Robert E. Osgood Professor, School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University
Eliot Cohen is the Robert E. Osgood Professor at the Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) where he has taught since 1990. He served as Dean of SAIS from 2019 to 2021. Cohen received his BA and PhD degrees from Harvard University and after teaching there and at the Naval War College founded the Strategic Studies program at SAIS. His books include The Big Stick (2017), Conquered into Liberty (2011), and Supreme Command (2002). In addition to public service in the Department of Defense he served as Counselor of the Department of State from 2007 to 2009. He writes frequently for major newspapers and is a contributing writer at The Atlantic.
Vice President and Deputy Counsel, Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty
General Counsel, Mountain States Legal Foundation
William E. Trachman is General Counsel for Mountain States Legal Foundation, where he protects the rights of individuals to live freely and securely under the U.S. Constitution. Previously, he was appointed to serve in the Department of Education as Deputy Assistant Secretary in the Office for Civil Rights. Prior to his appointment, he served as General Counsel to the Douglas County School District, where he helped litigate the fight for school choice in the school district. Presently, Mr. Trachman serves as Chair of the Colorado Federalist Society and the Vice Chair of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights’ Colorado Advisory Board. He previously taught as an Adjunct Professor at the University of Denver, Sturm College of Law. He attended U.C. Berkeley for both undergraduate and law school, and then clerked for the Honorable Harris Hartz on the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals. Mr. Trachman is licensed in Colorado, California, and Washington, D.C.
Vice President, Edwin Meese III Institute for the Rule of Law, Advancing American Freedom
John G. Malcolm oversees Advancing American Freedom’s work to increase understanding of the Constitution and the rule of law as Vice President of the organization’s Edwin Meese III Institute for the Rule of Law. Malcolm brings to the challenge a wealth of legal expertise and experience in both the public and private sectors.
Prior to joining Advancing American Freedom in 2025, Malcolm was the Vice President of the Institute for Constitutional Government and the Director of the Meese Center for Legal and Judicial Studies at the Heritage Foundation. Prior to joining Heritage in 2012, Malcolm was general counsel at the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, as well as a distinguished practitioner in residence at Pepperdine Law School. From 2004 to 2009, Malcolm was executive vice president and director of worldwide anti-piracy operations for the Motion Picture Association.
Malcolm served as a deputy assistant attorney general in the Department of Justice’s Criminal Division from 2001 to 2004, where he oversaw sections on computer crime and intellectual property, domestic security, child exploitation and obscenity, and special investigations. Immediately prior to that, he was a founding partner in the Atlanta law firm of Malcolm & Schroeder, LLP.
From 1990 to 1997, Malcolm was an assistant U.S. attorney in Atlanta, assigned to the fraud and public corruption section, and also an associate independent counsel, investigating fraud and abuse in the Department of Housing and Urban Development. He was honored with the Director’s Award for Superior Performance for his work in connection with the successful prosecution of Walter Leroy Moody Jr., who assassinated an 11th Circuit judge and the head of the Savannah chapter of the NAACP.
A graduate of Harvard Law School and Columbia College, Malcolm began his career as a law clerk to a federal district court judge and a federal appellate court judge, and as an associate at the Atlanta-based law firm of Sutherland, Asbill & Brennan (new Eversheds Sutherland).
Malcolm, who resides in Washington, D.C., serves on the Board of Trustees of the Washington National Opera and is a Senate-confirmed member of the Board of Directors of the Legal Services Corporation, the largest funder of civil legal aid in the United States.
Emanuel S. Heller Professor of Law, University of California at Berkeley; Thomas Smith Senior Research Fellow, The Civitas Institute, University of Texas at Austin
John Yoo is the Emanuel Heller Professor of Law at the University of California at Berkeley. He is also the Thomas Smith Senior Research Fellow, Civitas Institute, at the University of Texas at Austin. He is also a Nonresident Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.
His most recent book, The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Supreme Court, co-authored with Robert Delahunty, was published in 2023. Professor Yoo’s other books include Defender-in-Chief: Trump’s Fight for Presidential Power; Striking Power: How Cyber, Robots, and Space Weapons Change the Rules for War; Point of Attack: Preventive War, International Law, and Global Welfare; and Crisis and Command: A History of Executive Power from George Washington to George Bush.
He is a co-author of volumes 1 and 2 of R. Rossum, G. Tarr, V. Munoz & J. Yoo American Constitution Law (Routledge, 2026), and a co-editor of the eight-volume series on the 250th anniversary of the American Revolution, We Hold These Truths, with Yuval Levin and Adam White of the American Enterprise Institute.
Professor Yoo has published more than 100 articles in academic journals on subjects including national security, constitutional law, international law, and the Supreme Court. He also regularly contributes to the editorial pages of the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, and National Review, among others.
Professor Yoo has served in all three branches of government. He was an official in the U.S. Department of Justice, where he worked on national security and terrorism issues after the 9/11 attacks. He served as general counsel of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee. He has been a law clerk for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and federal appeals Judge Laurence Silberman. He has been a visiting professor at the University of Texas at Austin’s School of Civic Leadership, Seoul National University, the Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya, Keio University, Trento University, the University of Chicago, and the Free University of Amsterdam.
Professor Yoo supervises the Public Law and Policy Program and the California Constitution Center. He also serves on the boards of Founding Forward, the Washington Legal Foundation, the Pacific Legal Foundation, the Ulysses Grant Institute, the Federalist Society’s Separation of Powers and Federalism Division, the Universidad Cientifica del Sur Law School, and the Asia-Pacific Law Institute at Seoul National University. He is a winner of the Federalist Society’s Paul Bator award and the Heritage Foundation’s Edwin Meese III Originalism Lectureship.
Professor Yoo graduated from Yale Law School and summa cum laude from Harvard College.
Vice President, Edwin Meese III Institute for the Rule of Law, Advancing American Freedom
John G. Malcolm oversees Advancing American Freedom’s work to increase understanding of the Constitution and the rule of law as Vice President of the organization’s Edwin Meese III Institute for the Rule of Law. Malcolm brings to the challenge a wealth of legal expertise and experience in both the public and private sectors.
Prior to joining Advancing American Freedom in 2025, Malcolm was the Vice President of the Institute for Constitutional Government and the Director of the Meese Center for Legal and Judicial Studies at the Heritage Foundation. Prior to joining Heritage in 2012, Malcolm was general counsel at the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, as well as a distinguished practitioner in residence at Pepperdine Law School. From 2004 to 2009, Malcolm was executive vice president and director of worldwide anti-piracy operations for the Motion Picture Association.
Malcolm served as a deputy assistant attorney general in the Department of Justice’s Criminal Division from 2001 to 2004, where he oversaw sections on computer crime and intellectual property, domestic security, child exploitation and obscenity, and special investigations. Immediately prior to that, he was a founding partner in the Atlanta law firm of Malcolm & Schroeder, LLP.
From 1990 to 1997, Malcolm was an assistant U.S. attorney in Atlanta, assigned to the fraud and public corruption section, and also an associate independent counsel, investigating fraud and abuse in the Department of Housing and Urban Development. He was honored with the Director’s Award for Superior Performance for his work in connection with the successful prosecution of Walter Leroy Moody Jr., who assassinated an 11th Circuit judge and the head of the Savannah chapter of the NAACP.
A graduate of Harvard Law School and Columbia College, Malcolm began his career as a law clerk to a federal district court judge and a federal appellate court judge, and as an associate at the Atlanta-based law firm of Sutherland, Asbill & Brennan (new Eversheds Sutherland).
Malcolm, who resides in Washington, D.C., serves on the Board of Trustees of the Washington National Opera and is a Senate-confirmed member of the Board of Directors of the Legal Services Corporation, the largest funder of civil legal aid in the United States.
Emanuel S. Heller Professor of Law, University of California at Berkeley; Thomas Smith Senior Research Fellow, The Civitas Institute, University of Texas at Austin
John Yoo is the Emanuel Heller Professor of Law at the University of California at Berkeley. He is also the Thomas Smith Senior Research Fellow, Civitas Institute, at the University of Texas at Austin. He is also a Nonresident Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.
His most recent book, The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Supreme Court, co-authored with Robert Delahunty, was published in 2023. Professor Yoo’s other books include Defender-in-Chief: Trump’s Fight for Presidential Power; Striking Power: How Cyber, Robots, and Space Weapons Change the Rules for War; Point of Attack: Preventive War, International Law, and Global Welfare; and Crisis and Command: A History of Executive Power from George Washington to George Bush.
He is a co-author of volumes 1 and 2 of R. Rossum, G. Tarr, V. Munoz & J. Yoo American Constitution Law (Routledge, 2026), and a co-editor of the eight-volume series on the 250th anniversary of the American Revolution, We Hold These Truths, with Yuval Levin and Adam White of the American Enterprise Institute.
Professor Yoo has published more than 100 articles in academic journals on subjects including national security, constitutional law, international law, and the Supreme Court. He also regularly contributes to the editorial pages of the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, and National Review, among others.
Professor Yoo has served in all three branches of government. He was an official in the U.S. Department of Justice, where he worked on national security and terrorism issues after the 9/11 attacks. He served as general counsel of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee. He has been a law clerk for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and federal appeals Judge Laurence Silberman. He has been a visiting professor at the University of Texas at Austin’s School of Civic Leadership, Seoul National University, the Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya, Keio University, Trento University, the University of Chicago, and the Free University of Amsterdam.
Professor Yoo supervises the Public Law and Policy Program and the California Constitution Center. He also serves on the boards of Founding Forward, the Washington Legal Foundation, the Pacific Legal Foundation, the Ulysses Grant Institute, the Federalist Society’s Separation of Powers and Federalism Division, the Universidad Cientifica del Sur Law School, and the Asia-Pacific Law Institute at Seoul National University. He is a winner of the Federalist Society’s Paul Bator award and the Heritage Foundation’s Edwin Meese III Originalism Lectureship.
Professor Yoo graduated from Yale Law School and summa cum laude from Harvard College.
Deputy Coordinator for Countering Violent Extremism, U.S. Department of State
Christopher K. Harnisch is the Deputy Coordinator for Countering Violent Extremism. In this capacity, he is responsible for developing and implementing strategies to counter terrorist messaging and recruitment, including terrorists’ use of the Internet. He also oversees terrorist detention policy.
Prior to his appointment to the Bureau of Counterterrorism, Harnisch served as the Director for Transnational Threats and the Director for Afghanistan at the National Security Council. A Virginia native, he returned to the area following several years in Silicon Valley where he served as a Strategic Sourcing and Operations Product Development Manager at Apple. Before his time in the private sector, Harnisch worked in the public policy and defense arenas. From 2011 to 2012, he served as an Army Intelligence Officer on NATO’s counter-corruption task force in Afghanistan. Previous to that, he worked on the Critical Threats Project at the American Enterprise Institute, where he researched and wrote about al-Qa’ida’s emerging safe havens, focusing especially on those in Yemen and Somalia. He served on the staff of Vice President Dick Cheney.
Chris earned a B.A. in International Studies from Middlebury College and an MBA and M.A. in International Relations from Yale University.
He has published pieces on foreign policy in numerous publications, including The Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, and National Review Online, and he has appeared as a guest analyst on various public panels and television and radio broadcasts. Recently, he has worked on initiatives aimed at bridging the civil-military divide, including co-chairing the Veterans Summit at Yale University. He is a Term Member at the Council on Foreign Relations.
Deputy Director, Program on Extremism, George Washington University
Seamus Hughes is the Deputy Director of the Program on Extremism at George Washington University. He is an expert on terrorism, homegrown violent extremism, and countering violent extremism (CVE). Hughes has authored numerous reports for the Program including ‘ISIS in America: From Retweets to Raqqa’ and ‘The Travelers: American Jihadists in Syria and Iraq.’ He regularly provides commentary to media outlets, including the New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Atlantic, CNN, MSNBC, FoxNews, BBC, PBS, and CBS’ 60 Minutes. He has testified before the U.S. Congress on multiple occasions.
Hughes previously worked at the National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC), serving as a lead staffer on U.S. government efforts to implement a national CVE strategy. He regularly led engagements with Muslim American communities across the country, provided counsel to civic leaders after high-profile terror-related incidents, and met with families of individuals who joined terrorist organizations. Hughes created a groundbreaking intervention program to help steer individuals away from violence through non-law enforcement means, and worked closely with the FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force, Fusion Centers, and U.S. Attorney Offices.
Prior to NCTC, Hughes served as the Senior Counterterrorism Advisor for the U.S. Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee. He organized over a dozen congressional hearings on the threat of homegrown violent extremism, and led fact-finding delegations to the various European and Middle Eastern countries. He authored two reports for the Senate: “A Ticking Time Bomb: Counterterrorism Lessons from the U.S. Government’s Failure to Prevent the Fort Hood Attack” and “Zachary Chesser: A Case Study in Online Islamist Radicalization and Its Meaning for the Threat of Homegrown Terrorism.”
Hughes has authored numerous legislative bills, including sections of the 9/11 Commission Recommendations Act and the Special Agent Samuel Hicks Families of Fallen Heroes Act. He is a graduate of the University of Maryland, and a recipient of the National Security Council Outstanding Service Award and two NCTC Director’s Awards for outstanding service. He teaches classes at George Washington University and Georgetown University.
Harold Brown Chair; Director, Transnational Threats Project; and Senior Adviser, International Security Program, Center for Strategic and International Studies
Seth G. Jones holds the Harold Brown Chair, is director of the Transnational Threats Project, and is a senior adviser to the International Security Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). He teaches at Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) and the Center for Homeland Defense and Security (CHDS) at the U.S. Naval Postgraduate School.
Prior to joining CSIS, Dr. Jones was the director of the International Security and Defense Policy Center at the RAND Corporation. He also served as representative for the commander, U.S. Special Operations Command, to the assistant secretary of defense for special operations. Before that, he was a plans officer and adviser to the commanding general, U.S. Special Operations Forces, in Afghanistan (Combined Forces Special Operations Component Command–Afghanistan). In 2014, Dr. Jones served on a congressionally mandated panel that reviewed the FBI’s implementation of counterterrorism recommendations contained in the 9/11 Commission Report.
Dr. Jones specializes in counterterrorism, counterinsurgency, unconventional warfare, and covert action, including a focus on al Qaeda and ISIS. He is the author of A Covert Action: Reagan, the CIA, and the Cold War Struggle in Poland (W.W. Norton, 2018), Waging Insurgent Warfare (Oxford University Press, 2016), Hunting in the Shadows: The Pursuit of al Qa'ida after 9/11 (W.W. Norton, 2012), and In the Graveyard of Empires: America’s War in Afghanistan (W.W. Norton, 2009). Dr. Jones has published articles in a range of journals, such as Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, and International Security, as well as newspapers and magazines like the New York Times, Washington Post, and Wall Street Journal. Dr. Jones is a graduate of Bowdoin College and received his M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of Chicago.
Margaret Thatcher Fellow, Margaret Thatcher Center for Freedom, The Heritage Foundation
Robin Simcox is the Margaret Thatcher Fellow at The Heritage Foundation’s Margaret Thatcher Center for Freedom, where he specializes in counter-terrorism and national security policy.
Simcox has testified before Congress on multiple occasions on issues related to ISIS, al-Qaeda and associated movements. He has also provided oral evidence to a committee of Parliament established to examine British intelligence policy.
Simcox’s commentary has been published in newspapers such as The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The (London) Telegraph, and The Guardian. It also has appeared in magazines and journals such as Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, The Atlantic, West Point’s CTC Sentinel, and The Weekly Standard. He regularly appears on a variety of broadcast and cable news outlets, including Fox News Channel, MSNBC, CNN, CBS, BBC, and Sky News.
Prior to arriving at Heritage in January 2016, Simcox was a research fellow at the Henry Jackson Society, a foreign policy think tank in London. While there, he authored several important works on the terrorist group al-Qaeda, including "Al-Qaeda in the United States," a 728-page monograph profiling every known court conviction in America linked to al-Qaeda.
In joining Heritage’s Thatcher Center for Freedom and assuming the fellowship that bears the name of the former British prime minister, he became part of the leading policy center in Washington dedicated to strengthening the Anglo-American “special relationship” as well as U.S. and British leadership of the broader transatlantic alliance. Established in 2005, the Thatcher Center is the only public policy center in the world dedicated to advancing the vision and ideals of Lady Thatcher, who died in 2013.
Robin received a master of science degree in U.S. foreign policy from the Institute for the Study of the Americas, University of London, and a bachelor of arts degree in international history from the University of Leeds. He studied for a year at the University of Newcastle, Australia.
Staff Attorney, National Right To Work Legal Defense Foundation
Glenn Taubman is a Staff Attorney for the National Right to Work Legal Defense and Education Foundation (1982 to the present). He was a Law Clerk for Senior Circuit Judge Warren L. Jones, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth and Eleventh Circuits, Jacksonville, Florida, from 1981-82, and a Staff Attorney for the U.S. District Court, Middle District of Florida, Jacksonville, Florida, from 1980-81. His Bar Admissions include: Georgia, 1980; New York, 1981; U.S. Supreme Court, 1983; District of Columbia, 1985. He regularly appears before the National Labor Relations Board and various federal courts, representing individual employees only.
He is the author of "'Neutrality Agreements' and the Destruction of Employees' Section 7 Rights" (2005) and co-author of "Union Discipline and Employee Rights," a monograph published by the National Right to Work Foundation.
A partial listing of his reported cases includes: Lucas v. NLRB, 333 F.3d 927 (9th Cir. 2003);Penrod v. NLRB, 203 F.3d 41 (D.C. Cir. 2000);Production Workers v. NLRB, 161 F.3d 1047 (7th Cir. 1998);Food & Commercial Workers Local 951 v. Mulder, 31 F.3d 365 (6th Cir. 1994);NLRB v. Office Employees Local 2, 902 F.2d 1164 (4th Cir. 1990);Tierney v. City of Toledo, 917 F.2d 927 (6th Cir. 1990);Lowary v. Lexington Local Board of Education, 902 F.2d 422 (6th Cir. 1990);Lowary v. Lexington Local Board of Education, 854 F.2d 131 (6th Cir. 1988);Tierney v. City of Toledo, 824 F.2d 1497 (6th Cir. 1987);Masiello v. US Airways, Inc., 113 F. Supp. 2d 870 (W.D.N.C. 2000);Jordan v. City of Bucyrus, 739 F. Supp. 1124 (1990),further proceedings, 754 F. Supp. 554 (N.D. Ohio 1991);Dana Corp., 341 N.L.R.B. No. 150, 2004 WL 1329345 (June 7, 2004);California Saw & Knife Works, 320 N.L.R.B. 224 (1995),enforced, 133 F.3d 1012 (7th Cir. 1998).
Deputy General Counsel, Local 32 BJ, Service Employees International Union
Brent Garren is a Deputy General Counsel of SEIU Local 32 BJ, the 145,000 member property services local in New York and the eastern seaboard. He worked for the International Ladies’ Garment Workers Union, then UNITE, UNITE HERE and Workers United prior to Local 32 BJ, including serving as General Counsel for UNITE HERE and later Workers United.
Mr. Garren’s career has focused on the National Labor Relations Act. He is an Editor-In-Chief of How to Take a Case Before the NLRB, the leading text on NLRB procedure. He is a member of and past union co-chair of the ABA’s subcommittee on Practice and Procedure under the NLRA, part of the Labor and Employment Law Section. He has spoken about and written on the NLRA, including on remedies, voluntary recognition and NLRB jurisdiction.
He has been involved in international labor solidarity activities, including representing U.S. labor to the International Labor Organization, dealing with protection of home workers and protection of contracted labor.
He was graduated by Wayne State School of Law, summa cum laude.
Lunch & Keynote Address - Can America Remain a Global Power?
Eliot A. Cohen
Lunch will be served at 12:00 p.m. with remarks from Prof. Eliot A. Cohen to...
Nuziard v. MBDA: What is the Future of Equal Protection Litigation?
Daniel Lennington, William E. Trachman
On March 5, 2024, U.S. District Court Judge Mark Pittman of the Northern District of...
Conservatives Talk Presidential Power: An Update on Investigations, Indictments, and Disqualification
John G. Malcolm, John C. Yoo
John Malcolm and John Yoo continue their discussion of presidential power as they review the...
Conservatives Talk Presidential Power: The Hunter Biden Investigations
John G. Malcolm, John C. Yoo
John Malcolm and John Yoo continue their discussion of presidential power with a focus on...
ISIS Today: Prisoners, Escapees, Returnees, and Resurgent Fighters
Christopher K. Harnisch, Seamus Hughes, Seth Jones, Robin Simcox
What is the current status of ISIS worldwide? Some European countries have cancelled ISIS-travelers’ citizenship...
Employee Free Choice Act Debate
Glenn Taubman, Brent Garren
The U.S. House of Representatives has passed, the U.S. Senate will consider, and the Bush...
Anti-Ballistic Missle Treaty: A Letter from the White House
The following letter was written to The Honorable Benjamin Gilman, Chairman of the House of...
The Collapse of the Soviet Union and the End of the 1972 Anti-Missle Ballistic Missile Treaty
The following is the Executive Summary of a legal memorandum from the law firm of...