoma, Texas, and the District of Columbia. She holds a J.D. from the University of Oklahoma and a bachelor’s degree in education from Southern Nazarene University. Richey is a native of Corpus Christi, Texas.
General Counsel, Mountain States Legal Foundation
William E. Trachman is General Counsel for Mountain States Legal Foundation, where he protects the rights of individuals to live freely and securely under the U.S. Constitution. Previously, he was appointed to serve in the Department of Education as Deputy Assistant Secretary in the Office for Civil Rights. Prior to his appointment, he served as General Counsel to the Douglas County School District, where he helped litigate the fight for school choice in the school district. Presently, Mr. Trachman serves as Chair of the Colorado Federalist Society and the Vice Chair of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights’ Colorado Advisory Board. He previously taught as an Adjunct Professor at the University of Denver, Sturm College of Law. He attended U.C. Berkeley for both undergraduate and law school, and then clerked for the Honorable Harris Hartz on the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals. Mr. Trachman is licensed in Colorado, California, and Washington, D.C.
Professor of Law and J. Philip Johnson Faculty Fellow, University of North Dakota School of Law
Michael S. McGinniss is Professor of Law and J. Philip Johnson Faculty Fellow at the University of North Dakota School of Law, where he joined the faculty in 2010 and served as the Dean from 2019 to 2022. He chairs the executive committee for the Federalist Society's Practice Group on Professional Responsibility and Legal Education.
Before entering the legal academy, Professor McGinniss served for twelve years as a Disciplinary Counsel for the Supreme Court of Delaware. He currently teaches courses on Professional Responsibility, Advanced Legal Ethics, Civil Procedure, and Federal Courts. He also serves as Faculty Advisor for the North Dakota Law Review and the UND Law Federalist Society student chapter.
Professor McGinniss’ research and scholarship interests are wide-ranging and include lawyer and judicial ethics, lawyer discipline and regulation of the profession, constitutional law (especially First Amendment, separation of powers, and federalism), and cultural challenges faced by conservatives in the law schools and the legal profession. His most recent law review article, Declaring Independence to Secure Integrity: The Supreme Court Justices' Code of Conduct, was published in the Federalist Society Review. His article Expressing Conscience with Candor: Saint Thomas More and First Freedoms in the Legal Profession, was published in the Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy.
Professor McGinniss has spoken to Federalist Society lawyer and student chapters across the country about judicial independence and ethics, especially relating to the federal courts and the United States Supreme Court Justices. In addition, he has spoken to several chapters about rising challenges to ideological diversity and targeting of conservative viewpoints in law schools and the legal profession. Although he is very pleased to speak on these and many other topics that may be of interest to lawyer and student chapters, in 2026-2027, he has particular interest in speaking on the topic “Lawyer Discipline as Political ‘Resistance’: Separation of Powers, Federalism, and the Rule of Law,” concerning his work-in-progress on the weaponization of professional disciplinary processes against conservative lawyers for political and ideological purposes.
Professor of Law & Dean John F. Sutton, Jr. Chair in Lawyering a, Texas Law
John S. Dzienkowski is a summa cum laude graduate of the University of Miami with a Bachelor of Business Administration and a high honors graduate of the University of Texas School of Law. While in law school, Mr. Dzienkowski served as the editor-in-chief of the Texas Law Review and he received the honors of a member in the UT Chancellors and the Order of the Coif. He served as a judicial law clerk for Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Joseph Sneed in 1983-84 and for District of Massachusetts Judge Robert Keeton in 1984-85. Mr. Dzienkowski began his teaching career at Tulane Law School in New Orleans and he joined the Texas faculty in 1988. John was a visiting professor at the George Washington University School of Law in 1992-93 and at Cornell Law School in 1995. In Spring 2002, Mr. Dzienkowski visited the University of Florida Levin College of Law as the Hurst Eminent Visiting Scholar, and in Fall 2002, he visited the University of Alabama School of Law as the Francis Hare Visiting Chair in Tort Law.
Mr. Dzienkowski teaches and writes in the areas of professional responsibility of lawyers, real property, international energy transactions, and oil and gas taxation. He is widely regarded as one of the most dynamic and effective speakers on topics of professional responsibility and he has delivered almost one hundred ethics presentations to in-house corporate departments, large and small law firms, state bar continuing legal education programs, and law faculties throughout this country. In 2005, Mr. Dzienkowski received the Texas Exes Faculty Teaching Award for excellence in teaching. He is a four-term member of the drafting committee of the Multistate Professional Responsibility Examination.
In the area of professional responsibility of lawyers, John has authored leading articles on topics relating to conflicts of interest in lawyering: "Positional Conflicts of Interest" (71 Texas Law Review 457), "Lawyers as Intermediaries" (1992 Illinois Law Review 741), "Multidisciplinary Practice of Law" (69 Fordham Law Review 83) (with Bob Peroni), and "Lawyer Equity Investments in Clients" (81 Texas Law Review 405) (with Bob Peroni). He is the editor of the leading statutory supplement on PROFESSIONAL RESPONSIBILITY: STANDARDS, RULES, AND STATUTES and a co-author of a casebook on PROFESSIONAL RESPONSIBILITY OF LAWYERS (1988 and 2002) (with John Sutton). In 2005, Mr. Dzienkowski joined Ronald Rotunda as a co-author of Legal Ethics: A Lawyer's Deskbook on Professional Responsibility (2005). In the area of natural resources, Mr. Dzienkowski is a founding co-author of the first commercially produced casebooks on NATURAL RESOURCES TAXATION (1988) and INTERNATIONAL PETROLEUM TRANSACTIONS (1993 and 2000). He is also a co-author of a leading treatise on oil and gas law and taxation, HEMINGWAY'S OIL AND GAS LAW AND TAXATION (2004). Mr. Dzienkowski is also the co-chair of a bi-annual UT Program on Oil and Gas Taxation co-sponsored with the Internal Revenue Service. Mr. Dzienkowski, along with John Steele and Bradley Wendel, have co-founded www.legalethicsforum.com, a leading blog on issues related to legal ethics.
Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Third Circuit
David J. Porter is a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit. He was nominated by President Donald Trump and confirmed on October 11, 2018. Before his appointment, he was a shareholder at Buchanan Ingersoll & Rooney PC, where he practiced commercial and civil litigation. Porter received his bachelor’s degree from Grove City College and his J.D. from the George Mason University School of Law. He clerked for Judge D. Brooks Smith on the United States District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania.
US Representative, 21st District of New York
Congresswoman Elise Stefanik proudly represents New York’s 21st District in her fifth term and serves as the House Republican Conference Chair and most senior Republican in New York.
At the time of her first election in 2014, Elise was the youngest woman ever elected to Congress in United States history. She continued this historic rise and she is currently the youngest woman ever to serve in top elected House leadership. Elise is known for her tireless work ethic, policy leadership, media savvy, genuine grassroots connection with constituents, and laser focus on delivering real results to Upstate New York and North Country. Elise has consistently won historic re-election victories, often by the largest margin of any Republican in the Northeast, and consistently earning the most votes in history for any congressional candidate in the North Country.
Elise is a senior member of the Armed Services Committee, the Committee on Education and the Workforce, the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, and the Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government. Elise has been rated as one of the most effective and bipartisan Members of Congress. She is a well-respected national policy leader on issues ranging from economic policy impacting small businesses and manufacturers to national security, intelligence reform and oversight, rural broadband, rural healthcare, constitutional protections, conservation, life, K-12 & higher education, cyber security, artificial intelligence, law enforcement, battlefield preservation, northern border issues, border security, & government accountability and transparency.
Elise was born and raised in Upstate New York. Prior to serving in Congress, she worked at her family’s small business. Growing up in a small business family, Elise learned, lived, and understands the values of hard work, perseverance, determination, and grit. As the first member of her immediate family to have the opportunity to earn a college degree, Elise graduated with Honors from Harvard. From 2006 to 2009, Elise served in the West Wing of the White House on President George W. Bush’s Domestic Policy Council Staff and the Chief of Staff’s office where she assisted in overseeing the policy development process on all economic and domestic policy issues.
It is the highest and most humbling honor of Elise’s life to represent Upstate New York and the North Country in Congress. She is proud to work tirelessly every day to bring a new generation of leadership to Washington on behalf of her district’s hardworking families, small businesses, farmers, students, seniors, service members, military families, law enforcement officers, and veterans. She is unapologetic about fighting every day to give her constituents a seat at the absolute highest levels of government.
Elise lives in Schuylerville with her husband Matt and their young son Sam. They are proud to call Upstate New York – the cradle of the American Revolution – home.