Senior Vice President, Strategic Initiatives & Special Counsel to the President, Alliance Defending Freedom
Ryan Bangert serves as senior vice president for strategic initiatives and special counsel to the president at Alliance Defending Freedom. He oversees ADF’s regulatory practice, government relations, and corporate engagement teams. He also advises executive leadership with strategic initiatives and appears as counsel for ADF clients.
Before joining ADF, Bangert served as deputy first assistant attorney general and deputy for legal counsel in the office of the Texas attorney general. In those roles, he oversaw the state’s Special Litigation Unit, which handled critical litigation against the federal government, and oversaw multiple divisions within the office. Prior to that, he served as deputy for civil litigation for Missouri Attorney General Josh Hawley, overseeing the state’s civil litigation divisions, including the consumer protection and antitrust divisions, with over 200 attorneys and staff. During his time in government service, Bangert handled a diverse array of matters involving Big Tech, election law, civil rights, multistate antitrust and consumer protection investigations, and many other issues.
Prior to his government service, Bangert was a litigation partner at Baker Botts L.L.P., where he was a member of the firm’s commercial litigation and appellate practice sections. A seasoned trial attorney, The Texas Lawyer ranked the verdict Bangert achieved in the Janvey v. Maldonado case as the #1 verdict in the securities category for 2015-2019, and The National Law Journal ranked it in its “Top 100 Verdicts of 2015.” He was named a “Texas Rising Star” for multiple years by Texas Lawyer and Law and Politics magazines. While at Baker Botts, he was a volunteer attorney for ADF and served as amicus counsel in numerous cases, including Trinity Lutheran v. Comer and Salazar v. Buono, receiving the firm’s Opus Justitae Award in recognition of his outstanding commitment to pro bono service.
Bangert earned his J.D. from Southern Methodist University, where he was a Hatton Sumner’s scholar and graduated first in his class. He also participated in ADF’s Blackstone program and is a Blackstone Fellow. Following law school, he clerked for the Honorable Patrick E. Higginbotham on the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals.
Bangert is a member of the Philadelphia Society and Federalist Society. He is admitted to practice law in Texas, California (inactive), Missouri (inactive), the U.S. Supreme Court and numerous federal district and appellate courts. A frequent op-ed contributor, his work has appeared in National Review, Daily Wire, The Hill, Washington Examiner, The Federalist, Fox News, and RealClear Religion. He speaks nationally on constitutional, cultural, and religious liberty issues.
General Counsel, xAI and X
Chief Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit
Jennifer Walker Elrod is the Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. She was nominated to the Fifth Circuit in 2007, and she served as a Circuit Judge on the court until assuming the role of Chief Judge in October 2024. Prior to serving as a Circuit Judge, Chief Judge Elrod was appointed and then twice elected Judge of the 190th District Court of Harris County, Texas, where she spent over five years presiding over more than 200 jury and non-jury trials.
Chief Judge Elrod graduated cum laude from Harvard Law School, where she was an active member of the Harvard Federalist Society, an Ames Moot Court finalist, and a Senior Editor of the Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy. She clerked for the Honorable Sim Lake in the Southern District of Texas. Before serving as a judge, Chief Judge Elrod worked in private practice, focusing on civil litigation, antitrust, and employment matters.
She has been repeatedly recognized for her work as a jurist, as well as for her pro bono work and contributions to the community. She has been named the 2022 Texas Review of Law & Politics’ Jurist of the Year, the 2018 Harvard Federalist Society’s Alumni of the Year, the 2016–17 Texas Association of Civil Trial and Appellate Specialists’ Appellate Judge of the Year, and the 2008 Mexican-American Bar Association of Texas’s Judge of the Year.
Chief Judge Elrod is actively engaged in the academic and legal communities. Chief Judge Elrod currently serves on the Board of Directors and as the Jurist-in-Residence at the South Texas College of Law, where she teaches civil procedure and First Amendment law. She is also a member of the American Law Institute and of the Board of Advisors for the Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy, and she is a former member of the Board of Regents of her alma mater, Baylor University, and the Board of Visitors at Brigham Young University Law School. She previously served as the Chair of the Codes of Conduct Committee for the Judicial Conference of the United States. She has also served as the M.D. Anderson Visiting Public Service Professor at the Texas Tech University School of Law and as Jurist-in-Residence at Brigham Young University Law School, and she has taught legal writing at the University of Houston Law Center. She presented the Lewis F. Powell, Jr. Distinguished Lecture at the Washington and Lee University School of Law and is a frequent speaker on the topics of trial and appellate procedure, ethics, employment law, and constitutional law. Chief Judge Elrod also serves on the board of the Garland R. Walker Inn of Court, and co-produces an annual musical CLE, for which her pupilage group has won multiple national awards.
Chief Judge Elrod’s publications include: Trial by Siri: AI Comes to the Courtroom; Don’t Mess with Texas Judges: In Praise of the State Judiciary; For Good: Enriching Your Practice and Your Life Through Pro Bono and Community Service; Is the Jury Still Out?: A Case for the Continued Viability of the American Jury; and W(h)ither the Jury? The Diminishing Role of the Jury Trial in our Legal System.
Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Eleventh Circuit
Judge Kevin C. Newsom is a member of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. He sits in Birmingham, Alabama.
Before his appointment to the bench, Judge Newsom was the head of the appellate practice group at Bradley Arant Boult Cummings LLP and, before that, the Solicitor General of Alabama. As a practicing lawyer, Judge Newsom argued four cases in the Supreme Court of the United States, and nearly 40 more in the United States Courts of Appeals and state supreme and appellate courts.
Judge Newsom graduated summa cum laude from Samford University and magna cum laude from Harvard Law School, where he was an articles editor on the Harvard Law Review. Following law school, Judge Newsom clerked for Judge Diarmuid F. O’Scannlain of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and Justice David H. Souter of the Supreme Court of the United States.
Judge Newsom teaches at Harvard Law School, Yale Law School, Stanford Law School, and the University of Chicago Law School. His published work has appeared in the Yale Law Journal and the Harvard Law Review.
President, Notre Dame Student Chapter
Associate General Counsel, OpenAI
Michael Trinh is currently Associate General Counsel at OpenAI working on litigation and regulatory matters. He was formerly Head of Litigation Advance at Google where he led a team handling a broad portfolio of litigation strategy, research, amici briefs, and proactive/enforcement litigation across the company’s product areas.
In prior roles over 14 years at Google, Mike managed a group defending patent litigation worldwide, and also served as product counsel at Google X for emerging ‘moonshots’ (innovation projects primarily in developing economies). He guided experimental aviation projects as they evolved from research concept towards market introduction, handling the legal/regulatory issues arising from high altitude balloon-mounted telecommunication networks, drone delivery of burritos, kite-generated electricity, and cargo airships. Before this science fiction, he was Litigation Counsel at Google, managing a team handling a fast-growing docket of 100+ patent litigation cases in courts worldwide.
Previously, he was a technology/IP litigation associate at Orrick, Herrington and Sutcliffe in San Francisco. He also handled national security issues while representing, pro bono, Guantanamo Bay detainees challenging their indefinite incarceration without ever being charged. Mike graduated from the Georgetown University Law Center (2005) and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (2002, B.S. Comp Sci). While he grew up in Raleigh, NC, he now lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with his wife and a string cheese-seeking dog (who was once featured in the Financial Times).
General Counsel, Saronic Technologies
Tobi Young is the General Counsel of Saronic Technologies. Her responsibilities include managing global legal affairs, regulatory compliance, litigation, risk management, and government security, and corporate governance.
Tobi brings over 20 years of experience with sophisticated legal, regulatory, and compliance issues through leadership roles in all three branches of the federal government and in Fortune 500 companies. Among other governmental positions, she has been an attorney in the U.S. Department of Justice and in the Office of the White House Counsel; a law clerk to U.S. Supreme Court Justice Neil M. Gorsuch; and a press secretary for Congressman J.C. Watts. Tobi also currently serves as the Chair of the Nominating and Governance Committee on the Halliburton Board of Directors (NYSE: HAL).
Tobi grew up in Oklahoma and is a proud member of the Chickasaw Nation. She recently became the youngest inductee into the Chickasaw Hall of Fame. Tobi now lives in Austin with her husband Evan, a Justice on the Texas Supreme Court, and their daughter Romilly.
Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit
John B. Nalbandian serves as a United States Circuit Judge from Kentucky on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. He was nominated and confirmed to that position in 2018. Prior to that, Judge Nalbandian was a partner in the litigation practice group of Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP in Cincinnati, where he served as the firm’s lead appellate lawyer and also practiced complex litigation in state and federal courts. Judge Nalbandian was board certified by the Ohio State Bar Association as a specialist in appellate law. Prior to joining Taft, Judge Nalbandian practiced for five years in the appellate section of Jones Day in Washington, DC. Upon graduation from law school, Judge Nalbandian clerked for the Honorable Jerry E. Smith of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in Houston. While in private practice, he also served as a board member of the State Justice Institute, a nonprofit organization established by the federal government to improve the administration of justice in state courts. He served as President of the Cincinnati Lawyers Chapter of the Federalist Society. He has also been involved in his community as a board member of the Greater Cincinnati Minority Counsel Program, and as a board member of the Asian Pacific Bar Association of Southwest Ohio. Judge Nalbandian earned his B.S., magna cum laude, from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and his J.D. from the University of Virginia School of Law, where he was inducted into the Order of the Coif and served as managing editor of the Virginia Law Review.
Head of AI Policy, Abundance Institute
Neil Chilson is the Head of AI Policy at the Abundance Institute. Prior to this position, he served as a Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Growth and Opportunity. Chilson is a lawyer, computer scientist, and author of the book “Getting Out of Control: Emergent Leadership in a Complex World.”
Chilson was previously the senior research fellow for Technology and Innovation at Stand Together, where he guided efforts to understand and promote the legal and cultural paradigms that best enable people to discover, innovate, and improve all our lives.
Before Stand Together, Chilson was the Chief Technologist at the Federal Trade Commission, where he focused on the economics of privacy and blockchain-related issues. Previously, he was an attorney advisor to Acting FTC Chairman Maureen K. Ohlhausen. In both roles he advised Chairman Ohlhausen and worked with staff on nearly every major technology-related case, report, workshop, or other FTC proceeding since January 2014. Neil joined the FTC from telecom firm Wilkinson Barker Knauer. Neil is frequently quoted by the press and his work has appeared in numerous news outlets, including The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, USAToday, and Newsweek. Neil has a J.D. from The George Washington Law School, a M.S. in computer science from University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, and a B.S. in computer science from Harding University.
AI Innovation and Law Fellow, University of Texas School of Law
Kevin Frazier is an AI Innovation and Law Fellow with University of Texas School of Law.
Senior Fellow for Law, Economics, and Technology, The Heritage Foundation; Professor, Florida International University
Mario Loyola is a Senior Fellow for Law, Economics, and Technology at The Heritage Foundation.
Loyola served in the Trump Administration as Associate Director for Regulatory Reform at the White House Council on Environmental Quality. In that role, he was one of the principal drafters of the One Federal Decision policy, which helped to streamline the permitting and environmental review of large infrastructure projects. While at CEQ, he was a member of the U.S. delegation to the USMCA free trade negotiations with Mexico and Canada, as well as the United Nations conference on biodiversity on the high seas. Loyola initially joined the White House in February 2017 as a Presidential Speechwriter, employing his expertise in many areas of foreign and domestic policy.
After beginning his career in M&A and corporate finance law, Loyola served in the Bush 43 Administration as a special assistant to the Undersecretary of Defense for Policy. He left that position to start writing on national defense issues in magazines such as National Review and The Weekly Standard, reporting from the front lines of the war on terrorism in Lebanon, Israel, and Iraq. He finished the Bush Administration as Foreign and Defense Counsel to the U.S. Senate Republican Policy Committee, then under the chairmanship of Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas. He subsequently moved to Texas and joined the Texas Public Policy Foundation, where he specialized in energy, environment, and federalism.
Loyola is a frequent contributor to The Wall Street Journal, National Review, and The Atlantic, among others. He teaches environmental and administrative law at Florida International University, where he is Founding Director of the Environmental Finance and Risk Management program in FIU’s prestigious Institute of Environment. He received a bachelor’s degree in European history from the University of Wisconsin–Madison and a J.D. from Washington University School of Law.
Director of Artificial Intelligence & Technology Policy, Vanderbilt Policy Accelerator, Vanderbilt University
Asad Ramzanali is the Director of Artificial Intelligence & Technology Policy at the Vanderbilt Policy Accelerator.
Asad has technology and technology policy experience across government, nonprofit, and industry. Most recently, he served as the Chief of Staff and Deputy Director for Strategy at the Biden-Harris White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP), with the designation of Special Assistant to the President. He joined OSTP after four years on Capitol Hill. He was Legislative Director for U.S. Representative Anna Eshoo, whose district included much of Silicon Valley, after a short stint as a legislative fellow for U.S. Senator Brian Schatz. Before entering public service, Asad worked on the corporate strategy team at Intuit and managed an impact investing program backed by JPMorgan Chase, funding early-stage financial technology startups serving low-income Americans.
Asad earned a Bachelor of Arts in economics from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and a Master of Public Policy from Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government. He is based in Washington, D.C.
Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Eleventh Circuit
Judge Kevin C. Newsom is a member of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. He sits in Birmingham, Alabama.
Before his appointment to the bench, Judge Newsom was the head of the appellate practice group at Bradley Arant Boult Cummings LLP and, before that, the Solicitor General of Alabama. As a practicing lawyer, Judge Newsom argued four cases in the Supreme Court of the United States, and nearly 40 more in the United States Courts of Appeals and state supreme and appellate courts.
Judge Newsom graduated summa cum laude from Samford University and magna cum laude from Harvard Law School, where he was an articles editor on the Harvard Law Review. Following law school, Judge Newsom clerked for Judge Diarmuid F. O’Scannlain of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and Justice David H. Souter of the Supreme Court of the United States.
Judge Newsom teaches at Harvard Law School, Yale Law School, Stanford Law School, and the University of Chicago Law School. His published work has appeared in the Yale Law Journal and the Harvard Law Review.
Head of AI Policy, Abundance Institute
Neil Chilson is the Head of AI Policy at the Abundance Institute. Prior to this position, he served as a Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Growth and Opportunity. Chilson is a lawyer, computer scientist, and author of the book “Getting Out of Control: Emergent Leadership in a Complex World.”
Chilson was previously the senior research fellow for Technology and Innovation at Stand Together, where he guided efforts to understand and promote the legal and cultural paradigms that best enable people to discover, innovate, and improve all our lives.
Before Stand Together, Chilson was the Chief Technologist at the Federal Trade Commission, where he focused on the economics of privacy and blockchain-related issues. Previously, he was an attorney advisor to Acting FTC Chairman Maureen K. Ohlhausen. In both roles he advised Chairman Ohlhausen and worked with staff on nearly every major technology-related case, report, workshop, or other FTC proceeding since January 2014. Neil joined the FTC from telecom firm Wilkinson Barker Knauer. Neil is frequently quoted by the press and his work has appeared in numerous news outlets, including The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, USAToday, and Newsweek. Neil has a J.D. from The George Washington Law School, a M.S. in computer science from University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, and a B.S. in computer science from Harding University.
AI Innovation and Law Fellow, University of Texas School of Law
Kevin Frazier is an AI Innovation and Law Fellow with University of Texas School of Law.
Senior Fellow for Law, Economics, and Technology, The Heritage Foundation; Professor, Florida International University
Mario Loyola is a Senior Fellow for Law, Economics, and Technology at The Heritage Foundation.
Loyola served in the Trump Administration as Associate Director for Regulatory Reform at the White House Council on Environmental Quality. In that role, he was one of the principal drafters of the One Federal Decision policy, which helped to streamline the permitting and environmental review of large infrastructure projects. While at CEQ, he was a member of the U.S. delegation to the USMCA free trade negotiations with Mexico and Canada, as well as the United Nations conference on biodiversity on the high seas. Loyola initially joined the White House in February 2017 as a Presidential Speechwriter, employing his expertise in many areas of foreign and domestic policy.
After beginning his career in M&A and corporate finance law, Loyola served in the Bush 43 Administration as a special assistant to the Undersecretary of Defense for Policy. He left that position to start writing on national defense issues in magazines such as National Review and The Weekly Standard, reporting from the front lines of the war on terrorism in Lebanon, Israel, and Iraq. He finished the Bush Administration as Foreign and Defense Counsel to the U.S. Senate Republican Policy Committee, then under the chairmanship of Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas. He subsequently moved to Texas and joined the Texas Public Policy Foundation, where he specialized in energy, environment, and federalism.
Loyola is a frequent contributor to The Wall Street Journal, National Review, and The Atlantic, among others. He teaches environmental and administrative law at Florida International University, where he is Founding Director of the Environmental Finance and Risk Management program in FIU’s prestigious Institute of Environment. He received a bachelor’s degree in European history from the University of Wisconsin–Madison and a J.D. from Washington University School of Law.
Director of Artificial Intelligence & Technology Policy, Vanderbilt Policy Accelerator, Vanderbilt University
Asad Ramzanali is the Director of Artificial Intelligence & Technology Policy at the Vanderbilt Policy Accelerator.
Asad has technology and technology policy experience across government, nonprofit, and industry. Most recently, he served as the Chief of Staff and Deputy Director for Strategy at the Biden-Harris White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP), with the designation of Special Assistant to the President. He joined OSTP after four years on Capitol Hill. He was Legislative Director for U.S. Representative Anna Eshoo, whose district included much of Silicon Valley, after a short stint as a legislative fellow for U.S. Senator Brian Schatz. Before entering public service, Asad worked on the corporate strategy team at Intuit and managed an impact investing program backed by JPMorgan Chase, funding early-stage financial technology startups serving low-income Americans.
Asad earned a Bachelor of Arts in economics from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and a Master of Public Policy from Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government. He is based in Washington, D.C.
Head of AI Policy, Abundance Institute
Neil Chilson is the Head of AI Policy at the Abundance Institute. Prior to this position, he served as a Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Growth and Opportunity. Chilson is a lawyer, computer scientist, and author of the book “Getting Out of Control: Emergent Leadership in a Complex World.”
Chilson was previously the senior research fellow for Technology and Innovation at Stand Together, where he guided efforts to understand and promote the legal and cultural paradigms that best enable people to discover, innovate, and improve all our lives.
Before Stand Together, Chilson was the Chief Technologist at the Federal Trade Commission, where he focused on the economics of privacy and blockchain-related issues. Previously, he was an attorney advisor to Acting FTC Chairman Maureen K. Ohlhausen. In both roles he advised Chairman Ohlhausen and worked with staff on nearly every major technology-related case, report, workshop, or other FTC proceeding since January 2014. Neil joined the FTC from telecom firm Wilkinson Barker Knauer. Neil is frequently quoted by the press and his work has appeared in numerous news outlets, including The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, USAToday, and Newsweek. Neil has a J.D. from The George Washington Law School, a M.S. in computer science from University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, and a B.S. in computer science from Harding University.
AI Innovation and Law Fellow, University of Texas School of Law
Kevin Frazier is an AI Innovation and Law Fellow with University of Texas School of Law.
Senior Fellow for Law, Economics, and Technology, The Heritage Foundation; Professor, Florida International University
Mario Loyola is a Senior Fellow for Law, Economics, and Technology at The Heritage Foundation.
Loyola served in the Trump Administration as Associate Director for Regulatory Reform at the White House Council on Environmental Quality. In that role, he was one of the principal drafters of the One Federal Decision policy, which helped to streamline the permitting and environmental review of large infrastructure projects. While at CEQ, he was a member of the U.S. delegation to the USMCA free trade negotiations with Mexico and Canada, as well as the United Nations conference on biodiversity on the high seas. Loyola initially joined the White House in February 2017 as a Presidential Speechwriter, employing his expertise in many areas of foreign and domestic policy.
After beginning his career in M&A and corporate finance law, Loyola served in the Bush 43 Administration as a special assistant to the Undersecretary of Defense for Policy. He left that position to start writing on national defense issues in magazines such as National Review and The Weekly Standard, reporting from the front lines of the war on terrorism in Lebanon, Israel, and Iraq. He finished the Bush Administration as Foreign and Defense Counsel to the U.S. Senate Republican Policy Committee, then under the chairmanship of Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas. He subsequently moved to Texas and joined the Texas Public Policy Foundation, where he specialized in energy, environment, and federalism.
Loyola is a frequent contributor to The Wall Street Journal, National Review, and The Atlantic, among others. He teaches environmental and administrative law at Florida International University, where he is Founding Director of the Environmental Finance and Risk Management program in FIU’s prestigious Institute of Environment. He received a bachelor’s degree in European history from the University of Wisconsin–Madison and a J.D. from Washington University School of Law.
Director of Artificial Intelligence & Technology Policy, Vanderbilt Policy Accelerator, Vanderbilt University
Asad Ramzanali is the Director of Artificial Intelligence & Technology Policy at the Vanderbilt Policy Accelerator.
Asad has technology and technology policy experience across government, nonprofit, and industry. Most recently, he served as the Chief of Staff and Deputy Director for Strategy at the Biden-Harris White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP), with the designation of Special Assistant to the President. He joined OSTP after four years on Capitol Hill. He was Legislative Director for U.S. Representative Anna Eshoo, whose district included much of Silicon Valley, after a short stint as a legislative fellow for U.S. Senator Brian Schatz. Before entering public service, Asad worked on the corporate strategy team at Intuit and managed an impact investing program backed by JPMorgan Chase, funding early-stage financial technology startups serving low-income Americans.
Asad earned a Bachelor of Arts in economics from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and a Master of Public Policy from Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government. He is based in Washington, D.C.
Senior Policy Counsel, Public Knowledge
As Senior Policy Counsel, Meredith focuses on copyright, DMCA, intellectual property reform, and governance issues, as well as telecommunications regulatory matters. Prior to working at Public Knowledge, Meredith worked on consumer policy issues at the Federal Communications Commission, the Trans-Atlantic Consumer Dialogue, and Knowledge Ecology International. Meredith received her J.D. and A.B. from the University of Chicago. When not in the office, she’s an avid video gamer and desert hiker.
Associate Professor, UNH Franklin Pierce School of Law
Zvi S. Rosen is an Associate Professor at UNH Franklin Pierce School of Law and the Faculty Director of the Franklin Pierce Society for Intellectual Property. He has served as a Assistant Professor at the Southern Illinois University School of Law, as a Visiting Assistant Professor at the Maurice A. Deane School of Law at Hofstra University, and as a Visiting Scholar and Professorial Lecturer in Law at George Washington University School of Law.
In 2015-2016, he was the Abraham L. Kaminstein Scholar in Residence at the U.S. Copyright Office. Mr. Rosen received his J.D. from Northwestern University School of Law in 2005 and LLM in Intellectual Property in 2006 from the George Washington University Law School. He has practiced at Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson LLP as well as smaller firms and his own practice, and clerked for the Hon. Thomas B. Bennett of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Northern District of Alabama. He has written extensively on the development of modern copyright and trademark law, as well as on bankruptcy law.
Senior Vice President & General Counsel, News/Media Alliance
Regan Smith is Senior Vice President & General Counsel at the News/Media Alliance. She is a recognized expert in intellectual property law and policy who has testified before multiple parliamentary bodies and spoken in other government, academic, and industry forums on topics including copyright, artificial intelligence, digital rights management, free expression, algorithmic regulation, music, and collective licensing.
Previously, Ms. Smith served as General Counsel and Associate Register of Copyrights at the U.S. Copyright Office, where she assumed a broad range of responsibilities as a member of the agency’s senior leadership team. In that role, she oversaw an extensive portfolio of regulatory, litigation, and policy matters, including over 45 regulatory proceedings and several matters before the Supreme Court. Ms. Smith spearheaded the agency’s policy and legal work to update the licensing for musical works under the Music Modernization Act, overhauled the rulemaking regarding anticircumvention of technological measures required by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), and served on the administrative board determining final appeals to denials of registration applications on the thorniest questions of copyrightability. During her tenure, she helped formulate the government's views in every copyright litigation to reach the Supreme Court and multiple circuits.
Immediately prior to News/Media Alliance, Ms. Smith was Head of Public Policy in Spotify’s government affairs group, leading global intellectual property and music policy matters. Earlier in her career, she spent several years in private practice, focusing on intellectual property, media law, First Amendment, advertising, and emerging technology issues, and was previously an executive at an entertainment company that produced feature film and live theatrical properties.
Ms. Smith teaches copyright law at the George Washington University. She is a trustee of the Copyright Society of the U.S.A., the Chair of the ABA’s Copyright Legislation committee, and the recipient of many professional accolades, including the Librarian of Congress’s distinguished service award.
Ms. Smith received a JD from Harvard Law School and a BA in philosophy and political science from the University of Michigan.
Showcase Panel 3: AI for the Law, and Law for AI
2025 National Lawyers Convention
Washington, DCThe Future of Legal Education: ABA, DEI, and AI
Professional Responsibility Practice Group
Washington, DCThe Future of Legal Education: ABA, DEI, and AI
CLE credit for this event is available at On-Demand CLE. Legal Education stands at a decision...
The Future of Legal Education: ABA, DEI, and AI
Professional Responsibility Practice Group
Washington, DCJudge.ai? Automation and the Future of Legal Practice
Washington & Lee Student Chapter
Lexington, VAAmerica’s AI Action Plan: Green Lights or Guardrails?
Neil Chilson, Kevin Frazier, Mario Loyola, Asad Ramzanali
America’s new AI Action Plan — announced by the White House in July and framed...
America’s AI Action Plan: Green Lights or Guardrails?
Neil Chilson, Kevin Frazier, Mario Loyola, Asad Ramzanali
America’s new AI Action Plan — announced by the White House in July and framed...
America’s AI Action Plan: Green Lights or Guardrails?
AI, Corpus Linguistics, and the Future of Textualism with Judge Kevin Newsom
Atlanta Young Lawyers Chapter
Atlanta, GAAI Training vs. Copyright Law: Updates from the Copyright Office and the Courts
Meredith Filak Rose, Zvi Rosen, Regan Smith
Whether AI training and generation is a fair use under copyright law puts two important...