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Law clerk

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Sep 10 2025
Wednesday 5:30 p.m. CDT    

Houston Young Lawyer - Student Mentorship

Huston Young Lawyers

Houston, TX
Sponsors:
Houston Young Lawyer Chapter • Houston Lawyer Chapter
  • In-Person Event
May 6 2025
Tuesday 5:30 p.m. EDT    

Path to the Bench

Tampa Bay Lawyers Chapter

Tampa, FL
Speakers:
John L. Badalamenti • Thomas P. Barber • Kathryn Kimball Mizelle • Lindsay Saxe Griffin
Sponsors:
Tampa Bay Lawyer Chapter
  • In-Person Event
Mar 13 2025
Thursday 5:30 p.m. EDT    

Corporations Unbound: The Growing Threat to American Liberty

Tampa Bay Lawyers Chapter

Tampa, FL
Speakers:
Jonathan Berry
Sponsors:
Tampa Bay Lawyer Chapter
  • In-Person Event
Nov 7 2024
Thursday 11:45 a.m. CDT    

Supreme Court Round Up with Prof. Josh Blackman

Birmingham Lawyers Chapter

Homewood, AL
Speakers:
Josh Blackman
Sponsors:
Birmingham Lawyer Chapter
  • In-Person Event
Nov 3 2023
Friday 11:30 a.m. CDT    

America's Under-Incarceration Problem

New Orleans Lawyers Chapter

New Orleans, LA
Speakers:
Prerak Shah
Sponsors:
New Orleans Lawyer Chapter
  • In-Person Event
Jun 16 2023
Friday 9:00 a.m. EDT    

2023 Midwestern Regional Conference

Indianapolis, IN
Sponsors:
Chicago Lawyer Chapter • Indianapolis Lawyer Chapter • Evansville Lawyer Chapter • Iowa Lawyer Chapter • Kansas Lawyer Chapter • Wichita Lawyer Chapter • Michigan Lawyer Chapter • Grand Rapids Lawyer Chapter • Minnesota Lawyer Chapter • Jefferson City Lawyer Chapter • St. Louis Lawyer Chapter • Kansas City Lawyer Chapter • Nebraska Lawyer Chapter • Cleveland Lawyer Chapter • Columbus Lawyer Chapter • Toledo Lawyer Chapter • Cincinnati Lawyer Chapter • Milwaukee Lawyer Chapter • Madison Lawyer Chapter • North Dakota Lawyer Chapter • South Dakota Lawyer Chapter
  • In-Person Event
Oct 7 2019
Monday 9:30 a.m. EDT    

2019 Kentucky Chapters Conference

Kentucky Lawyers Chapters

Frankfort, KY
Speakers:
Cassie Chambers Armstrong • Amy D. Cubbage • Mitch McConnell • Donald F. McGahn • Michael T. Morley • John B. Nalbandian • Jesse Panuccio • Rand Paul • John O. Sheller • Amul R. Thapar • William Thro • Jonathan D. Urick • Laurance B. VanMeter
  • In-Person Event
Jul 19 2019
Friday 12:00 p.m. MDT    

Reviewing The Supreme Court’s 2018/19 Term: A Panel Discussion

Colorado Lawyers Chapter

Denver, CO
Topics:
Supreme Court
Sponsors:
Colorado Lawyer Chapter
  • In-Person Event
Sep 6 2018
Thursday 12:00 p.m. MDT    

51 Imperfect Solutions: States and the Making of American Constitutional Law

Colorado Lawyers Chapter

Denver, CO
Speakers:
Jeffrey S. Sutton
Sponsors:
Colorado Lawyer Chapter
  • In-Person Event
James Madison Portrait
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Speaker Information
John L. Badalamenti

John L. Badalamenti

United States District Judge, Middle District of Florida

Biography

John L. Badalamenti is a United States District Judge for the Middle District of Florida and a former judge on Florida’s Second District Court of Appeal. He earned a Bachelor of Arts in Criminology and Law with Highest Honors and a Master of Arts Degree in Sociology from the University of Florida, and a Juris Doctor with Honors from the University of Florida Levin College of Law, where he served as an editor for the University of Florida Journal of Law and Public Policy.

After law school, he accepted an appointment to the United States Attorney General’s Honors Program, serving as legal counsel to the Federal Bureau of Prisons in Atlanta. Judge Badalamenti served as a law clerk to both the Honorable Frank Mays Hull and the late Honorable Paul H. Roney of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. He served for nearly a decade as an Assistant Federal Public Defender in Tampa. He represented clients in the federal trial and appellate courts and presented oral argument for the prevailing petitioner in Yates v. United States, 574 U.S. 528 (2015).

Judge Badalamenti serves as an Adjunct Professor of Law at the University of Florida Levin College of Law, where he teaches an originalism seminar.

 

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Speaker Information
Thomas P. Barber

Thomas P. Barber

U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida

Biography

Prior to joining the federal bench, Judge Barber served as a Circuit Judge in the criminal division of the Thirteenth Judicial Circuit, where he has served since his appointment by the Governor in 2008. As a Circuit Judge he has handled the full range of civil and criminal cases. He previously served for four years as a Hillsborough County Court Judge. Upon graduation from law school, Judge Barber practiced for five years in the trial and business litigation department of Carlton Fields, P.A. He then served as an Assistant Statewide Prosecutor in the Office of Statewide Prosecution and as an Assistant State Attorney for the Thirteenth Judicial Circuit. Upon completion of his service as a prosecutor he returned to Carlton Fields, P.A., where his practice focused on business litigation until his appointment to the bench.

 

Judge Barber earned his B.A. from the University of Florida, where he was inducted into Phi Beta Kappa, and his J.D. from the University of Pennsylvania Law School.

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Kathryn Kimball Mizelle

Kathryn Kimball Mizelle

United States District Judge, United States District Court for the Middle District of Florida

Biography

In November 2020, the Senate confirmed Kathryn Kimball Mizelle as a United States District Judge for the Middle District of Florida. At age 33, she became the youngest Article III judge in the country. Prior to her confirmation, Judge Mizelle was in private practice at Jones Day, where she focused on complex civil and criminal litigation and appeals. Judge Mizelle previously served at the United States Department of Justice in the Office of the Associate Attorney General, in the Southern Criminal Enforcement Section of the Tax Division, and in the United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Virginia. Judge Mizelle has also taught as an adjunct professor of law at the University of Florida Levin College of Law and at George Mason University’s Antonin Scalia Law School.

Judge Mizelle earned her B.A., summa cum laude, from Covenant College, and her J.D., summa cum laude, from the University of Florida Levin College of Law. After graduation, Judge Mizelle served as a law clerk at every level of the federal judiciary: at the Supreme Court for Justice Clarence Thomas, at the D.C. Circuit for Judge Gregory G. Katsas, at the Eleventh Circuit for Chief Judge William H. Pryor Jr., and at the Middle District of Florida for Judge James S. Moody Jr.

 

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Lindsay Saxe Griffin

Magistrate Judge, U.S. District Court, Middle District of Florida

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Speaker Information
Jonathan Berry

Jonathan Berry

Solicitor, U.S. Department of Labor

Biography

Jonathan Berry is Solicitor at the U.S. Department of Labor, in service to President Trump’s agenda to put American workers first. He leads the Department’s lawyers in advising the Secretary and agency leadership on all aspects of law and in representing the Department in court. He was previously managing partner at Boyden Gray PLLC, where he provided strategic counsel and litigated on issues at the intersection of law, politics, and public policy. Earlier, he headed the regulatory office at Labor, and also served at the Department of Justice, in the first Trump Administration. Mr. Berry served as a law clerk to Judge Jerry E. Smith of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, and to Associate Justice Samuel A. Alito, Jr., of the Supreme Court of the United States.

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Josh Blackman

Josh Blackman

Professor of Law, South Texas College of Law Houston

Biography

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.

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Prerak Shah

Prerak Shah

Of Counsel, Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP

Biography

Prerak Shah is Of Counsel at Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP. He was most recently the Acting United States Attorney for the Northern District of Texas, leading a team of approximately 120 Assistant U.S. Attorneys handling a wide range of cases, including securities fraud, health care fraud, the False Claims Act, computer crime, national security, tax fraud, money laundering, public corruption, and terrorism. Mr. Shah previously held several leadership positions at the Department of Justice, including Deputy Associate Attorney General in the office overseeing the work of the Antitrust, Civil, Civil Rights, Environment & Natural Resources, and Tax Divisions. Before joining the Justice Department, Mr. Shah served as Chief of Staff to Senator Ted Cruz and as a Chief Counsel on the Senate Judiciary Committee. He graduated from the University of Chicago Law School and clerked for the Honorable Jerry E. Smith of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.

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Cassie Chambers Armstrong

Cassie Chambers Armstrong

Kaplan Johnson Abate & Bird

Biography

Cassie Chambers Armstrong focuses her practice on litigation. She has significant courtroom experience; prior to joining the firm, she was the lead attorney on multiple trials. She has worked on class actions, appeals, and other complex litigation.

Previously, she was a Skadden Fellow at a Kentucky nonprofit, where she formulated and implemented impact litigation strategies.

Her graduate degrees in Public Health and Public Management give her a unique perspective on the intersection between health care, government, and law.

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Speaker Information
Amy D. Cubbage

Amy D. Cubbage

Member, Ackerson & Yann PLLC

Biography

Amy D. Cubbage is a member of Ackerson & Yann practicing litigation in the areas of complex business and commercial litigation, real estate litigation, construction litigation, employment law, and internet and technology issues, including internet defamation issues. She also counsels clients with respect to energy and environmental matters, including cases involving CERCLA, RCRA, OSHA, and related state regulatory programs.

Ms. Cubbage also litigates and counsels clients in the area of general constitutional and governmental law, with an emphasis on First Amendment, campaign finance, elections, and other constitutional issues, including the commerce clause, public contracts, governmental ethics, and eminent domain.

Within the area of government relations, Ms. Cubbage primarily counsels clients on campaign finance compliance, including formation and administration of political action committees. She lobbies state and local governments on behalf of her clients and advises clients on compliance with lobbying and other ethics restrictions. She also assists clients in preparing and analyzing legislative proposals.

Ms. Cubbage is a frequent speaker on law and technology issues as well as attorney ethics issues.

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Mitch McConnell

Mitch McConnell

United States Senator, Kentucky

Biography

Mitch McConnell is the Senate Majority Leader. Elected to that position unanimously by his Republican colleagues first in 2014 and again in 2016, he is only the second Kentuckian to ever serve as Majority Leader in the U.S. Senate. The first, Senator Alben Barkley, led the Democrats from 1937 to 1949.

Senator McConnell has served, again by the unanimous vote of his colleagues, as the Republican Leader since the 110th Congress. He is the longest-serving Senate Republican Leader in the history of the United States. McConnell previously served in leadership as the Majority Whip in the 108th and 109th Congresses and as chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee during the 1998 and 2000 election cycles.

McConnell has been called “the most conservative leader of either party in the history of the Senate.” He has also earned a reputation as a “master tactician” for permanently locking in critical tax relief for working families and small businesses, and putting in place the most significant spending reduction legislation in a generation.

He has received praise from numerous media outlets for his work as Senate Majority Leader, and in 2015 TIME Magazine named McConnell one of the 100 Most Influential People in the World.

First elected to the Senate in 1984, McConnell is Kentucky’s longest-serving senator. He made history that year as the only Republican challenger in the country to defeat an incumbent Democrat and as the first Republican to win a statewide Kentucky race since 1968. On November 4, 2014, he was elected to a record sixth term by receiving broad support across Kentucky, winning 110 of the Commonwealth’s 120 counties.

McConnell graduated with honors from the University of Louisville College of Arts and Sciences, where he served as student body president. He also is a graduate of the University of Kentucky College of Law, where he was elected president of the Student Bar Association.

McConnell worked as an intern on Capitol Hill for Senator John Sherman Cooper before serving as chief legislative assistant to Senator Marlow Cook and as Deputy Assistant Attorney General to President Gerald Ford.

Before his election to the Senate, he served as judge-executive of Jefferson County, Kentucky, from 1978 until he commenced his Senate term on January 3, 1985.

McConnell currently serves as a senior member of the Appropriations, Agriculture and Rules Committees. He is the proud father of three daughters.

McConnell is married to Secretary Elaine L. Chao, the 18th U.S. Secretary of Transportation. Previously, Secretary Chao served for eight years as President George W. Bush’s U.S. Secretary of Labor. She is also a former president of the United Way of America and director of the Peace Corps.

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Donald F. McGahn

Donald F. McGahn

Partner, Jones Day

Biography

Don McGahn represents clients before government agencies, in enforcement matters, and in court disputes arising from government regulation or action. He handles litigation, crisis management, regulatory compliance, and political issues.

Prior to rejoining Jones Day in 2019, Don served as Counsel to the President of the United States, advising Donald J. Trump on all legal issues concerning the President and his administration, including constitutional and statutory authority, executive orders, international agreements, tariffs, trade, administrative law, and national security. Don also managed the judicial selection process for the President. During Don's tenure, a historic number of judges were appointed to the federal bench, including two Supreme Court justices. In addition, he spearheaded President Trump's deregulation efforts, which resulted in deregulation at record rates. Following Don's departure from the White House, the President appointed him to the Council of the Administrative Conference of the United States, a nonpartisan, independent agency dedicated to promoting improvement to administrative agency processes.

Don's accomplishments have been recognized at the highest levels of government. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell stated that Don concluded his tenure "not only as the best White House Counsel I've seen on the job, but more broadly, as one of the most successful and consequential aides to any President in recent memory."

Don was nominated by President George W. Bush in 2008, and confirmed in the Senate by unanimous consent, to serve as a member of the Federal Election Commission. He also served as outside Counsel to the Committee on House Administration during the 113th and 114th Congresses and as general counsel to the National Republican Congressional Committee.

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Michael T. Morley

Michael T. Morley

Sheila M. McDevitt Professor of Law and Faculty Director of the Election Law Center, Florida State University College of Law

Biography

Professor Morley joined FSU Law in 2018, and teaches and writes in the areas of election law, constitutional law, remedies, and the federal courts. He is best known for his work on election emergencies and post-election litigation, nationwide and other defendant-oriented injunctions, the jurisdiction of the federal courts and their equitable powers more generally. He has testified before congressional committees, made presentations to election officials for the U.S. Election Assistance Commission and participated in bipartisan blue-ribbon groups to develop election reforms. The governor of Florida also appointed Professor Morley to the Criminal Punishment Code Task Force, to propose potential revisions to the legislature.  

The U.S. Supreme Court has cited several of his articles, and he was counsel of record for the successful Petitioner in a landmark campaign finance case. Professor Morley has appeared on C-SPAN, Court TV, Fox News and numerous local news programs, and has been quoted in the Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Roll Call, Politico, U.S. News and World Report, and a wide range of other national publications. His work has been published in many of the nation’s top law reviews, including the Georgetown Law Journal, Northwestern University Law Review, Boston University Law Review and Emory Law Journal.  

Before joining FSU Law, Professor Morley was a Climenko Fellow and Lecturer in Law at Harvard Law School. Prior to his experience in academia, he served in government as special assistant to the General Counsel of the Army at the Pentagon, as well as a law clerk for Judge Gerald B. Tjoflat of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. During his tenure with the Army General Counsel’s office, he was awarded the Meritorious Civilian Service Award and the Army Staff Lapel Pin. He also worked as an associate at Williams & Connolly LLP and the Supreme Court & Appellate group of Winston & Strawn, LLP, both in Washington, D.C. 

Professor Morley earned his J.D. from Yale Law School in 2003, where he was a senior editor on the Yale Law Journal; served on the moot court board; and received the Thurman Arnold Prize for Best Oralist in the Morris Tyler Moot Court of Appeals.

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John B. Nalbandian

John B. Nalbandian

Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit

Biography

John B. Nalbandian serves as a United States Circuit Judge from Kentucky on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. He was nominated and confirmed to that position in 2018. Prior to that, Judge  Nalbandian was a partner in the litigation practice group of Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP in Cincinnati, where he served as the firm’s lead appellate lawyer and also practiced complex litigation in state and federal courts. Judge Nalbandian was board certified by the Ohio State Bar Association as a specialist in appellate law. Prior to joining Taft, Judge Nalbandian practiced for five years in the appellate section of Jones Day in Washington, DC. Upon graduation from law school, Judge Nalbandian clerked for the Honorable Jerry E. Smith of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in Houston. While in private practice, he also served as a board member of the State Justice Institute, a nonprofit organization established by the federal government to improve the administration of justice in state courts. He served as President of the Cincinnati Lawyers Chapter of the Federalist Society. He has also been involved in his community as a board member of the Greater Cincinnati Minority Counsel Program, and as a board member of the Asian Pacific Bar Association of Southwest Ohio. Judge Nalbandian earned his B.S., magna cum laude, from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and his J.D. from the University of Virginia School of Law, where he was inducted into the Order of the Coif and served as managing editor of the Virginia Law Review.

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Jesse Panuccio

Jesse Panuccio

Partner, Boies Schiller Flexner LLP

Biography

Jesse, the former third-ranking official at the U.S. Department of Justice, helps clients with their most difficult litigation and regulatory issues─whether that means defending against an enforcement action, pursuing high-stakes litigation and appeals, navigating regulatory thickets at federal and state agencies, or crafting a comprehensive strategy to manage a crisis. He approaches these problems with the knowledge gained both from his broad private-practice experience and from having served at the highest levels of federal and state government.

Jesse has experience across a range of substantive and regulatory areas. He has sued the federal government and has also been one of its top law-enforcement officials; he has represented states and has also navigated their regulatory agencies on behalf of clients; and he has represented companies in business disputes, both as defendants and plaintiffs.

Before joining the firm, Jesse was the Acting Associate Attorney General at the United States Department of Justice. In that role, he oversaw the civil and criminal work of the Antitrust, Civil, Civil Rights, Environment and Natural Resources, and Tax Divisions. During Jesse’s tenure, the Associate’s office closely managed the Department’s most significant litigation, including matters involving large financial institutions, healthcare companies, automakers, energy companies, and state and local governments. In addition, Jesse served as Chair of DOJ’s Regulatory Reform Task Force and Vice Chair of DOJ’s Task Force on Market Integrity and Consumer Fraud. Jesse regularly provided legal and strategic advice to the highest-level decision makers in the federal government, including the Attorney General and Deputy Attorney General, general counsels across the spectrum of federal agencies, and White House officials.

Jesse served for three years as the secretary of Florida’s labor, economic-development, and land-use agency, the Florida Department of Economic Opportunity. Before that, he served as Governor (now Senator) Rick Scott’s general counsel.

Jesse maintains offices in both Washington D.C. and Florida. From Washington, he focuses on federal litigation and crisis management. In Florida, in addition to federal litigation, Jesse employs his knowledge of state government and regulation to help clients in courts across the state, from trial through the Florida Supreme Court.

Jesse currently serves on the Florida Supreme Court Judicial Nominating Commission, the body that provides the governor with nominees for appointment to the Florida Supreme Court. Jesse is also a fellow at the Center for the Study of the Administrative State at the Scalia Law School at George Mason University, where he writes and speaks about administrative law.

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Rand Paul

Rand Paul

United States Senator, Kentucky

Biography

U.S. Senator Rand Paul, M.D. was elected to represent Kentucky in the United States Senate in 2010. He serves on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, the Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee, and the Small Business and Entrepreneurship Committee. 

Dr. Paul is the third of five children born to Carol and Ron Paul. He grew up in Lake Jackson, Tex., and attended Baylor University. He graduated from Duke Medical School in 1988. Dr. Paul completed a general surgery internship at Georgia Baptist Medical Center in Atlanta, Ga., and completed his residency in ophthalmology at Duke University Medical Center. Upon completion of his training in 1993, Dr. Paul and Kelley moved to Bowling Green to start their family and begin his ophthalmology practice. Dr. Paul has been married for 25 years to Kelley Ashby Paul of Russellville, Ky., and they have three sons together: William, 22; Duncan, 19; and Robert, 16. 



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John O. Sheller

John O. Sheller

Member, Stoll Keenon Ogden PLLC

Biography

John is a Member in Stoll Keenon Ogden’s Louisville office and has been with the firm since 2007. He has a track record of success in Labor and Employment Law spanning 35 years, and is honored to serve as Chair of the Kentucky State Labor Relations Board, which resolves disputes between public employers and their labor organizations.

He is responsible for creating binding legal precedent entitling employers to secure indemnity from other parties in harassment or retaliation cases. He has also established legal precedent holding that the claim for intentional infliction of emotional distress is preempted by statute. In a class discrimination case, he prevailed in challenging a claim brought by the federal government that women were categorically excluded from coal mining jobs.

For his many accomplishments, John has been distinguished with multiple local, state and national recognitions, including more than eight consecutive years of being listed in the Best Lawyers in America® peer-review publication.

Labor, Employment & Employee Benefits: John’s extensive experience encompasses the full breadth of employment law, including traditional labor law, claims of harassment and retaliation, breach of contract disputes and enforcement of trade secrets.

Appellate: Once a trial court decision has been made, John is fully prepared to take cases to court at the state or federal level as necessary to obtain a satisfactory resolution. He has obtained favorable verdicts for both appellants and appellees.

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Amul R. Thapar

Amul R. Thapar

Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit

Biography

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.

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William Thro

William Thro

General Counsel, University of Kentucky & Former Solicitor General of Virginia, University of Kentucky

Biography

William E. Thro, the General Counsel of the University of Kentucky, is an accomplished university attorney, appellate advocate, and legal scholar.

As the Chief Legal Officer for the University of Kentucky, he provides proactive strategic advice on critical legal and policy issues confronting a public flagship land grant research university with an integrated academic medical center and a high profile athletics program. Before assuming his present position in 2012, he spent more than twenty years representing public universities including eight years as the first in-house counsel at Christopher Newport University.

As Solicitor General of Virginia for four years, he was responsible for the Virginia State Government’s U.S. Supreme Court litigation (except capital cases) as well as lower court appeals involving the constitutionality of statutes or politically sensitive issues. He argued two cases in the U.S. Supreme Court and numerous cases in the lower appellate courts. He co-authored seven U.S. Court merits briefs, eleven U.S. Supreme Court amicus briefs, and more than fifty briefs at the petition stage. He received two Best Brief Awards from the National Association of Attorneys General.

As a legal scholar, he focuses on constitutional law in educational contexts. He has more than sixty publications in law reviews or peer reviewed journals as well as numerous monographs, book chapters, and encyclopedia entries. In recognition of his scholarly work, he received Stetson University’s Kaplin Award for Excellence in Higher Education Law & Policy Scholarship (2014) and became a Fellow of both the National Education Finance Conference (2012) and the National Association of College and University Attorneys (2007).

He has served as President of the Education Law Association, Chair of the Virginia Bar Association’s Appellate Practice Section, Board Chair for a local Red Cross Chapter, on the Boards of both the National Association of College & University Attorneys and the National Education Finance Academy, and an Elder in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). 

A native of Kentucky, he received his undergraduate degree summa cum laude from Hanover College. In addition to receiving the Crowe Citation as the outstanding male in his class, he was the first Hanover student to become a Harry S. Truman Scholar. He earned a graduate degree with honours from the University of Melbourne while attending as a Rotary Foundation International Ambassadorial Scholar. His law degree is from the University of Virginia where he was a published member of the VIRGINIA LAW REVIEW and research assistant to constitutional law professor A.E. Dick Howard. He began his legal career as a judicial clerk to the late Judge Ronald E. Meredith of the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Kentucky in Louisville.

He is married to the Rev. Dr. Julie Urback Thro and has two children in college (Sandra, Will) and one in high school (Noah).



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Jonathan D. Urick

Jonathan D. Urick

Senior Associate Chief Counsel, U.S. Chamber of Commerce Litigation Center

Biography

Jonathan Urick is senior associate chief counsel at the U.S. Chamber Litigation Center, the litigation arm of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. Urick handles a variety of litigation matters for the Chamber.

Urick rejoined the Chamber after helping launch the national litigation boutique Lehotsky Keller LLP, where he represented large corporations and trade associations as one of the firm’s early partners. He previously served as senior counsel for the Chamber Litigation Center, primarily covering arbitration and class-action issues.

Before his first stint at the Chamber, Urick practiced law at McGuireWoods LLP on the firm’s appeals and issues team. With a diverse commercial-litigation practice focused on appeals and dispositive motions, Urick represented a variety of businesses across federal and state courts.

Urick served as a law clerk at all three levels of the federal judiciary: For Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas of the U.S. Supreme Court, Judge Jeffrey Sutton of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, and Judge Amul Thapar, then a judge on the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky.

Urick graduated Order of the Coif from the University of Virginia School of Law, where he served as Articles Development Editor of the Virginia Law Review. He received his undergraduate degree in economics from the University of Delaware.

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Laurance B. VanMeter

Laurance B. VanMeter

Justice, Supreme Court of Kentucky

Biography

Laurance B. VanMeter was elected to the Kentucky Supreme Court in November 2016 from the 5th Appellate District, comprising Anderson, Bourbon, Boyle, Clark, Fayette, Franklin, Jessamine, Madison, Mercer, Scott, and Woodford Counties. Upon taking office on January 2, 2017, he became just the third Justice to have served at all four levels of Kentucky unified court system. Prior to being elected to the Supreme Court, Justice VanMeter served thirteen years as a Judge of the Kentucky Court of Appeals, having been elected in November 2003, and being re-elected unopposed in 2006 and 2014.

Justice VanMeter currently serves as the chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Kentucky Judicial Form Retirement Systems, having previously served as chairman of that Board for two terms (2012-16), with an intervening term as chairman of the Judicial Retirement Fund Investment Committee (2016-18). Justice VanMeter is the Supreme Court’s liaison to the Kentucky Bar Association’s Continuing Legal Education Commission. He served the Court of Appeals as acting Chief Judge during 2010 and as Chief Judge Pro Tempore from 2007 to 2010, and served as the Court of Appeals’ representative on the Ethics Committee of the Kentucky Judiciary from 2004 to 2012 and as its alternate member on the Kentucky Judicial Conduct Commission from 2012 to 2016. In addition, Justice VanMeter has served on the Probate and Trust Legislative Committee of the Kentucky Bar Association, the Family Court Rules and the Civil Rules Committees of the Kentucky Supreme Court, the Chief Justice’s Fayette County Family Court Task Force, and is a frequent speaker for continuing legal education.

Justice VanMeter was born in 1958 in Lexington, and was raised in Winchester. He received his undergraduate degree with a major in history in 1980 from Vanderbilt University, and his law degree in 1983 from the University of Kentucky College of Law, where he was a member of the Order of the Coif and the Kentucky Law Journal.

Justice VanMeter practiced law with the Lexington firm of Stoll, Keenon & Park from 1983 to 1994, where his practice areas included equine law, business planning and organizations, real estate, taxation, estate planning, trusts and probate. He has been admitted to the bar of the Supreme Court of the United States, and is a member of the Kentucky and Fayette County Bar Associations. From 1994 to 1999, he served as a judge of the Fayette District Court, 22nd District, Division 1. Justice VanMeter was appointed and then elected to the Fayette Circuit Court bench in 1999 on which he served until his election to the Court of Appeals.

Justice VanMeter has been actively involved in a number of community organizations, including Little League Baseball, Lexington Youth Soccer, Boys' and Girls' Clubs of America, Parents’ Place, the University of Kentucky Libraries National Advisory Board, and has served on the vestry of Christ Church Cathedral, on the Vanderbilt University Alumni Board of Directors, and on the Sayre School Board of Trustees. He is a Fellow of the University of Kentucky, a Life Fellow of the Kentucky Bar Foundation, and a Founding Fellow of the Fayette County Bar Foundation. He is a member of Christ Church Cathedral. Justice VanMeter and his late wife, Lucy, are the parents of four children.

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Jeffrey S. Sutton

Jeffrey S. Sutton

Chief Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit

Biography

JEFFREY S. SUTTON is the Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. He has served as Chair of the Federal Judicial Conference Committee on Rules of Practice and Procedure, Chair of the Advisory Committee on Appellate Rules, and Chair of the Supreme Court Fellows Commission. He currently serves as Chair of the Executive Committee of the Judicial Conference of the United States. Since 1993, Chief Judge Sutton has been an adjunct professor at The Ohio State University College of Law, where he teaches seminars on State Constitutional Law, the United States Supreme Court, and Appellate Advocacy. He also teaches a class on State Constitutional Law at Harvard Law School. Among other publications, he is the author of Who Decides? States as Laboratories of Constitutional Experimentation and 51 Imperfect Solutions: States and the Making of American Constitutional Law. He is the co-author of a casebook, State Constitutional Law: The Modern Experience, as well as The Law of Judicial Precedent. He is also the co-editor of The Essential Scalia: On the Constitution, the Courts, and the Rule of Law. In 2006, Chief Judge Sutton was elected to the American Law Institute, and in 2017 he was elected to its Council.

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