Interim Dean, Florida International University College of Law
Dan Epstein was Vice President at America First Legal and an Associate Professor of Law at St. Thomas University in Miami, Florida. He also advises individuals and small businesses in affirmative and defensive actions against government overreach. Previously, he advised startups on regulatory matters as Director at a venture capital firm. His federal service includes being a Special Assistant to and Senior Associate Counsel to the President and a counsel for the House of Representatives Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. Earlier in his career, Mr. Epstein founded and ran Cause of Action, where he represented clients in government investigations and litigated regulatory, constitutional, political, and public law matters.
He holds a Ph.D. from George Washington University in Political Economy, a J.D. from Emory University School of Law, and a B.A. from Kenyon College. He is active in the Palm Beach community as a member of the Fourth Court of Appeals Judicial Nominating Commission in Florida, a transition team member to Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier, and the Chairman and Trustee of Palm Beach State College.
Judge, United States District Court for the Western District of Kentucky
Prior to joining the bench, Judge Beaton was a Partner at Squire Patton Boggs LLP, where he co-chaired the firm’s Appellate & Supreme Court practice group. Judge Beaton’s represented clients engaged in complex commercial litigation in Federal and State courts, and before administrative agencies. Judge Beaton also served as an adjunct professor at the University of Louisville Brandeis School of Law, where he taught constitutional interpretation. Before joining Squire Patton Boggs, Judge Beaton practiced in the Washington, D.C. office of Sidley Austin, LLP, and also served as a legal fellow with the International Justice Mission in Kampala, Uganda. Upon graduation from law school, Judge Beaton served as a law clerk to Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg of the United States Supreme Court, and to Judge A. Raymond Randolph of the United States Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. Judge Beaton earned his B.A., summa cum laude, from Centre College, and his J.D. from Columbia Law School, where he served as an Articles Editor on the Columbia Law Review.
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.
John Tanski is Vice President & Associate General Counsel at Tyson Foods.
Professor of Law and Executive Director, Law and Economics Center, Antonin Scalia Law School, George Mason University
Donald Kochan is Professor of Law and Executive Director of the Law & Economics Center (LEC). Professor Kochan is an elected member of the American Law Institute (ALI) and serves as an Adviser to ALI's Restatement of the Law Fourth, Property project. Professor Kochan is a Nonresident Scholar at the Center for the Constitution at Georgetown University Law Center, where he was a Visiting Scholar in residence during Fall 2018. Before joining the Antonin Scalia Law School faculty, he was the Parker S. Kennedy Professor in Law at Chapman University’s Dale E. Fowler School of Law from 2004 to 2020. From 2003 to 2004, Professor Kochan was an Olin Fellow at the University of Virginia School of Law. During 2002-2003, he was a Visiting Assistant Professor of Law at George Mason’s Scalia Law School.
Professor Kochan’s scholarship focuses on areas of property law, constitutional law, administrative law, local government law, natural resources and environmental law, and law & economics. He has published several books and more than 50 scholarly articles and essays in well-regarded law journals. His work has been cited in more than a dozen state and federal court opinions, in more than 75 briefs filed in state and federal courts including more than 25 filed in the U.S. Supreme Court, in dozens of books and treatises, and in more than 800 scholarly articles.
Professor Kochan received his JD from Cornell Law School, where he was a John M. Olin Scholar in Law and Economics and managing editor of the Cornell International Law Journal. During law school, he also served as editor and executive editor of the Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy symposium issues in 1997 and 1998. He received his BA from Western Michigan University, magna cum laude, with majors in both political science and philosophy, where he studied as the John W. Gill Medallion Scholar and was honored as the Presidential Scholar (awarded to the top graduate in the political science department).
After graduating from law school, Professor Kochan was a law clerk to The Honorable Richard F. Suhrheinrich of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. Following his clerkship, Professor Kochan was an associate with the firm of Crowell & Moring LLP in Washington, D.C., where he specialized in natural resources & environmental law as well as tort, products, and consumer civil litigation & legislative affairs.
Director, Center for Legal Policy, Manhattan Institute for Policy Research
James R. Copland is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute and director of Legal Policy. In those roles, he develops and communicates novel, sound ideas on how to improve America’s civil- and criminal-justice systems. His forthcoming book, The Unelected: How an Unaccountable Elite is Governing America (Encounter Books) will be released on September 8, 2020. He has testified before Congress as well as state and municipal legislatures; and has authored many policy briefs, book chapters, articles and opinion pieces in a variety of publications, including the Harvard Business Law Review and Yale Journal on Regulation, the Wall Street Journal, National Law Journal, and USA Today. Copland speaks regularly on civil- and criminal-justice issues; has made hundreds of media appearances in such outlets as PBS, Fox News, MSNBC, CNBC, Fox Business, Bloomberg, C-Span, and NPR; and is frequently cited in news articles in the New York Times, Washington Post, The Economist, and Forbes. In 2011 and 2012, he was named to the National Association of Corporate Directors “Directorship 100” list, which designates the individuals most influential over U.S. corporate governance.
Prior to joining MI, Copland was a management consultant with McKinsey and Company in New York. Earlier, he was a law clerk for Ralph K. Winter on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. Copland has been a director of two privately held manufacturing companies since 1997 and has served on many public and nonprofit boards. He holds a J.D. and an M.B.A. from Yale, where he was an Olin Fellow in Law and Economics; an M.Sc. in the politics of the world economy from the London School of Economics; and a B.A. in economics from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he was a Morehead Scholar.
Deputy Chief of Appeals, U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of New York
Saritha Komatireddy is Deputy Chief of Appeals at the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of New York. She previously served as Chief of International Narcotics and Money Laundering, Deputy Chief of General Crimes, Computer Hacking and Intellectual Property Coordinator, and as an Assistant U.S. Attorney in the Office's National Security and Cybercrime Section. Komatireddy has tried eight federal criminal trials and has argued more than a dozen cases before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. She has received numerous awards for her work as a federal prosecutor, including three Attorney General’s Awards, two True American Hero Awards, and the Federal Law Enforcement Foundation Prosecutor of the Year Award.
From 2023-2024, Komatireddy served as the Chief of Staff of the Drug Enforcement Administration.
Previously, Komatireddy practiced law at Kellogg, Huber, Hansen, Todd, Evans & Figel P.L.L.C. in Washington, D.C., and was Counsel to the National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling. She clerked for the Honorable Brett M. Kavanaugh on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.
Circuit Judge, United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit
Michael H. Park was appointed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in May 2019. He earned his A.B. magna cum laude from Princeton University and his J.D. from Yale Law School, where he served as Managing Editor of the Yale Law Journal. Upon graduation from law school in 2001, Judge Park served as a law clerk to then-Judge Samuel A. Alito, Jr. on the Third Circuit, for whom he also clerked on the Supreme Court during the 2008 Term. Judge Park was an associate in the New York office of the Wilmer Hale law firm from 2002 to 2006, and he served as an Attorney-Adviser in the U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Legal Counsel from 2006 to 2008. Judge Park worked in the New York office of the Dechert law firm, first as counsel (2009-2011) and then as a partner (2012-2015). In 2015, Judge Park joined the law firm Consovoy McCarthy Park as a name partner, where he specialized in appellate and complex civil litigation. During that time, he also served as an adjunct professor at the Antonin Scalia Law School at George Mason University.
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.
Senior Counsel, Chair, Religious Institutions and Education Practice Groups, First Liberty Institute
Jeremy Dys, Esq., is Senior Counsel for First Liberty.
Dys earned his law degree from West Virginia University College of Law in 2005. After law school, Dys clerked for the Hon. Russell M. Clawges, Jr., chief judge of the Circuit Court of Monongalia County in Morgantown, West Virginia. For six years prior to joining First Liberty Institute, Dys led a public policy organization where he led research and advocacy efforts on matters of life, marriage, and religious freedom.
Dys graduated from Taylor University in 2001 with a Bachelor of Arts, cum laude, degree in Communication Studies, with minors in U.S. History and Philosophy. During his undergraduate career, Dys studied at the American Studies Program in Washington, D.C., where he interned with the late David Orgon Coolidge as part of the Marriage Law Project of the Ethics and Public Policy Center.
In support of his clients, Dys has made numerous appearances in local, state, and national television, print, and radio outlets. His written commentaries have been featured at the Wall Street Journal, FoxNews.com, New York Daily News, TheHill.com, Des Moines Register, Dallas Morning News, DailySignal.com, Washington Examiner, Indianapolis Star, Charleston Gazette-Mail, Outcomes Magazine, TheFederalist.com, and others.
Partner, Clement & Murphy PLLC
Erin Murphy is widely recognized as one of the nation’s leading Supreme Court and appellate advocates. She has argued dozens of cases in appellate and trial courts throughout the country, including the Supreme Court and nearly all of the federal courts of appeals. Erin is one of only seven women in the top two bands of Chambers & Partners rankings for Appellate Law–Nationwide, and the National Law Journal has named her one of the nation’s “Outstanding Women Lawyers.” Erin has litigated appeals involving myriad provisions of the Constitution, including several cases involving the Constitution’s structural protections of liberty. She has litigated a wide range of statutory issues as well, including cases involving the Affordable Care Act, the Bankruptcy Code, the False Claims Act, the Federal Arbitration Act, the Federal Power Act, the Natural Gas Act, the National Labor Relations Act, and more. The National Law Journal named Erin a “Litigation Trailblazer” for her work representing institutional clients, which includes successfully arguing before the Supreme Court on behalf of the U.S. House of Representatives and the Wisconsin State Legislature. Erin also has an active pro bono practice, through which she has successfully represented many religious organizations and adherents, criminal defendants, asylum applicants, adoptive parents, and more.
Erin is an adjunct professor at her alma mater the Georgetown University Law Center, a member and former officer of the Edward Coke Appellate Inn of Court, and a frequent speaker on topics relating to the Supreme Court and appellate advocacy. In her spare time, Erin serves on the boards of directors of Street Law and the Mother of Light Center.
Senior Counsel, Chair, Religious Institutions and Education Practice Groups, First Liberty Institute
Jeremy Dys, Esq., is Senior Counsel for First Liberty.
Dys earned his law degree from West Virginia University College of Law in 2005. After law school, Dys clerked for the Hon. Russell M. Clawges, Jr., chief judge of the Circuit Court of Monongalia County in Morgantown, West Virginia. For six years prior to joining First Liberty Institute, Dys led a public policy organization where he led research and advocacy efforts on matters of life, marriage, and religious freedom.
Dys graduated from Taylor University in 2001 with a Bachelor of Arts, cum laude, degree in Communication Studies, with minors in U.S. History and Philosophy. During his undergraduate career, Dys studied at the American Studies Program in Washington, D.C., where he interned with the late David Orgon Coolidge as part of the Marriage Law Project of the Ethics and Public Policy Center.
In support of his clients, Dys has made numerous appearances in local, state, and national television, print, and radio outlets. His written commentaries have been featured at the Wall Street Journal, FoxNews.com, New York Daily News, TheHill.com, Des Moines Register, Dallas Morning News, DailySignal.com, Washington Examiner, Indianapolis Star, Charleston Gazette-Mail, Outcomes Magazine, TheFederalist.com, and others.
Partner, Clement & Murphy PLLC
Erin Murphy is widely recognized as one of the nation’s leading Supreme Court and appellate advocates. She has argued dozens of cases in appellate and trial courts throughout the country, including the Supreme Court and nearly all of the federal courts of appeals. Erin is one of only seven women in the top two bands of Chambers & Partners rankings for Appellate Law–Nationwide, and the National Law Journal has named her one of the nation’s “Outstanding Women Lawyers.” Erin has litigated appeals involving myriad provisions of the Constitution, including several cases involving the Constitution’s structural protections of liberty. She has litigated a wide range of statutory issues as well, including cases involving the Affordable Care Act, the Bankruptcy Code, the False Claims Act, the Federal Arbitration Act, the Federal Power Act, the Natural Gas Act, the National Labor Relations Act, and more. The National Law Journal named Erin a “Litigation Trailblazer” for her work representing institutional clients, which includes successfully arguing before the Supreme Court on behalf of the U.S. House of Representatives and the Wisconsin State Legislature. Erin also has an active pro bono practice, through which she has successfully represented many religious organizations and adherents, criminal defendants, asylum applicants, adoptive parents, and more.
Erin is an adjunct professor at her alma mater the Georgetown University Law Center, a member and former officer of the Edward Coke Appellate Inn of Court, and a frequent speaker on topics relating to the Supreme Court and appellate advocacy. In her spare time, Erin serves on the boards of directors of Street Law and the Mother of Light Center.
Originalism and the Rule of Law: Past and Future
Joint Lawyers and Students Event
Columbia, SCTariffs at the Supreme Court: A Conversation with Dr. Daniel Z. Epstein
Michigan Lawyer Chapter
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Delaware Lawyers Chapter and Delaware Association of Second Amendment Lawyers (DASAL)
Wilmington, DEForgotten Founders Episode 2: Elbridge Gerry
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Milwaukee Lawyer Chapter
Milwaukee, WIPanel Discussion of Food Policy in the MAHA Era
New Orleans Lawyer Chapter
New Orleans, LALitigation Update: Attorney’s Fees as Deterrence in Civil Rights Litigation
Jeremy G. Dys, Erin E. Murphy
When Congress amended the Civil Rights Act in 1976, it directed federal courts to use...
Litigation Update: Attorney’s Fees as Deterrence in Civil Rights Litigation
Jeremy G. Dys, Erin E. Murphy
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The Declaration at 250 with Donald Kochan: The Role of the Declaration of Independence in an Originalist Constitutional Interpretation
Orange County Lawyer Chapter
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New York City Lawyers Chapter, New York City Young Lawyers Chapter, and the Manhattan Institute
New York, NY