Partner, Jenner & Block LLP
Adam Unikowsky is a partner in Jenner & Block LLP’s Appellate & Supreme Court Practice Group, where he has worked since 2011.
Prior to his time at Jenner & Block, Mr. Unikowsky served as a Judicial Law Clerk to former Justice Antonin Scalia. He also previously clerked for Judge Douglas Ginsberg at the U.S. Courts of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.
Mr. Unikowsky got his JD from Harvard University, following achieving his Masters of Engineering & Bachelors of Science from Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Partner, Cooper & Kirk
Megan M. Wold focuses her practice on legal issues and brief-writing in complex commercial matters, constitutional litigation, and administrative law disputes. She has argued cases in both state and federal court, drafted briefs at all levels of state and federal litigation, and regularly practices before the U.S. Supreme Court. She has represented Fortune 500 clients in international arbitrations, complex tort and fraud litigation, class actions, commercial property disputes, and complex multi-district litigation. She has frequently represented clients in regulatory disputes with state and federal agencies.
Ms. Wold previously served as a Simon Karas Fellow and Deputy Solicitor General in the Ohio Attorney General’s Office. Ms. Wold has practiced as an associate at Bancroft PLLC and as a partner in the Washington, D.C. office of Kirkland & Ellis LLP.
Ms. Wold served as a law clerk to Justice Samuel A. Alito of the U.S. Supreme Court and to Judge Jeffrey Sutton of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. She graduated from the University of Notre Dame School of Law in 2011 and is a member of the bars of Ohio and the District of Columbia. Ms. Wold graduated summa cum laude from Ohio Wesleyan University in 2008 with an undergraduate degree in international studies and religion. She was a member of Phi Beta Kappa and a recipient of the Meek Family Service Leadership Prize.
Professor and Director, Prolife Center, University of St. Thomas School of Law
Teresa Collett, J.D., is professor at the University of St. Thomas School of Law, where she serves as director of the school's Prolife Center. Collett received her doctorate at the University of Oklahoma College of Law. As a well-known advocate for the protection of human life and the family, Collett specializes in the subjects of marriage, religion and bioethics in her research.
Collett has published numerous legal articles and is the co-author of a law casebook on professional responsibility and co-editor of a collection of essays exploring “catholic” and “Catholic” perspectives on American law. She is an elected member of the American Law Institute, and has testified before committees of the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives, as well as before legislative committees in several states.
In 2009, Pope Benedict XVI appointed Collett to a five-year term on the Pontifical Council for the Family. Her appointment was renewed by His Holiness Pope Francis until 2016 when the responsibilities of the Council were assumed by the Dicastery for the Laity, Family and Life. In 2013, she served as a delegate to the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) for the Mission of the Holy See to the United Nations.
She represented Congressman Ron Paul and various medical groups in the defense of the U.S. federal ban of partial-birth abortion, and the governors of Minnesota and North Dakota defending the N.H. requirement of state parental involvement prior to performance of an abortion on a minor before the U.S. Supreme Court. Collett is often asked to represent the interests of government officials before federal appellate courts. She has served as special attorney general for the states of Oklahoma and Kansas, as well as assisting other state attorneys general in defending laws protecting human life and marriage. Prior to joining St. Thomas in 2003, Collett taught at the South Texas College of Law, where she established the nation's first annual symposium on legal ethics.
Anne Fleming Research Professor and Professor of Law, Georgetown University Law Center; Faculty Director, Georgetown Center for the Constitution
Stephanie Barclay is a Professor of Law at Georgetown Law School, and the Faculty Director of the Georgetown Center for the Constitution. Her research focuses on the role our different democratic institutions play in protecting minority rights, particularly at the intersection of free speech and religious exercise. Barclay‘s work is published or is forthcoming in leading journals such as the Harvard Law Review, the Chicago Law Review, the University of Pennsylvania Law Review, and the Yale Law Journal Forum. One of her articles was also selected for the 2020 Stanford/Harvard/Yale Junior Faculty Forum. Her work has been featured in many media outlets, including The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, USA Today, Bloomberg BNA, The Hill, and Law 360. And her work has also been cited by the U.S. Supreme Court.
Prior to joining Georgetown, Barclay was twice voted Professor of the Year. Barclay has also litigated constitutional cases at both the trial and appellate level, including before the U.S. Supreme Court. Barclay served as a law clerk to Judge N. Randy Smith on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, and to Justice Neil M. Gorsuch of the U.S. Supreme Court.
Barclay is a Faculty Affiliate at the Constitutional Law Center at Stanford Law School; and she is a Nootbaar Fellow at the Nootbaar Institute on Law, Religion, and Ethics at Pepperdine University. She currently serves as the Chair for the AALS Law and Religion Section and as a Member of the Executive Committee for the AALS Constitutional Law Section. She graduated summa cum laude from BYU Law School, where she was elected to the Order of the Coif. She is completing a Ph.D. in Law at Oxford University as a Clarendon Scholar and a Tang Scholar.
Professor of History, Southern Methodist University
Kate Carté (Ph.D., history, University of Wisconsin; B.A., Haverford College) is a Professor of History at Southern Methodist University, specializing in early American and Atlantic history. She is the author of Religion and the American Revolution: An Imperial History (UNC Press for the Omohundro Institute, 2021) and Religion and Profit: Moravians in Early America (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2009, paper 2011), which was awarded the 2010 Dale W. Brown Award for Outstanding Scholarship in Anabaptist and Pietist Studies. Her articles have appeared in the William and Mary Quarterly, Church History, and Early American Studies, as well as a variety of edited collections. Carté has been a Charles A. Ryskamp Fellow of the American Council of Learned Societies, an affiliate fellow of the Center for the Study of Religion at Princeton University, a Franklin Fellow of the American Philosophical Society, and a Barra Postdoctoral Fellow at the McNeil Center for Early American Studies.
Senior Counsel, Alliance Defending Freedom's Appellate Advocacy Team
Chris Schandevel serves as senior counsel on Alliance Defending Freedom’s Appellate Advocacy Team. In that role, he represents ADF clients of all stripes at the appellate level, preserving lower-court victories and seeking to overturn unjust results.
Among other clients, he has represented a faith-based pregnancy resource center and adoption agency, a Christian photographer, a college student and conservative student group, a former Planned Parenthood clinic manager, female track-and-field athletes, and a high-school French teacher. Schandevel also was on the team of attorneys who successfully represented the Thomas More Law Center in the U.S. Supreme Court. And he regularly represents clients in friend-of-the-court briefs filed in state and federal appellate courts and in the U.S. Supreme Court.
Before joining ADF, Schandevel served as an assistant attorney general in the Criminal Appeals Section at the Office of the Attorney General of Virginia. During his five years in that office, Schandevel briefed and argued 14 appeals in the Supreme Court of Virginia and more than 60 appeals in the Court of Appeals of Virginia. Before his time at the Virginia attorney general’s office, Schandevel clerked for the Honorable Stephen R. McCullough on the Court of Appeals of Virginia.
Schandevel earned his J.D. from the University of Virginia School of Law in 2012. During law school, he founded a student organization called Advocates for Life at Virginia Law. He also completed ADF’s Blackstone Legal Fellowship and was commissioned as a Blackstone Fellow in 2010 after an internship with ADF’s Center for Life. Schandevel earned his B.A. in Social Work from Harding University in 2009.
A member of the state bar of Virginia, Schandevel is admitted to practice before the U.S. Supreme Court and various state and federal trial and appellate courts.
Senior Counsel, Storzer and Associates; Adjunct Professor at the Catholic University of America Columbus School of Law
Eric Treene is Senior Counsel at Storzer and Associates in Washington, D.C., and an Adjunct Professor at the Catholic University of America School of Canon Law. He served for 19 years in four administrations in the U.S. Department of Justice as Special Counsel for Religious Discrimination, where he provided leadership for the Department on a wide range of religious liberty issues, including developing and overseeing the Department’s enforcement program for the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA), testifying before the U.S. Senate on religious hate crimes and developing training programs to protect places of worship from violence, and leading the Department’s efforts to protect religious liberty rights during the COVID-19 epidemic. Prior to serving at the Department of Justice, Mr. Treene was Litigation Director at the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty in Washington, D.C, and was a law clerk to the Hon. John M. Walker, Jr. on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. He is a graduate of Amherst College and Harvard Law School.
Partner, Jenner & Block LLP
Adam Unikowsky is a partner in Jenner & Block LLP’s Appellate & Supreme Court Practice Group, where he has worked since 2011.
Prior to his time at Jenner & Block, Mr. Unikowsky served as a Judicial Law Clerk to former Justice Antonin Scalia. He also previously clerked for Judge Douglas Ginsberg at the U.S. Courts of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.
Mr. Unikowsky got his JD from Harvard University, following achieving his Masters of Engineering & Bachelors of Science from Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Chief Deputy Attorney General
Ryan Newman is currently Chief Deputy Attorney General for Florida Office of the Attorney General.
During the first Trump Administration, he served as Counselor to the United States Attorney General for national security and international affairs, Deputy General Counsel (Legal Counsel) for the Department of Defense, and Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Policy at the Department of Justice. Prior to serving in the Executive Branch, Ryan was Chief Counsel to United States Senator Ted Cruz during the 114th Congress.
Ryan served as a law clerk to the Honorable Samuel A. Alito, Jr. on the United States Supreme Court, the Honorable Richard J. Leon on the United States District Court for the District of Columbia, and the Honorable J.L. Edmondson on the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit.
Prior to law school, Ryan was an armor officer in the United States Army assigned to the 1st Squadron, 10th U.S. Cavalry Regiment (Buffalo Soldiers). He deployed to Iraq in 2003 for Operation Iraqi Freedom.
Ryan graduated from the United States Military Academy at West Point in 1998. He earned his law degree with high honors from The University of Texas School of Law in 2007.
Law Clerk to the Hon. Justin Walker, U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit
Eric Bush is a law clerk for the Honorable Justin R. Walker on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. He graduated magna cum laude from Harvard Law School, where he was Deputy Editor-in-Chief of the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy and a member of the winning team in the Ames Moot Court Competition. Eric also served on the Advisory Council for the Harvard Law School Student Chapter of the Federalist Society. He holds a B.A. and B.S. from the University of Louisville.
Associate, Shutts and Bowen LLP
Shiza Francis is a recent graduate of Washington University School of Law where she served as the President of the Federalist Society student chapter and as a research assistant for Prof. Conor Clarke. She will be starting at Shutts and Bowen LLP in their Government and Appellate Litigation practice group and will be clerking on the Southern District of Florida in 2026. During law school, she interned at the U.S. House Committee on Oversight, the Missouri Solicitor General’s Office, and the United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Missouri. Prior to law school, Shiza worked at the Federalist Society, the White House Office of Management and Budget, and the Office of General Counsel for the Governor of Florida. She holds a B.A. from Villanova University.
Associate Dean for Academic Affairs, The George Washington University Law School
Aram A. Gavoor is the Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and an internationally recognized scholar in American administrative law, national security, and federal courts. His co-authored work was cited by the U.S. Supreme Court in Department of Commerce v. New York (2019). His scholarship has earned placement in the Florida Law Review, Indiana Law Journal, Ohio State Law Journal, and other law journals. He has briefed and argued over a dozen high-profile public law cases before a majority of the U.S. Courts of Appeals and numerous cases before almost a third of the 94 U.S. District Courts. Associate Dean Gavoor frequently shares his national security, artificial intelligence policy, and federal courts expertise with international news media, including CNN, BBC World News, Wall Street Journal, NBC News, and ABC (Australia) World News. In 2021, the National Law Journal named Associate Dean Gavoor a Rising Star (top 40 under 40) honoree.
Earlier in his career, Associate Dean Gavoor served as Senior Counsel for National Security in the Civil Division of the U.S. Department of Justice, as third-in-rank Counselor to the Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs in the White House Office of Management and Budget, and in private practice. He received the Attorney General's Award for Distinguished Service in 2019, the Civil Division Special Commendation Award in 2020, 2019, and 2018, and a Commendation from the Human Rights and Special Prosecutions Section of the Criminal Division in 2018.
Associate Dean Gavoor previously served on the law school’s part-time faculty from 2008-2017 before accepting a term-limited position as Visiting Associate Professor from 2017-2019. He received GW Law’s Distinguished Adjunct Faculty Teaching Award from the 2020 and 2017 graduating classes. He currently teaches Constitutional Law II, Administrative Law, National Security Law, and Federal Courts.
Law Clerk to the Hon. Emil Bove, United States Court of Appeals
Aaron Watt is a law clerk for the Honorable Emil Bove on the United States Court of Appeals. He graduated from Scalia Law School where he was President of the Federalist Society Student chapter. While in law school, Aaron worked on the United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary for Senator Ted Cruz. He also worked as a law clerk for America First Legal. Aaron graduated summa cum laude from the University of Maine where he obtained a B.A. in Philosophy and minors in Political Science and Legal Studies. Before attending law school, Aaron spent 20 years in the private sector owning two businesses.
Professor, University of Southern California Gould School of Law
Jonathan Barnett is the Torrey H. Webb Professor of Law at the Gould School of Law, University of Southern California. He founded and currently directs the USC Media, Entertainment and Technology Law Program. Barnett specializes in intellectual property, contracts, antitrust, and corporate law. Barnett has published in the Harvard Law Review, Yale Law Journal, Journal of Legal Studies, Review of Law & Economics, Journal of Corporation Law and other scholarly journals.
He joined USC Law in fall 2006 and was a visiting professor at New York University School of Law in fall 2010. Prior to academia, Barnett practiced corporate law as a senior associate at Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton in New York, specializing in private equity and mergers and acquisitions transactions. He was also a visiting assistant professor at Fordham University School of Law in New York. A magna cum laude graduate of University of Pennsylvania, Barnett received a MPhil from Cambridge University and a JD from Yale Law School.
Taft, Stettinius & Hollister Professor of Law, University of Minnesota Law School
Professor Thomas F. Cotter joined the University of Minnesota Law School faculty in 2006. He received his B.S. and M.S. degrees in economics from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and in 1987 graduated magna cum laude from the University of Wisconsin Law School, where he served as Senior Articles Editor of the Wisconsin Law Review and was elected to the Order of the Coif.
From 1987-89, Professor Cotter clerked for the Honorable Lawrence W. Pierce, United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. He practiced law at Cravath, Swaine & Moore in New York City from 1988-90, and at Jenner & Block in Chicago from 1990-94. From 1994-2005, he taught at the University of Florida College of Law, where he held a University of Florida Research Foundation Professorship and directed the school’s Intellectual Property Law Program. From 2005-06, he was a Professor of Law at Washington and Lee University School of Law. In 2007, he was named to a two-year Solly Robins Distinguished Research Fellowship at the University of Minnesota Law School, and in 2008 was named to the Taft, Stettinius & Hollister Chair in Law.
Professor Cotter’s principal research and teaching interests are in the fields of domestic and international intellectual property law, antitrust, and law and economics. He is the author of six books—Patent Wars: How Patents Impact Our Daily Lives (Oxford Univ. Press, 2018); Trademarks, Unfair Competition, and Business Torts (with Barton Beebe, Mark A. Lemley, Peter S. Menell, and Robert P. Merges) (Wolters Kluwer 2d ed., 2016; 1st ed., 2011); Law and Economics: Positive, Normative, and Behavioral Perspectives (with Jeffrey L. Harrison) (3d ed., Thomson West, 2013); Comparative Patent Remedies: A Legal and Economic Analysis (Oxford University Press, 2013); and Intellectual Property: Economic and Legal Dimensions of Rights and Remedies (with Roger D. Blair) (Cambridge University Press 2005).
Altogether he has authored or coauthored over 60 other scholarly works, including articles in the California Law Review, the Georgetown Law Journal, the Iowa Law Review, the Minnesota Law Review, and the University of Illinois Law Review. He also publishes a blog, ComparativePatentRemedies.com, on the law (both foreign and domestic) and economics of patent remedies. Most recently, the Innovators Network Foundation, in partnership with ACT|The App Association, appointed Professor Cotter to a one-year Intellectual Property Fellowship.
Senior Counsel for Law and Policy, Committee for Justice
Jeff is a registered patent attorney and an intellectual property and innovation policy professional with a unique combination of training and real-world experience. Jeff is also currently a PhD candidate at the University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public and International Affairs (GSPIA). His dissertation is entitled “An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of American Innovation: An Austrian Economics Perspective.”
Jeff maintains an active intellectual property law practice in the life sciences space. While counseling clients and working on his dissertation and other scholarship, Jeff remains active in the policy analysis and advocacy space. He currently serves as the President of the Association for American Innovation and a member and former Chair of the Public Policy Legal Task Force (PPLTF) for the Association of University of Technology Managers (AUTM).
Jeff has a bachelor’s degree chemical and biomedical engineering with concentrations in molecular biology and fermentation technology and from Carnegie Mellon. He also has a master’s degree in industrial administration (business) from Carnegie Mellon where he concentrated on international management, marketing and finance. He earned his law degree from the Duquesne University School of Law with a focus on intellectual property law.
Former Chief Judge, United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit
Judge Michel served for more than 22 years on the Federal Circuit, retiring on May 31, 2010. From December 25, 2004 until his retirement, he also discharged the duties of Chief Judge of this national court, serving simultaneously on the U.S. Judicial Conference -- the Judiciary's governing body -- and by appointment of the Chief Justice on its seven-judge Executive Committee.
He judged several thousand appeals and authored more than 800 opinions, one third concerning intellectual property law. Intellectual Asset Management magazine inducted him into its Hall of Fame and he was designated one of the 50 most influential leaders in intellectual property law in the world. His contributions were also recognized by lifetime achievement and similar awards by the American Intellectual Property Law Association (AIPLA); Intellectual Property Owners Education Foundation (IPO); the American Bar Association's Intellectual Property Section; Managing Intellectual Property magazine; the Sedona Conference; the Patent and Trademark Office Society (PTOS); the New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, and Los Angeles Intellectual Property Law Associations; and the William C. Connor, the Giles S. Rich, and the Richard Linn Intellectual Property American Inns of Court. In 2010 the Los Angeles IP Inn was renamed in his honor as the Paul R. Michel IP Inn.
Judge Michel received the Jefferson Medal, the Eli Whitney Award, and the Katz-Kiley Prize as well as Honorary Doctor of Law degrees from the Catholic University of America and the John Marshall Law School. He is a lifetime Member of Honore of FICPI, the international association of private practitioners of intellectual property law. Williams College granted him the Kellogg Award for "outstanding leadership in law and public service."
Judge Michel has written numerous articles on patent law and advocacy, taught related courses and master classes at George Washington University, the University of Akron, and John Marshall law schools, serving as well on their IP advisory boards and on counterpart boards at the universities of California (Berkley), Washington, and Maryland. He co-authored a casebook, Patent Litigation and Strategy (West, 1999) and an August 2010 editorial in the New York Times on strengthening the patent system to promote prosperity and create new jobs.
A frequent speaker at conferences and law schools during his judicial tenure and since, he retired from a lifetime appointment to be free to speak out on the national need for better patent policy and protection of intellectual property and the vital, unmet resource needs of the courts, the PTO, the International Trade Commission, and other IP-related agencies. He was appointed Distinguished Scholar in Residence by IPO, following his retirement. Judge Michel also consults for law firms and their clients in intellectual property litigations, conducting moot courts, mock trials, case evaluations, editing briefs, advising on strategy and providing mediation and arbitration services.
Professor, University of Southern California Gould School of Law
Jonathan Barnett is the Torrey H. Webb Professor of Law at the Gould School of Law, University of Southern California. He founded and currently directs the USC Media, Entertainment and Technology Law Program. Barnett specializes in intellectual property, contracts, antitrust, and corporate law. Barnett has published in the Harvard Law Review, Yale Law Journal, Journal of Legal Studies, Review of Law & Economics, Journal of Corporation Law and other scholarly journals.
He joined USC Law in fall 2006 and was a visiting professor at New York University School of Law in fall 2010. Prior to academia, Barnett practiced corporate law as a senior associate at Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton in New York, specializing in private equity and mergers and acquisitions transactions. He was also a visiting assistant professor at Fordham University School of Law in New York. A magna cum laude graduate of University of Pennsylvania, Barnett received a MPhil from Cambridge University and a JD from Yale Law School.
Taft, Stettinius & Hollister Professor of Law, University of Minnesota Law School
Professor Thomas F. Cotter joined the University of Minnesota Law School faculty in 2006. He received his B.S. and M.S. degrees in economics from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and in 1987 graduated magna cum laude from the University of Wisconsin Law School, where he served as Senior Articles Editor of the Wisconsin Law Review and was elected to the Order of the Coif.
From 1987-89, Professor Cotter clerked for the Honorable Lawrence W. Pierce, United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. He practiced law at Cravath, Swaine & Moore in New York City from 1988-90, and at Jenner & Block in Chicago from 1990-94. From 1994-2005, he taught at the University of Florida College of Law, where he held a University of Florida Research Foundation Professorship and directed the school’s Intellectual Property Law Program. From 2005-06, he was a Professor of Law at Washington and Lee University School of Law. In 2007, he was named to a two-year Solly Robins Distinguished Research Fellowship at the University of Minnesota Law School, and in 2008 was named to the Taft, Stettinius & Hollister Chair in Law.
Professor Cotter’s principal research and teaching interests are in the fields of domestic and international intellectual property law, antitrust, and law and economics. He is the author of six books—Patent Wars: How Patents Impact Our Daily Lives (Oxford Univ. Press, 2018); Trademarks, Unfair Competition, and Business Torts (with Barton Beebe, Mark A. Lemley, Peter S. Menell, and Robert P. Merges) (Wolters Kluwer 2d ed., 2016; 1st ed., 2011); Law and Economics: Positive, Normative, and Behavioral Perspectives (with Jeffrey L. Harrison) (3d ed., Thomson West, 2013); Comparative Patent Remedies: A Legal and Economic Analysis (Oxford University Press, 2013); and Intellectual Property: Economic and Legal Dimensions of Rights and Remedies (with Roger D. Blair) (Cambridge University Press 2005).
Altogether he has authored or coauthored over 60 other scholarly works, including articles in the California Law Review, the Georgetown Law Journal, the Iowa Law Review, the Minnesota Law Review, and the University of Illinois Law Review. He also publishes a blog, ComparativePatentRemedies.com, on the law (both foreign and domestic) and economics of patent remedies. Most recently, the Innovators Network Foundation, in partnership with ACT|The App Association, appointed Professor Cotter to a one-year Intellectual Property Fellowship.
Senior Counsel for Law and Policy, Committee for Justice
Jeff is a registered patent attorney and an intellectual property and innovation policy professional with a unique combination of training and real-world experience. Jeff is also currently a PhD candidate at the University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public and International Affairs (GSPIA). His dissertation is entitled “An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of American Innovation: An Austrian Economics Perspective.”
Jeff maintains an active intellectual property law practice in the life sciences space. While counseling clients and working on his dissertation and other scholarship, Jeff remains active in the policy analysis and advocacy space. He currently serves as the President of the Association for American Innovation and a member and former Chair of the Public Policy Legal Task Force (PPLTF) for the Association of University of Technology Managers (AUTM).
Jeff has a bachelor’s degree chemical and biomedical engineering with concentrations in molecular biology and fermentation technology and from Carnegie Mellon. He also has a master’s degree in industrial administration (business) from Carnegie Mellon where he concentrated on international management, marketing and finance. He earned his law degree from the Duquesne University School of Law with a focus on intellectual property law.
Former Chief Judge, United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit
Judge Michel served for more than 22 years on the Federal Circuit, retiring on May 31, 2010. From December 25, 2004 until his retirement, he also discharged the duties of Chief Judge of this national court, serving simultaneously on the U.S. Judicial Conference -- the Judiciary's governing body -- and by appointment of the Chief Justice on its seven-judge Executive Committee.
He judged several thousand appeals and authored more than 800 opinions, one third concerning intellectual property law. Intellectual Asset Management magazine inducted him into its Hall of Fame and he was designated one of the 50 most influential leaders in intellectual property law in the world. His contributions were also recognized by lifetime achievement and similar awards by the American Intellectual Property Law Association (AIPLA); Intellectual Property Owners Education Foundation (IPO); the American Bar Association's Intellectual Property Section; Managing Intellectual Property magazine; the Sedona Conference; the Patent and Trademark Office Society (PTOS); the New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, and Los Angeles Intellectual Property Law Associations; and the William C. Connor, the Giles S. Rich, and the Richard Linn Intellectual Property American Inns of Court. In 2010 the Los Angeles IP Inn was renamed in his honor as the Paul R. Michel IP Inn.
Judge Michel received the Jefferson Medal, the Eli Whitney Award, and the Katz-Kiley Prize as well as Honorary Doctor of Law degrees from the Catholic University of America and the John Marshall Law School. He is a lifetime Member of Honore of FICPI, the international association of private practitioners of intellectual property law. Williams College granted him the Kellogg Award for "outstanding leadership in law and public service."
Judge Michel has written numerous articles on patent law and advocacy, taught related courses and master classes at George Washington University, the University of Akron, and John Marshall law schools, serving as well on their IP advisory boards and on counterpart boards at the universities of California (Berkley), Washington, and Maryland. He co-authored a casebook, Patent Litigation and Strategy (West, 1999) and an August 2010 editorial in the New York Times on strengthening the patent system to promote prosperity and create new jobs.
A frequent speaker at conferences and law schools during his judicial tenure and since, he retired from a lifetime appointment to be free to speak out on the national need for better patent policy and protection of intellectual property and the vital, unmet resource needs of the courts, the PTO, the International Trade Commission, and other IP-related agencies. He was appointed Distinguished Scholar in Residence by IPO, following his retirement. Judge Michel also consults for law firms and their clients in intellectual property litigations, conducting moot courts, mock trials, case evaluations, editing briefs, advising on strategy and providing mediation and arbitration services.
Associate Dean for Research and Intellectual Life, McKnight Presidential Professor in Law, Distinguished McKnight University Professor, Harlan Albert Rogers Professor in Law, Associate Director, Corporate Institute, University of Minnesota Law School
Professor Kristin E. Hickman is the McKnight Presidential Professor in Law, a Distinguished McKnight University Professor, and Harlan Albert Rogers Professor in Law at the University of Minnesota Law School. She also has taught at Harvard Law School and Northwestern University School of Law. Professor Hickman teaches and writes primarily in the areas of administrative law, tax administration, and statutory interpretation. Her articles on these topics have appeared in the Columbia Law Review, Cornell Law Review, Virginia Law Review, Duke Law Journal, and other publications. She also co-authors the Administrative Law Treatise with Richard J. Pierce, Jr., and a casebook on federal administrative law with Pierce and Christopher J. Walker. Her scholarly work has been cited several times in opinions of the United States Supreme Court as well as regularly in lower court judicial opinions and court briefs.
In 2018-19, Professor Hickman served as Special Adviser to the Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs in Washington, D.C. She presently serves as a Senior Fellow, and previously served as a public member and chair of the judicial review committee, for the Administrative Conference of the United States. She also is a Fellow of the American College of Tax Counsel.
Professor Hickman received her B.S. degree in business administration with a concentration in accounting and a secondary major in history from Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas. After practicing for several years as a certified public accountant, Professor Hickman earned her J.D. degree, magna cum laude, from Northwestern University School of Law, where she was awarded the Raoul Berger Prize and the Lowden Wigmore Prize for her scholarly writings. Following law school, Professor Hickman clerked for The Honorable David B. Sentelle of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit and practiced law as an associate with the Chicago office of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom, concentrating on corporate and international tax transactions and matters.
Senior Litigation Counsel, New Civil Liberties Alliance
Mr. Vecchione is a Senior Litigation Counsel for the non-profit New Civil Liberties Alliance representing clients against the Administrative State. He was previously President and CEO of the non-profit Cause of Action Institute, also advancing the constitutional order. He practiced at a number of D.C. area firms, including the eponymous John J. Vecchione Law, PLLC. Mr. Vecchione focuses his practice on strategic litigation in the federal district and appellate courts, including the Supreme Court of the United States. He is an experienced trial and appellate advocate having tried cases and argued appeals across the country. He is a member of the bars of the State of New York, the District of Columbia, and the Commonwealth of Virginia, as well as the Supreme Court of the United States and many federal courts. His cases are reported in scores of published opinions. He has also published pieces advancing the freedom agenda and constitutional order in the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Times and many other forums. He lives in Virginia with his wife Rebecca, sons Tommy and Joe.
William R. Orthwein Distinguished Professor of Law, Washington University in St. Louis School of Law
Professor Ronald M. Levin is a nationally known scholar who specializes in administrative law and related public law issues. He is the co-author of a casebook on state and federal administrative law, now in its third edition, as well as a nutshell on administrative law and process, now in its fifth edition. Formerly the law school's associate dean, he has published numerous articles and book chapters on administrative law topics, including judicial review, rulemaking, and legislative reform of the regulatory process. He also has written about the law of legislation, lobbying, and legislative ethics. Among his professional affiliations, Professor Levin has chaired the ABA Section of Administrative Law and Regulatory Practice and served as the ABA's advisor to the drafting committee to revise the Model State Administrative Procedure Act. He also has chaired the Section on Administrative Law and the Section on Legislation of the Association of American Law Schools (AALS). Currently a public member of the Administrative Conference of the United States (ACUS), he previously served as a consultant to ACUS and to the Supreme Court of Indonesia. Before joining the law faculty, Professor Levin clerked for the Hon. John C. Godbold, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, and practiced for three years in Washington, D.C., with the firm of Sutherland, Asbill & Brennan.
Director, GW Regulatory Studies Center & Distinguished Professor of Practice, Trachtenberg School of Public Policy & Public Administration, The George Washington University
Susan Dudley is the Founder and Director of the George Washington University Regulatory Studies Center, established in 2009 to raise awareness of regulations’ effects and improve regulatory policy through research, education, and outreach. She is also a distinguished professor of practice in the Trachtenberg School of Public Policy and Public Administration. She is past-president of the Society for Benefit Cost Analysis, a senior fellow of the Administrative Conference of the United States, and on the Regulatory Transparency Project Regulatory Practice Working Group. Her book, Regulation: A Primer, with Jerry Brito, is available on Amazon.com.
From April 2007 through January 2009, Professor Dudley served as the Presidentially-appointed Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs in the U.S. Office of Management and Budget and was responsible for the review of draft executive branch regulations under Executive Order 12866, the collection of federal-government-wide information under the Paperwork Reduction Act, the development and implementation of government-wide policies in the areas of information policy, privacy, and statistical policy, and international regulatory cooperation efforts.
Prior to OIRA, she directed the Regulatory Studies Program at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University, and taught courses on regulation at the George Mason University School of Law. Earlier in her career, Professor Dudley served as an economist at OIRA, as well as the Environmental Protection Agency and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. She was also a consultant to government and private clients at Economists Incorporated. She holds a Master of Science degree from the Sloan School of Management at MIT and a Bachelor of Science degree (summa cum laude) in Resource Economics from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.
Assistant Attorney General, Office of Legal Counsel, U.S. Department of Justice
T. Elliot Gaiser is the Office of Legal Counsel’s 27th Assistant Attorney General. He was nominated by President Donald Trump on April 29, 2025, confirmed by the United States Senate on July 30, 2025, and sworn in as AAG by Attorney General Pam Bondi on August 4, 2025.
Prior to joining the Office of Legal Counsel, Mr. Gaiser served as the 11th Solicitor General of Ohio. In that role, he represented his home state and its agencies before the Supreme Court of the United States, the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, the Supreme Court of Ohio, and other state and federal courts. He also advised Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost on significant legal and constitutional matters important to the people of Ohio.
Mr. Gaiser clerked for Justice Samuel A. Alito, Jr. of the Supreme Court of the United States, Judge Neomi Rao of the United States Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, and Judge Edith H. Jones of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. In the private sector, Mr. Gaiser worked at the law firms Jones Day, Boyden Gray, and Gibson Dunn. He graduated from the University of Chicago Law School and Hillsdale College. He is also a husband and father.
Of Counsel, Covington & Burling LLP
The Honorable Paul J. Ray is currently Of Counsel at Covington & Burling LLP where he advises clients on regulatory opportunities and challenges and helps them formulate and execute advocacy strategies for their regulatory policy priorities before the executive branch and Congress.
During the first Trump Administration, Paul held various senior positions at the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) within the White House’s Office of Management and Budget, including as acting, and then Senate-confirmed, head of the office. As OIRA Administrator (the "regulations czar"), Paul supervised the review of hundreds of regulations from across the government, drafted numerous executive orders governing the regulatory process, and led the Administration’s regulatory reform effort. As a result of this experience, Paul is well-positioned to help clients understand and achieve regulatory policy priorities in the context of the government’s regulatory agenda and ongoing reform efforts.
Most recently, Paul was also the Director of the Roe Institute for Economic Policy Studies at The Heritage Foundation. In that role, he supervised the formulation of the Foundation’s economic and regulatory policy recommendations and provided technical assistance to congressional committees and staff regarding legislative changes to the regulatory process. In addition to his role at The Heritage Foundation, Paul also served as a Senior Advisor at a strategic advisory firm. Before his time in government, Paul practiced law at a law firm in Washington, specializing in administrative law matters.
Prior to his role at the White House, Paul was Counselor to the Secretary at the U.S. Department of Labor. There he led departmental efforts in high-profile rulemakings and helped formulate the Department’s legal positions and strategy.
Paul served as a law clerk to Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito and as a law clerk to the Honorable Debra Livingston of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.
Paul is a thought leader in the conservative legal movement and is a frequent commentator and speaker on regulatory policy and reform matters, including at law schools, professional gatherings, and other venues. He is the Chairman of Innovations in Peacebuilding International and the Regulatory Process Working Group of the Federalist Society’s Regulatory Transparency Project and a public member of the Administrative Conference of the United States. Paul is also an adjunct lecturer at the Hillsdale College School of Government.
Former President & CEO, The Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies
Eugene B. Meyer, former President and CEO of the Federalist Society, has served as Executive Director, CEO, and/or President of the organization for more than 40 years. He is responsible for shepherding the organization from a small group of law students to a community of 90,000 lawyers, law students, academics, judges, and others interested in the rule of law. The Society now includes a Student Chapter at nearly every ABA-accredited law school in the country and Lawyers Chapters in 220 major cities across the nation. Gene earned his B.A. in history at Yale in 1975 and his M.A. in political science from the London School of Economics in 1976. Gene currently serves on the boards of the U.S. Chess Center, the Holman Foundation, the Sarah Scaife Foundation, and the advisory board of the Adam Smith Society. He holds the title of International Chess Master.
Professor, University of Southern California Gould School of Law
Jonathan Barnett is the Torrey H. Webb Professor of Law at the Gould School of Law, University of Southern California. He founded and currently directs the USC Media, Entertainment and Technology Law Program. Barnett specializes in intellectual property, contracts, antitrust, and corporate law. Barnett has published in the Harvard Law Review, Yale Law Journal, Journal of Legal Studies, Review of Law & Economics, Journal of Corporation Law and other scholarly journals.
He joined USC Law in fall 2006 and was a visiting professor at New York University School of Law in fall 2010. Prior to academia, Barnett practiced corporate law as a senior associate at Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton in New York, specializing in private equity and mergers and acquisitions transactions. He was also a visiting assistant professor at Fordham University School of Law in New York. A magna cum laude graduate of University of Pennsylvania, Barnett received a MPhil from Cambridge University and a JD from Yale Law School.
Taft, Stettinius & Hollister Professor of Law, University of Minnesota Law School
Professor Thomas F. Cotter joined the University of Minnesota Law School faculty in 2006. He received his B.S. and M.S. degrees in economics from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and in 1987 graduated magna cum laude from the University of Wisconsin Law School, where he served as Senior Articles Editor of the Wisconsin Law Review and was elected to the Order of the Coif.
From 1987-89, Professor Cotter clerked for the Honorable Lawrence W. Pierce, United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. He practiced law at Cravath, Swaine & Moore in New York City from 1988-90, and at Jenner & Block in Chicago from 1990-94. From 1994-2005, he taught at the University of Florida College of Law, where he held a University of Florida Research Foundation Professorship and directed the school’s Intellectual Property Law Program. From 2005-06, he was a Professor of Law at Washington and Lee University School of Law. In 2007, he was named to a two-year Solly Robins Distinguished Research Fellowship at the University of Minnesota Law School, and in 2008 was named to the Taft, Stettinius & Hollister Chair in Law.
Professor Cotter’s principal research and teaching interests are in the fields of domestic and international intellectual property law, antitrust, and law and economics. He is the author of six books—Patent Wars: How Patents Impact Our Daily Lives (Oxford Univ. Press, 2018); Trademarks, Unfair Competition, and Business Torts (with Barton Beebe, Mark A. Lemley, Peter S. Menell, and Robert P. Merges) (Wolters Kluwer 2d ed., 2016; 1st ed., 2011); Law and Economics: Positive, Normative, and Behavioral Perspectives (with Jeffrey L. Harrison) (3d ed., Thomson West, 2013); Comparative Patent Remedies: A Legal and Economic Analysis (Oxford University Press, 2013); and Intellectual Property: Economic and Legal Dimensions of Rights and Remedies (with Roger D. Blair) (Cambridge University Press 2005).
Altogether he has authored or coauthored over 60 other scholarly works, including articles in the California Law Review, the Georgetown Law Journal, the Iowa Law Review, the Minnesota Law Review, and the University of Illinois Law Review. He also publishes a blog, ComparativePatentRemedies.com, on the law (both foreign and domestic) and economics of patent remedies. Most recently, the Innovators Network Foundation, in partnership with ACT|The App Association, appointed Professor Cotter to a one-year Intellectual Property Fellowship.
Senior Counsel for Law and Policy, Committee for Justice
Jeff is a registered patent attorney and an intellectual property and innovation policy professional with a unique combination of training and real-world experience. Jeff is also currently a PhD candidate at the University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public and International Affairs (GSPIA). His dissertation is entitled “An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of American Innovation: An Austrian Economics Perspective.”
Jeff maintains an active intellectual property law practice in the life sciences space. While counseling clients and working on his dissertation and other scholarship, Jeff remains active in the policy analysis and advocacy space. He currently serves as the President of the Association for American Innovation and a member and former Chair of the Public Policy Legal Task Force (PPLTF) for the Association of University of Technology Managers (AUTM).
Jeff has a bachelor’s degree chemical and biomedical engineering with concentrations in molecular biology and fermentation technology and from Carnegie Mellon. He also has a master’s degree in industrial administration (business) from Carnegie Mellon where he concentrated on international management, marketing and finance. He earned his law degree from the Duquesne University School of Law with a focus on intellectual property law.
Former Chief Judge, United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit
Judge Michel served for more than 22 years on the Federal Circuit, retiring on May 31, 2010. From December 25, 2004 until his retirement, he also discharged the duties of Chief Judge of this national court, serving simultaneously on the U.S. Judicial Conference -- the Judiciary's governing body -- and by appointment of the Chief Justice on its seven-judge Executive Committee.
He judged several thousand appeals and authored more than 800 opinions, one third concerning intellectual property law. Intellectual Asset Management magazine inducted him into its Hall of Fame and he was designated one of the 50 most influential leaders in intellectual property law in the world. His contributions were also recognized by lifetime achievement and similar awards by the American Intellectual Property Law Association (AIPLA); Intellectual Property Owners Education Foundation (IPO); the American Bar Association's Intellectual Property Section; Managing Intellectual Property magazine; the Sedona Conference; the Patent and Trademark Office Society (PTOS); the New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, and Los Angeles Intellectual Property Law Associations; and the William C. Connor, the Giles S. Rich, and the Richard Linn Intellectual Property American Inns of Court. In 2010 the Los Angeles IP Inn was renamed in his honor as the Paul R. Michel IP Inn.
Judge Michel received the Jefferson Medal, the Eli Whitney Award, and the Katz-Kiley Prize as well as Honorary Doctor of Law degrees from the Catholic University of America and the John Marshall Law School. He is a lifetime Member of Honore of FICPI, the international association of private practitioners of intellectual property law. Williams College granted him the Kellogg Award for "outstanding leadership in law and public service."
Judge Michel has written numerous articles on patent law and advocacy, taught related courses and master classes at George Washington University, the University of Akron, and John Marshall law schools, serving as well on their IP advisory boards and on counterpart boards at the universities of California (Berkley), Washington, and Maryland. He co-authored a casebook, Patent Litigation and Strategy (West, 1999) and an August 2010 editorial in the New York Times on strengthening the patent system to promote prosperity and create new jobs.
A frequent speaker at conferences and law schools during his judicial tenure and since, he retired from a lifetime appointment to be free to speak out on the national need for better patent policy and protection of intellectual property and the vital, unmet resource needs of the courts, the PTO, the International Trade Commission, and other IP-related agencies. He was appointed Distinguished Scholar in Residence by IPO, following his retirement. Judge Michel also consults for law firms and their clients in intellectual property litigations, conducting moot courts, mock trials, case evaluations, editing briefs, advising on strategy and providing mediation and arbitration services.
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