General Counsel, Strive
Before joining Strive, Alexandra served as the Director of Regulatory Affairs at River Financial, where she handled all regulatory and government matters and served as product counsel. Prior to her time at River, Alexandra worked at the U.S. Department of Treasury, first in the General Counsel’s office and then as the youngest-ever Executive Secretary, where she worked directly with Secretary Mnuchin. Alexandra previously worked as an associate in the Washington, D.C. office of Akin Gump. She clerked for then-Justice Allison Eid on the Colorado Supreme Court and Judge Jennifer Elrod on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. She holds a J.D. from the University of Texas and a B.A. from The King’s College.
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.
General Counsel, xAI and X
Partner, Clement & Murphy, PLLC
Paul served as the 43rd Solicitor General of the United States from June 2005 until June 2008. Before his confirmation as Solicitor General, he served as Acting Solicitor General for nearly a year and as Principal Deputy Solicitor General for over three years.
Paul has argued over 100 cases before the United States Supreme Court, including McConnell v. FEC, Tennessee v. Lane, United States v. Booker, MGM v. Grokster, Hobby Lobby v. Burwell, Epic Systems Corp. v. Lewis, Rucho v. Common Cause, Facebook v. Duguid, and TransUnion v. Ramirez. Paul has argued more Supreme Court cases since 2000 than any lawyer in or out of government. He has also argued many important cases in the lower courts, including Walker v. Cheney, United States v. Moussaoui and NFL v. Brady.
Paul’s practice focuses on appellate matters, constitutional litigation and strategic counseling. He represents a broad array of clients in the Supreme Court and in federal and state appellate courts. Last year, for example, he successfully argued Supreme Court cases involving significant issues of energy regulation, statutory interpretation, state sovereign immunity and Article III standing, and successfully argued a trademark appeal in the Fourth Circuit, and a constitutional appeal before the en banc Eleventh Circuit.
Paul focuses on high-stakes appeals. In recent years, he successfully defended a $1.2 billion jury verdict for clients in a Tenth Circuit case, while securing the reversal of an over $2 billion jury verdict for another client in the Seventh Circuit and the approval of a nearly $1 billion dollar class action settlement in the Third Circuit. He has initiated major administrative law challenges and constitutional litigation against the federal government, such as the successful challenge to the HHS drug-pricing rule and threatened challenges that led to the withdrawal of the Treasury Department’s proposed cryptocurrency regulations. He also counsels clients on a variety of strategic legal questions, whether arising from pending legislation, government inquiries or ongoing litigation.
Paul has undertaken substantial pro bono engagements in the Supreme Court, such as twice successfully representing the defendant in Bond v. United States and successfully representing the Omaha Tribe in Nebraska v. Parker, the guardian ad litem in Adoptive Couple v. Baby Girl, the defendant in Sekhar v. United States, a high school football coach in Kennedy v. Bremerton, and the Little Sisters of the Poor. Paul’s pro bono representation also precipitated the federal government’s confession of error in United States v. Rojas.
Following law school, Paul clerked for Judge Laurence H. Silberman of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit and for Associate Justice Antonin Scalia of the U.S. Supreme Court. After his clerkships, he went on to serve as Chief Counsel of the U.S. Senate Subcommittee on the Constitution, Federalism and Property Rights.
Paul is a Distinguished Lecturer in Law at the Georgetown University Law Center, where he has taught in various capacities since 1998. He also serves as a Senior Fellow of the Law Center’s Supreme Court Institute. He is the Justice Joseph Story Distinguished Practitioner in Residence at the Gray Center at Scalia Law School.
Partner, Jones Day
David Morrell is aPartner at Jones Day. Previously, David oversaw the U.S. Department of Justice's (DOJ) Consumer Protection Branch, which enforces the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FDCA), the FTC Act, and other laws relating to consumer and health care fraud. David later ran DOJ's Federal Programs Branch, which defends against regulatory challenges to significant government policies and programs in federal district court.
Before DOJ, David served at the White House, where he advised senior Administration officials on a wide range of international trade issues, including the new United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) and tariff actions under Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974 and other trade remedy laws. In this role, David worked closely with the United States Trade Representative (USTR) and other senior U.S. trade officials.
David's practice builds on his previous tenure at the Firm, during which he represented clients in complex trial and appellate litigation matters. David has argued numerous cases in federal courts across the country, including in the U.S. Court of International Trade. graduated from Yale Law School and Hillsdale College, summa cum laude.
Senior Counselor and Director of Oversight and Investigations, America First Legal Foundation, Cause of Action
Reed D. Rubinstein is Senior Counselor and Director of Oversight and Investigations for the America First Legal Foundation. He has extensive constitutional, administrative, and complex commercial trial and appellate experience, including Executive Branch and Congressional oversight, investigations, and enforcement.
Reed joined the Trump Campaign legal team in February 2016, supported Treasury, DHS, and DOD operations during the Presidential Transition, and entered Federal service in January 2017. As Deputy Associate Attorney General, U.S. Department of Education General Counsel (acting and delegated), and Senior Advisor to the Secretary of the Treasury, Reed fought to protect free speech, religious liberty, and civil rights; combat anti-Semitism; expose Obama/Biden support for the Iranian regime; and defend the Trump Administration against Congressional overreach and leftist lawfare. He played a material role in many Trump Administration actions and Executive Orders and between June 2019 and January 2021, initiated and led twenty-seven civil investigations of U.S. universities for colluding with the Chinese Communist Party, violating foreign money disclosure laws, misrepresenting free speech policies, failing to provide balance in Middle Eastern studies, making false non-discrimination assurances (the Princeton investigation), and consumer fraud.
Reed is a graduate of the University of Michigan Law School and has practiced law since 1985. A former AmLaw 10 shareholder, he spent thirty years in the private practice of law representing manufacturing and retail corporations, financial institutions, trade associations, and individuals in a wide range of matters. Notably, he represented the victims of the Fort Hood terrorist attack, overcoming the Obama Administration, the Pentagon, and House Speaker John Boehner to win them Purple Hearts and medical benefits.
Milton R. Underwood Chair in Free Enterprise, Vanderbilt University Law School
Brian Fitzpatrick is the Milton R. Underwood Chair in Free Enterprise and Professor of Law at Vanderbilt Law School, where his research focuses on class action litigation, federal courts, judicial selection, and constitutional law. He is best known for his empirical studies of class action settlements as well as his book The Conservative Case for Class Actions (University of Chicago Press, 2019). Professor Fitzpatrick joined Vanderbilt's law faculty in 2007 after serving as the John M. Olin Fellow at New York University School of Law. He graduated first in his class from Harvard Law School and went on to clerk for Judge Diarmuid O'Scannlain on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and Justice Antonin Scalia on the U.S. Supreme Court. After his clerkships, Professor Fitzpatrick practiced commercial and appellate litigation for several years at Sidley Austin in Washington, D.C., and served as Special Counsel for Supreme Court Nominations to U.S. Senator John Cornyn. Before earning his law degree, Fitzpatrick graduated summa cum laude with a bachelor's of science in chemical engineering from the University of Notre Dame. He has received the Hall-Hartman Outstanding Professor Award, which recognizes excellence in classroom teaching, for his Civil Procedure and Federal Courts courses.
Judge, Ohio Eleventh District Court of Appeals
Judge Eugene A. Lucci was elected in 2022 to serve a full six-year term on the Eleventh District Court of Appeals commencing February 9, 2023. Prior to this election, Judge Lucci was elected to four consecutive full terms on the Lake County Common Pleas Court, General Division, commencing his judicial career in January 2001. Prior to taking the bench, Judge Lucci was engaged in the private practice of law from 1980 to 2000 and was a founding member and senior partner of the Mentor, Ohio law firm of McNamara, Lucci, Hanrahan & Loxterman. Judge Lucci is a retired police officer, having served as a police patrol officer for the City of Painesville and University Circle Police Departments, and later with the Lake County Sheriff’s Office as a detective. Judge Lucci earned his bachelor’s degree from Case Western Reserve University in January 1975, his law degree from Cleveland-Marshall College of Law in March 1980, and his Master of Judicial Studies degree from the University of Nevada, Reno in 2012. He holds a Certificate in Judicial Development, General Jurisdiction Trial Skills, from the National Judicial College in 2004, and is an Inaugural Fellow of the Advanced Science & Technology Adjudication Resource Program, Washington DC, in October 2006. Judge Lucci has been admitted to practice law in Ohio in 1980 and Florida in 1982 and is a certified instructor for the Ohio Peace Officer Training Academy.
Associate Professor of Law, Antonin Scalia Law School at George Mason University
Robert Luther III was appointed Associate Professor of Law in 2025 after serving as Distinguished Professor of Law from 2024-2025 and Adjunct Professor of Law from 2019-2024. He teaches and writes on the federal courts, legal and judicial ethics, political law, Congress, and professional sports. He has served at high levels in all three branches of the federal government and recently founded Constitutional Solutions PLLC—a law firm that navigates judicial candidates, judges, elected officials, professional athletes, and executives through high-stakes hearings, investigations, and reputational attacks.
Immediately before joining the Scalia Law faculty, Professor Luther spent over five years in the Washington, D.C. office of Jones Day, where his practice focused on strategic counseling, crisis management, and litigation. Prior to joining Jones Day, he served as Associate Counsel to the President of the United States in the White House Counsel’s Office. In the White House, he co-managed the judicial selection process and supervised the preparation of over 150 federal judicial nominees for their successful U.S. Senate confirmation hearings. The New York Times Magazine referred to his work on judicial selection during this period as “unique in White House history.” Before joining the White House, Professor Luther served as Counsel to then–U.S. Senator Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) on the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, where he served as a core member of the team that prepared the Senator for confirmation as United States Attorney General. Professor Luther was also a law clerk to Judge Daniel A. Manion of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. Earlier in his career, Professor Luther practiced civil and appellate litigation at a boutique firm in Williamsburg, Va. and taught at William & Mary Law School.
Professor Luther frequently speaks on the legal profession, political law, and federal judicial selection. His public work has been covered by or appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, Fox News, The Hill, Politico, the Washington Examiner, National Law Journal, Law360, The Washington Reporter, and elsewhere, while his scholarship is published in the law journals of nearly twenty universities including three journals of Harvard University. He holds active law licenses in Virginia, the District of Columbia, the U.S. Supreme Court, and half of the U.S. Courts of Appeals.
In 2025, Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin appointed Professor Luther to the Board of Visitors to Mount Vernon. He is an elected member of the American Law Institute (ALI) and serves on the Advisory Board of the Wilson Center for Leadership at Hampden-Sydney College. Since 2019, he has helped over 200 of his students secure clerkships with federal judges.
Director, Robert A. Levy Center for Constitutional Studies, Cato Institute
Thomas Berry is the director in the Cato Institute’s Robert A. Levy Center for Constitutional Studies and editor in chief of the Cato Supreme Court Review. Before joining Cato, he was an attorney at Pacific Legal Foundation and clerked for Judge E. Grady Jolly of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. His academic work has appeared in NYU Journal of Law and Liberty, Washington and Lee Law Review Online, and Federalist Society Review. His popular writing has appeared in The Wall Street Journal, National Law Journal, Investor’s Business Daily, National Review Online, and The Hill Online. He has testified before the U.S. Senate, and his work has been cited by the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.
Berry holds a J.D. from Stanford Law School, where he was a senior editor on the Stanford Law and Policy Review and a Bradley Student Fellow in the Stanford Constitutional Law Center. He graduated with a B.A. in Liberal Arts from St. John’s College, Santa Fe.
General Counsel, xAI and X
Partner, Wiley Rein LLP
Tom has over 15 years’ experience in private practice and public service at the federal and state levels representing clients in high-stakes appellate and regulatory litigation matters. Tom has argued appeals in the Fourth, Fifth, Ninth, D.C. and Federal Circuits, and the West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals.
Prior to joining Wiley, Tom was the General Counsel at the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), where he served as the agency’s chief legal officer and briefed dozens of appeals – personally arguing two – in the federal courts of appeals in constitutional and administrative law challenges to the FCC’s orders. Tom managed a team of over 70 attorneys and staff and provided consultation and advice on a wide range of practice areas relating to the FCC’s work, including administrative law, appellate and trial litigation, bankruptcy, ethics, fiscal law, fraud, labor and employment, and public records requests. He has spent his career advising clients on all stages of federal agency rulemaking, adjudication, and litigation, in fields ranging from communications to environmental law to securities to labor and employment. He frequently speaks and writes on legal issues and his articles have appeared in the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, National Review, Forbes, and Newark Star-Ledger.
United States Circuit Judge, United States Circuit Court, Third Circuit
Kent A. Jordan was appointed in 2006 to serve as a United States Circuit Judge for the Third Circuit. Before that, Judge Jordan was a United States District Judge for the District of Delaware from 2002 to 2006. He received a B.A. in Economics in 1981 from Brigham Young University and a J.D. in 1984 from Georgetown University. He was an Assistant United States Attorney and head of the Civil Division in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Delaware. Later, he served as an officer and as a member of the boards of directors of privately held businesses and was a partner in a Wilmington, Delaware law firm. He is an Adjunct Professor of Law at the University of Pennsylvania and Vanderbilt University and currently serves as President of the Board of Trustees of the American Inns of Court Foundation, as well as on the boards of other non-profit organizations.
Litigation Director, Center for Individual Rights
Caleb Kruckenberg is CIR’s Litigation Director.
Caleb previously worked as a prosecutor, a public defender, a lobbyist for a national advocacy organization and, most recently, an impact litigator protecting the separation of powers at both the Pacific Legal Foundation and the New Civil Liberties Alliance. He has won major victories against numerous federal agencies, including the U.S. Department of Justice, Department of Labor, Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms, and the Securities and Exchange Commission. He is also proud to have sued every U.S. attorney general, eight so far, since he has been litigating against the government on behalf of liberty-minded clients. Caleb has also argued more than 20 times in the U.S. Courts of Appeals, winning cases in 8 of the 12 regional circuit courts.
He graduated cum laude from Temple University Beasley School of Law in Philadelphia, where he was the lead articles editor for the Temple Law Review. Caleb also attended the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, where he studied figurative painting.
Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Third Circuit
Judge Paul Matey was appointed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit in 2019 by President Trump.
Before his judicial service, Judge Matey was a partner at Lowenstein Sandler in New Jersey where he practiced complex commercial litigation and criminal defense. Earlier, Judge Matey was the Senior Vice President, General Counsel and Secretary for University Hospital Newark, an academic medical center and teaching hospital.
He also served as the Deputy Chief Counsel to Governor Chris Christie, and as an Assistant United States Attorney in the District of New Jersey, where he was awarded the Justice Department’s Director’s Award for Superior Performance. He also practiced at the Washington D.C. firm of Kellogg, Hansen, Todd, Figel & Frederick, and served as a law clerk to judges on the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit and the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey.
He earned his bachelor’s degree from the University of Scranton, a Jesuit University, in 1993, and his juris doctorate, summa cum laude, from Seton Hall University School of Law in 2001, where he served as Editor-in-Chief of the Seton Hall Law Review.
In 2019, Judge Matey was elected to membership in the American Law Institute and, since 2020, has lectured on administrative law and the American legal history at Seton Hall.
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.
Professor of Law, Antonin Scalia Law School, George Mason University
ILYA SOMIN is Professor of Law at George Mason University and the B. Kenneth Simon Chair in Constitutional Studies at the Cato Institute. His research focuses on constitutional law, property law, democratic theory, federalism, and migration rights. He is the author of Free to Move: Foot Voting, Migration, and Political Freedom (Oxford University Press, revised and expanded edition, 2022), Democracy and Political Ignorance: Why Smaller Government is Smarter (Stanford University Press, revised and expanded second edition, 2016), and The Grasping Hand: Kelo v. City of New London and the Limits of Eminent Domain (University of Chicago Press, 2015, rev. paperback ed., 2016), coauthor of A Conspiracy Against Obamacare: The Volokh Conspiracy and the Health Care Case (Palgrave Macmillan, 2013), and co-editor of Eminent Domain: A Comparative Perspective (Cambridge University Press, 2017). Democracy and Political Ignorance has been translated into Italian and Japanese.
Somin’s work has appeared in numerous scholarly journals, including the Yale Law Journal, Stanford Law Review, Northwestern University Law Review, Georgetown Law Journal, Critical Review, and others. Somin has also published articles in a variety of popular press outlets, including the New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, CNN, NBC, The Atlantic, USA Today, Boston Globe, US News and World Report, South China Morning Post, National Law Journal and Reason. He has been quoted or interviewed by the New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Time, Newsweek, The Economist, the Christian Science Monitor, the Financial Times, The Guardian, the Associated Press, CBS, MSNBC, NPR, BBC, Reuters, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Al Jazeera, and the Voice of America, among other media.
Somin’s writings have been cited in decisions by the United States Supreme Court, multiple state supreme courts and lower federal courts, and the Supreme Court of Israel. He is co-counsel for the plaintiffs in VOS Selections, Inc. v. Trump, a case challenging the constitutionality of President Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs. Somin has testified on the use of drones for targeted killing in the War on Terror before the US Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Human Rights. In 2009, he testified on property rights issues at the United States Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearings for Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor. Somin writes regularly for the popular Volokh Conspiracy law and politics blog, now affiliated with Reason magazine (previously affiliated with the Washington Post from 2014 to 2017). From 2006 to 2013, he served as Co-Editor of the Supreme Court Economic Review, one of the country’s top-rated law and economics journals.
Somin has served as a visiting professor at the University of Pennsylvania Law School. He has also been a visiting professor or scholar at the Georgetown University Law Center, the University of Hamburg, Germany, the University of Torcuato Di Tella in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Uriel Reichman University in Israel, and Zhengzhou University in China. He is a University Affiliate of the Schar School of Policy and Government at George Mason University, and an affiliated faculty member of the George Mason University Institute for Immigration Research. Before joining the faculty at George Mason, Somin was the John M. Olin Fellow in Law at Northwestern University Law School in 2002-2003. In 2001-2002, he clerked for the Hon. Judge Jerry E. Smith of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. Professor Somin earned his B.A., Summa Cum Laude, at Amherst College, M.A. in Political Science from Harvard University, and J.D. from Yale Law School.
Former Senator, Pennsylvania
Pat Toomey (born November 17, 1961, Providence, Rhode Island, U.S.) is an American politician who was elected as a Republican to the U.S. Senate in 2010 and represented Pennsylvania from 2011 to 2023. He previously served in the U.S. House of Representatives (1999–2005).
Professor of Law, University of Baltimore Law School
Kimberly Wehle (formerly Kimberly N. Brown) joined the law school after several years of teaching as an Associate Professor at the University of Oklahoma College of Law and a Visiting Professor at the George Washington University Law School. She teaches and writes in the areas of administrative law, federal courts and civil procedure. She is particularly interested in separation of powers questions, as well as in the constitutional implications of structural and technological innovations in modern government.
Wehle is the author of three books that explain complex constitutional concepts for lay audiences. She is a contributor for BBC World News and BBC World News America on PBS, and an opinion contributor to The Atlantic, Politico, The Bulwark and The Hill. She was an on-air legal analyst and commentator for CBS News. In addition, she appears regularly as a guest legal analyst on constitutional topics such as separation of powers and impeachment with outlets including CNN, MSNBC, NPR’s Morning Edition, PBS NewsHour and Fox News. Her articles have also appeared in The Baltimore Sun, The Los Angeles Times, and NBC News Think. She is regularly interviewed and cited by prominent print journalists on a range of newsworthy legal issues.
She hosts a show on Instagram called #SimplePolitics with Kim Wehle at @kimwehle. She also tweets @kimwehle. She is the 2020 recipient of the prestigious University of Maryland System Board of Regents Faculty Award for excellence in scholarship.
Wehle's scholarship addresses the constitutional relationship of independent agencies and private contractors to the enumerated branches of government. Her articles have appeared in the Notre Dame Law Review, the Indiana Law Journal and the North Carolina Law Review, among others, and her work is cited in a leading federal courts casebook.
Wehle was an editor of the Michigan Law Review and clerked for the Hon. Charles R. Richey of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia. She went on to practice, first at the Federal Trade Commission and subsequently as an Associate Independent Counsel in the Office of Independent Counsel Kenneth W. Starr, and as an Assistant U.S. Attorney in the Civil Division of the Office of the United States Attorney in Washington, D.C.
She has practiced before the United States Supreme Court and argued several cases in the United States Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.
Wehle is also an advisor to the nonpartisan nonprofit, Protect Democracy.
Lecturer in Law, University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School
Matthew Lee Wiener served until recently as the twice-presidentially appointed Acting Chair and Vice Chair of the Administrative Conference of the United States (ACUS), as well as a member of its Council and its Executive Director. (In 2016, President Obama nominated him to be ACUS’s Chairman.)
He is now a special counsel to ACUS, co-chair of its Council on Federal Administrative Adjudication, and a lecturer at the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School, where he teaches Administrative Law.
Before affiliating with ACUS, Mr. Wiener was general counsel to U.S. Senator Arlen Specter (Senate Committee on the Judiciary), counsel to the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on the Judiciary, a partner at Dechert LLP, and special counsel to Cuneo Gilbert & LaDuca.
He has taught courses on administrative law, administrative practice, regulation remedies, statutory interpretation, and separation of powers at the law schools of the University of Pennsylvania, Rutgers University, and George Mason University.
Mr. Wiener is an elected member of the American Law Institute, a fellow of the American Bar Foundation, and co-chair of the Adjudication Committee of the American Bar Association’s Section of Administrative Law and Regulatory Practice.
Mr. Wiener holds a J.D. from Stanford Law School, where he was Articles Editor of the Stanford Law Review, and an A.B. from William and Mary.
United States District Judge, Eastern District of Pennsylvania
Judge Wolson was nominated to the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania in May 2018 and was confirmed in May 2019. Judge Wolson earned his J.D., cum laude, from Harvard Law School, B.A., magna cum laude, from the University of Pennsylvania. After graduating from law school, he served as a law clerk for Hon. Jan E. DuBois of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. He then maintained a complex commercial litigation practice, first as an associate with Covington & Burling in Washington, D.C., and then as a partner with Dilworth Paxson in Philadelphia.
Litigation Counsel, New Civil Liberties Alliance
Jenin Younes is Litigation Counsel for the New Civil Liberties Alliance. Having always been a passionate advocate for individual liberties, Jenin spent the first part of her career as an appellate public defender, providing representation to indigent clients convicted of criminal offenses in New York City. In this capacity, she briefed and argued countless appeals in New York’s Appellate Division, Second Department, and several cases in the New York State Court of Appeals. She also represented individuals at civil hearings in trial court.
Jenin holds a B.A. from Cornell University and a J.D. from New York University School of Law.
Professor of Legal Studies & Business Ethics, The Wharton School, The University of Pennsylvania
David Zaring’s scholarship addresses administrative and regulatory law from an international perspective. Professor Zaring comes to the business school from the Washington & Lee University School of Law. At Washington & Lee, he was an assistant professor and Alumni Faculty Fellow from 2005 to 2007. He had previously served as Acting Assistant Professor in the Lawyering Program at New York University School of Law from 2002 to 2005, and as a visiting professor at Vanderbilt Law School in the fall of 2007. After graduating magna cum laude from Harvard Law School, Professor Zaring clerked for Chief Judge William Matthew Byrne Jr. of the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California and then for Judge Judith Rogers on the US. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. He served as a trial attorney for the U.S. Department of Justice in the Federal Programs Branch of the Civil Division and as a special assistant to the General Counsel in the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development before entering the academy.
Columnist, New York Post
Karol Markowicz is a columnist at the New York Post. She has also written for Time, USA Today, The Observer, Heat Street, Federalist, Daily Beast and elsewhere. Follow her on Twitter @Karol.
Judge, Florida Fifth District Court of Appeal
In April 2023, Judge Jordan E. Pratt was commissioned as a member of the Florida Fifth District Court of Appeal following his appointment by Governor Ron DeSantis.
Before joining the court, Judge Pratt worked as senior counsel at First Liberty Institute and served in various roles in state and federal government: as senior counsel in the U.S. Department of Justice, deputy general counsel in the U.S. Small Business Administration, and deputy solicitor general in the Florida Office of the Attorney General. As a deputy solicitor general, he defended significant Florida legislation and executive actions at every level of the state and federal court systems, with successful arguments before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit, the Florida Supreme Court, and Florida’s First District Court of Appeal.
Judge Pratt graduated as a co-valedictorian of his undergraduate class at the University of Florida. He then received his J.D., magna cum laude, from the University of Florida College of Law, where he was a law review editor and president of the school’s Federalist Society and Christian Legal Society chapters. During law school, he interned for the Hon. Jeffrey S. Sutton on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit.
After his graduation from law school, Judge Pratt served as a law clerk to the Hon. Harvey E. Schlesinger on the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida, Jacksonville Division. He then clerked for the Hon. Jennifer W. Elrod on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.
Judge Pratt has held several fellowships, including an Olin–Searle Fellowship at Florida State University’s College of Law, and has published scholarship in the Tennessee Law Review, the Nebraska Law Review, and the Mississippi Law Journal. He is a member of the Federalist Society for Law & Public Policy Studies, and he has held several leadership roles in the organization, including service as president of its Tallahassee Lawyers Chapter from 2016 to 2019.
Judge, United States District Court, Southern District of Florida
Rodolfo “Rudy” Armando Ruiz II is a District Judge of the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida. Prior to his judicial commission on May 3, 2019, Ruiz was a Circuit Court Judge for the Eleventh Judicial Circuit of Florida from 2014 through 2019, and a Miami-Dade County Court Judge from 2012 through 2014. Ruiz also served as an Assistant County Attorney with the Miami-Dade County Attorney’s Office and an associate with White & Case LLP.
Ruiz received a Bachelor of Science in Economics from Duke University and earned his Juris Doctor from Georgetown University. After graduating from law school, he was a law clerk to the Honorable Federico A. Moreno of the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida.
Assistant Attorney General, Civil Division, United States Department of Justice
Brett A. Shumate was sworn in as the Civil Division’s 36th Assistant Attorney General on June 11, 2025. He previously served in the Civil Division from 2017 to 2019 as the Deputy Assistant Attorney General for the Federal Programs Branch. Prior to rejoining the Department, Mr. Shumate was a partner at Jones Day in Washington, D.C.
Mr. Shumate clerked for Judge Edith H. Jones on the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. He graduated from Wake Forest University School of Law and Furman University.
Assistant U.S. Attorney, U.S. Department of Justice
Jay G. Trezevant has worked as an Assistant U.S. Attorney in the United States Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Florida, Tampa Division, since 1997. Over that span, AUSA Trezevant has participated in criminal and civil fraud matters and cases that have returned over $1 billion to government programs. Currently, AUSA Trezevant works in the Tampa Division’s Economic Crimes Section, prosecuting a wide array of complex investigations and cases involving economic crimes, such as health care fraud, securities fraud, tax fraud, government program fraud, transnational elder fraud, money laundering, and mail and wire fraud, as well as matters and cases concerning public corruption. AUSA Trezevant has previously served in the Office as the Chief of the Economic Crimes Section and in other supervisory capacities.
General Counsel, xAI and X
Judge, United States Court of Appeals, District of Columbia Circuit
Judge Katsas was appointed to the D.C. Circuit in December 2017. He graduated from Princeton University and Harvard Law School, where he was an executive editor on the Harvard Law Review. Between 1989 and 1992, he served as a law clerk to Judge Edward Becker on the Third Circuit, to then-Judge Clarence Thomas on the D.C. Circuit, and to Justice Thomas on the Supreme Court. Between 1992 and 2001, he was an associate and then partner in the Washington office of Jones Day, where he specialized in appellate and complex civil litigation. Between 2001 and 2009, he served in many senior positions in the Department of Justice, including as Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Division and as Acting Associate Attorney General. In 2009, he returned to Jones Day. From January to December 2017, he served as Deputy Assistant to the President and Deputy Counsel to the President.
Before joining the bench, Judge Katsas argued more than 75 appeals, including three cases in the Supreme Court, 13 cases in the D.C. Circuit, and cases in every other federal court of appeals. By appointment of the Chief Justice, he served on the Advisory Committee on Appellate Rules from 2013 to 2017. In 2016, he was elected to membership in the American Academy of Appellate Lawyers.
Columnist, New York Post
Karol Markowicz is a columnist at the New York Post. She has also written for Time, USA Today, The Observer, Heat Street, Federalist, Daily Beast and elsewhere. Follow her on Twitter @Karol.
Judge, Florida Fifth District Court of Appeal
In April 2023, Judge Jordan E. Pratt was commissioned as a member of the Florida Fifth District Court of Appeal following his appointment by Governor Ron DeSantis.
Before joining the court, Judge Pratt worked as senior counsel at First Liberty Institute and served in various roles in state and federal government: as senior counsel in the U.S. Department of Justice, deputy general counsel in the U.S. Small Business Administration, and deputy solicitor general in the Florida Office of the Attorney General. As a deputy solicitor general, he defended significant Florida legislation and executive actions at every level of the state and federal court systems, with successful arguments before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit, the Florida Supreme Court, and Florida’s First District Court of Appeal.
Judge Pratt graduated as a co-valedictorian of his undergraduate class at the University of Florida. He then received his J.D., magna cum laude, from the University of Florida College of Law, where he was a law review editor and president of the school’s Federalist Society and Christian Legal Society chapters. During law school, he interned for the Hon. Jeffrey S. Sutton on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit.
After his graduation from law school, Judge Pratt served as a law clerk to the Hon. Harvey E. Schlesinger on the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida, Jacksonville Division. He then clerked for the Hon. Jennifer W. Elrod on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.
Judge Pratt has held several fellowships, including an Olin–Searle Fellowship at Florida State University’s College of Law, and has published scholarship in the Tennessee Law Review, the Nebraska Law Review, and the Mississippi Law Journal. He is a member of the Federalist Society for Law & Public Policy Studies, and he has held several leadership roles in the organization, including service as president of its Tallahassee Lawyers Chapter from 2016 to 2019.
Judge, United States District Court, Southern District of Florida
Rodolfo “Rudy” Armando Ruiz II is a District Judge of the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida. Prior to his judicial commission on May 3, 2019, Ruiz was a Circuit Court Judge for the Eleventh Judicial Circuit of Florida from 2014 through 2019, and a Miami-Dade County Court Judge from 2012 through 2014. Ruiz also served as an Assistant County Attorney with the Miami-Dade County Attorney’s Office and an associate with White & Case LLP.
Ruiz received a Bachelor of Science in Economics from Duke University and earned his Juris Doctor from Georgetown University. After graduating from law school, he was a law clerk to the Honorable Federico A. Moreno of the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida.
Assistant Attorney General, Civil Division, United States Department of Justice
Brett A. Shumate was sworn in as the Civil Division’s 36th Assistant Attorney General on June 11, 2025. He previously served in the Civil Division from 2017 to 2019 as the Deputy Assistant Attorney General for the Federal Programs Branch. Prior to rejoining the Department, Mr. Shumate was a partner at Jones Day in Washington, D.C.
Mr. Shumate clerked for Judge Edith H. Jones on the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. He graduated from Wake Forest University School of Law and Furman University.
Assistant U.S. Attorney, U.S. Department of Justice
Jay G. Trezevant has worked as an Assistant U.S. Attorney in the United States Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Florida, Tampa Division, since 1997. Over that span, AUSA Trezevant has participated in criminal and civil fraud matters and cases that have returned over $1 billion to government programs. Currently, AUSA Trezevant works in the Tampa Division’s Economic Crimes Section, prosecuting a wide array of complex investigations and cases involving economic crimes, such as health care fraud, securities fraud, tax fraud, government program fraud, transnational elder fraud, money laundering, and mail and wire fraud, as well as matters and cases concerning public corruption. AUSA Trezevant has previously served in the Office as the Chief of the Economic Crimes Section and in other supervisory capacities.
Professor of Law, South Texas College of Law Houston
Josh Blackman is a national thought leader on constitutional law and the United States Supreme Court. Josh’s work was quoted during two presidential impeachment trials. He has testified before Congress and advises federal and state lawmakers. Josh regularly appears on TV, including NBC, CBS, ABC, Fox, and the BBC. Josh is also a frequent guest on NPR and other syndicated radio programs. He has published commentaries in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, and leading national publications.
Since 2012, Josh has served as a professor at the South Texas College of Law Houston. He holds the Centennial Chair of Constitutional Law. Josh is an Adjunct Fellow at the Manhattan Institute. Josh has written more than seven dozen law review articles that have been cited more than a thousand times. Josh was selected as the Jurist of the Year by the Texas Journal of Law & Public Policy, received the inaugural Meese III Originalism Award, and was awarded the Inaugural Joseph Story Award. Josh was selected by Forbes Magazine for the “30 Under 30” in Law and Policy. Josh is the President of the Harlan Institute, and founded FantasySCOTUS, the Internet’s Premier Supreme Court Fantasy League. He blogs at the Volokh Conspiracyand posts@JoshMBlackman.
Partner, Torridon Law PLLC
Mike Fragoso is a seasoned legal and policy strategist. Most recently he served as chief counsel to Senate Republican Leader, Mitch McConnell. He has negotiated consequential legislation, managed successful congressional oversight, and prepared individuals for the most contentious Senate hearings.
As chief counsel to Leader McConnell Mike was the Leader’s primary legal advisor and managed the “last mile” of any legislation touching on the Senate Judiciary Committee. He ran the 2024 reauthorization of FISA Section 702 and was involved at the highest levels of the appropriations and budget-reconciliation processes. Mike also repeatedly represented Leader McConnell as counsel of record at the Supreme Court. Leader McConnell said of Mike that he’s “equally at home in the high-minded philosophical discourse of the legal community and the urgent pragmatism of Congressional dealmaking,” and that he “maintains a firm grasp on the realm of the possible” but “knows which screws to twist.” He observed that Mike “is so exceptionally competent that he often produces from his desk the work that would normally require, literally, teams of outside counsel.”
Mike previously was chief counsel for nominations and constitutional law for the Senate Judiciary Committee under Ranking Member Chuck Grassley and Chairman Lindsey Graham. During this time he advised the Senators on two presidential impeachments, ran multiple policy hearings, and managed the confirmation process for over 80 federal judges, including Justice Amy Coney Barrett. Chairman Graham described Mike as “a force of nature.”
During the first Trump administration Mike was deputy assistant attorney general in the Department of Justice’s Office of Legal Policy where he ran the Department’s efforts in support of judicial nominations and prepared over 100 nominees for Senate hearings.
Earlier in his career Mike was legislative director to former Senator Jeff Flake and chief counsel to the Senate Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Privacy, Technology and the Law. There he led the oversight and repeal of the FCC’s broadband-privacy rule and was Senator Flake’s top advisor on the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017.
He frequently comments on public affairs and his writing has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, National Review, and the Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy.
Mike also served as a law clerk to Judge Diane Sykes of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit.
Founder, Original Jurisdiction
David Lat is a lawyer turned writer. He publishes Original Jurisdiction, a newsletter on Substack about law and legal affairs, and he writes for newspapers and magazines, including the New York Times, Washington Post, and Wall Street Journal. Prior to launching Original Jurisdiction, David founded Above the Law, one of the nation's most widely read legal news websites, and Underneath Their Robes, a popular blog about federal judges that he wrote under a pseudonym. He is also the author of a novel set in the world of the federal courts, Supreme Ambitions. Before entering the media world, David worked as a federal prosecutor in Newark, New Jersey; a litigation associate at Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, in New York; and a law clerk to Judge Diarmuid F. O’Scannlain of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. David graduated from Harvard College and Yale Law School, where he served as an editor of the Yale Law Journal.
Associate Professor of Law, Antonin Scalia Law School at George Mason University
Robert Luther III was appointed Associate Professor of Law in 2025 after serving as Distinguished Professor of Law from 2024-2025 and Adjunct Professor of Law from 2019-2024. He teaches and writes on the federal courts, legal and judicial ethics, political law, Congress, and professional sports. He has served at high levels in all three branches of the federal government and recently founded Constitutional Solutions PLLC—a law firm that navigates judicial candidates, judges, elected officials, professional athletes, and executives through high-stakes hearings, investigations, and reputational attacks.
Immediately before joining the Scalia Law faculty, Professor Luther spent over five years in the Washington, D.C. office of Jones Day, where his practice focused on strategic counseling, crisis management, and litigation. Prior to joining Jones Day, he served as Associate Counsel to the President of the United States in the White House Counsel’s Office. In the White House, he co-managed the judicial selection process and supervised the preparation of over 150 federal judicial nominees for their successful U.S. Senate confirmation hearings. The New York Times Magazine referred to his work on judicial selection during this period as “unique in White House history.” Before joining the White House, Professor Luther served as Counsel to then–U.S. Senator Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) on the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, where he served as a core member of the team that prepared the Senator for confirmation as United States Attorney General. Professor Luther was also a law clerk to Judge Daniel A. Manion of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. Earlier in his career, Professor Luther practiced civil and appellate litigation at a boutique firm in Williamsburg, Va. and taught at William & Mary Law School.
Professor Luther frequently speaks on the legal profession, political law, and federal judicial selection. His public work has been covered by or appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, Fox News, The Hill, Politico, the Washington Examiner, National Law Journal, Law360, The Washington Reporter, and elsewhere, while his scholarship is published in the law journals of nearly twenty universities including three journals of Harvard University. He holds active law licenses in Virginia, the District of Columbia, the U.S. Supreme Court, and half of the U.S. Courts of Appeals.
In 2025, Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin appointed Professor Luther to the Board of Visitors to Mount Vernon. He is an elected member of the American Law Institute (ALI) and serves on the Advisory Board of the Wilson Center for Leadership at Hampden-Sydney College. Since 2019, he has helped over 200 of his students secure clerkships with federal judges.
Deputy Secretary of Agriculture, U.S. Department of Agriculture
Judge Stephen Alexander Vaden was appointed as the Deputy Secretary of the U.S. Department of Agriculture on July 7, 2025. Alongside Secretary Brooke L. Rollins, Deputy Secretary Vaden leads the Department’s operations and implements policies that support America’s food and farm systems. A native of Union City, Tennessee, Deputy Secretary Vaden brings expertise in agricultural policy, law, and rural development. Previously, he served as a judge on the U.S. Court of International Trade and as General Counsel of USDA. Throughout Deputy Secretary Vaden’s time as General Counsel, he led successful Supreme Court litigation, advanced regulatory reform, and supported the implementation of the 2018 Farm Bill. He is a graduate of Yale Law School and Vanderbilt University. A public servant with strong agricultural roots, Deputy Secretary Vaden is committed to revitalizing rural America and ensuring an abundant, affordable, and safe U.S. food supply.
Cryptocurrency and the Major Questions Doctrine
Little Rock Lawyers Chapter
Little Rock, ARPanel 2: Navigating Investigations and Rulemakings
Chicago, ILBreakout Sessions
Chicago, ILPanel 2: Judicial Selection & Courage
Columbus, OHThe Future of the Administrative State and the Roberts Court
Pennsylvania Student Chapter
Philadelphia, PAPanel Three: Post-Pandemic Legal Landscape and the Next Crisis
Karol Markowicz, Jordan E. Pratt, Rodolfo Armando Ruiz, Brett Shumate, Jay Trezevant
This panel will focus on the lasting impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on law and...
Panel Three: Post-Pandemic Legal Landscape and the Next Crisis
Ninth Annual Florida Chapters Conference
Lake Buena Vista, FLLunch Address by Judge Katsas
Simi Valley, CATopics
DC Court of Appeals Holds That Judicial Intervention Is Inappropriate In a Religious Schism
The District of Columbia Court of Appeals recently declined to intervene in a religious dispute...
The Judge’s Role in Choosing a Successor
Josh Blackman, Michael Fragoso, David Lat, Robert Luther, Stephen Alexander Vaden
Under the Constitution, two branches of government are formally involved in the selection of federal...