Senior Fellow and Director of Constitutional Studies, Manhattan Institute
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 is the author of Lawless: The Miseducation of America’s Elites (2025) and Supreme Disorder: Judicial Nominations and the Politics of America’s Highest Court (2020), coauthor of Religious Liberties for Corporations? (2014), and editor of 11 volumes of the Cato Supreme Court Review (2008-18). He has contributed to a variety of academic, popular, and professional publications, including the Wall Street Journal, Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, USA Today, National Review, and Newsweek. He also regularly provides commentary for various media outlets, writes the Shapiro’s Gavel newsletter on Substack, and once appeared on the Colbert Report.
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.
Partner, Barr & Klein PLLC
Steve Klein, a partner at Barr & Klein PLLC, is an experienced free speech attorney who has successfully fought for the First Amendment rights of his clients against local, state and federal regulators. As a lobbyist, Steve’s advocacy has led to the successful amendment of state laws to respect political engagement and prevented the enactment of laws that burden it. Steve has published articles in several legal journals, and his commentary has appeared in The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Times, The Detroit News, and other outlets. Steve earned a bachelors degree in politics at Hillsdale College and a law degree from Ave Maria School of Law, where he served as Managing Editor of the Ave Maria Law Review. He is licensed to practice law in the District of Columbia, Illinois and Michigan.
John Marshall Harlan II Professor of Law Emerita, New York Law School; Former President, American Civil Liberties Union
Nadine Strossen, New York Law School Professor Emerita and Senior Fellow at FIRE (the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression), was national President of the American Civil Liberties Union from 1991 to 2008. An internationally acclaimed free speech scholar and advocate, who regularly addresses diverse audiences and provides media commentary around the world, Strossen is also the Host and Project Consultant for Free To Speak, a 3-hour documentary film series distributed on public television in 2023. Her books about free speech include: Free Speech: What Everyone Needs to Know® (Oxford University Press 2023); HATE: Why We Should Resist It with Free Speech, Not Censorship (Oxford University Press 2018); and Defending Pornography: Free Speech, Sex, and the Fight for Women’s Rights (Scribner 1995), which was republished with a new Preface in 2024 as part of the NYU Classics Series. Her many honors and awards include the National Coalition Against Censorship’s Judy Blume Lifetime Achievement Award for Free Speech. She serves on the Advisory Boards of several organizations that do free speech work, including: ACLU, Academic Freedom Alliance, Foundation Against Intolerance and Racism (FAIR), Heterodox Academy, National Coalition Against Censorship, and the University of Austin.
Topics
Iowa Supreme Court Considers ABA Model Rule 8.4(g): Comment Deadline September 30, 2019
The Iowa Supreme Court is holding a public comment period until 4:30 on September 30,...
Explainer Episode 4 – Civil Rights and Vanity Plates
Regulatory Transparency Project's Fourth Branch Podcast
Jon Kotler, a California fan of the London soccer club Fulham FC, wanted to put...
Supreme Court Roundup: October Term 2018 [SCOTUSbrief]
Ilya Shapiro
Short video featuring Ilya Shapiro
While the Supreme Court’s last term included a number of blockbuster decisions, the majority of...
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Alaska Attorney General Warns that Proposed Rule 8.4(f) Is Unconstitutional
On September 5 at 1 p.m., the Alaska Bar Association Board of Governors will hear...
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Telescope Media Group v. Lucero Decided: Religious Liberty in the 8th Circuit
Assessing a pre-enforcement challenge, the 8th Circuit via Judge Stras protects religious liberty and conscience...
Citizens’ Secret Recording and the First Amendment
Stephen R. Klein
For over half a century, federal law and most states have regulated secretly recording speech...
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The Alaska Bar Association Considers ABA Model Rule 8.4(g): Comments Received Until August 15, 2019
The Alaska Bar Association recently announced that it is taking comments on Proposed Rule 8.4(f)...
Should Hate Speech Be Censored? [POLICYbrief]
Nadine Strossen
Short video featuring Nadine Strossen
Should the US government censor hate speech? Nadine Strossen, Professor of Law at New York...
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Fourth Circuit Recognizes Free Speech Concerns with Voter List Access Restrictions
On July 12, a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit...
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Licensing Speech & Regulating the Internet: Tennessee’s Auctioneer Licensing Scheme
This spring the Tennessee legislature substantially broadened the sweep of its auctioneering license, with an...