Partner, Briscoe Prows Kao Ivester & Bazel LLP
Tony Francois is experienced in Water and Real Property Law, Land Use and Zoning, Environmental Regulation, Natural Resources Development, Agricultural Law, and Constitutional Law. He has represented homeowners, builders, farmers and ranchers, trade associations, and water districts in administrative, civil, and criminal proceedings before state and federal administrative agencies and state and federal trial and appellate courts. He is a member of the California State Bar and the Northern, Eastern, and Central Districts of California and the Districts of New Mexico and North Dakota, and has litigated cases in federal courts in California, Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, North and South Dakota, Minnesota, Massachusetts, Maryland, South Carolina, and the District of Columbia, as well as the Sixth, Eighth, Ninth, and Tenth Circuit Courts of Appeals. He has appeared before the Supreme Courts of California, Idaho, Nevada, and the United States.
Prior to attending law school, he served as an infantry officer in the United States Army, and was stationed in the former West Germany during the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Tony was an Attorney at Pacific Legal Foundation from 2012 to 2021. He was a lobbyist for 10 years, first with California Farm Bureau Federation from 2003 to 2007, and then with KP Public Affairs from 2007 to 2012. He was an attorney at McQuaid, Bedford & Van Zandt in San Francisco from 1999 – 2003.
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.
Vice President of Law & Policy, Property and Environment Research Center
Jonathan Wood is vice president of law and policy at the Property and Environment Research Center (PERC). An attorney, Jonathan has litigated environmental and property-rights cases in the Supreme Court of the United States, federal and state appellate courts, and trial courts across the country. His writing has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, National Review, Reason, and other outlets. And his research has been published in journals such as Environmental Law Reporter, Yale Journal on Regulation Notice & Comment, Pace Environmental Law Review, and California Western Law Review.
Prior to coming to PERC, Jonathan was a senior attorney at Pacific Legal Foundation, where he litigated cases concerning the Endangered Species Act, Clean Water Act, and other federal environmental laws. He was co-counsel for forest landowners in Weyerhaeuser Co. v. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, in which the Supreme Court ruled unanimously that private land could not be arbitrarily regulated as critical habitat under the ESA. He also led a successful effort to reform regulation of threatened species to better align the incentives of private landowners with the interests of rare species.
Jonathan has testified before several congressional committees on wildlife conservation and endangered species topics. He has also appeared on national television and radio, including NPR’s All Things Considered, C-Span’s Washington Journal, Stossel, Fox News, and Hill.TV.
Jonathan has a law degree from the New York University School of Law, a masters degree in economic policy from the London School of Economics, and a bachelor’s degree in economics from the University of Texas. He is on the executive committee for the Federalist Society’s Environmental Law and Property Rights Practice Group and a steering committee member for the Environmental Law Institute’s Emerging Leaders Initiative.
Director, ENRD, Pacific Legal Foundation
Mark Miller is the Director of the Environment and Natural Resources practice group at Pacific Legal Foundation, where he leads the firm’s efforts to protect individuals and small businesses from government overreach in matters involving land and water, and its efforts to encourage America to better harness its abundant natural resources, including energy resources, minerals, timber, and grazing lands. Mark first joined PLF in 2014.
A seasoned appellate specialist, Mark has litigated several high-profile cases for PLF, including Weyerhaeuser v. United States Fish & Wildlife Service, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers v. Hawkes Co., and United States v. Robertson, all of them unanimous Supreme Court of the United States wins for property owners fighting federal overreach via the Clean Water Act and Endangered Species Act.
In 2020, Mark left PLF to serve as General Counsel and later Chief of Staff for then-South-Dakota Governor Kristi Noem. As Noem’s longest-serving chief of staff, he worked behind the scenes to advance limited government, cut red tape, defend individual rights, and promote free-market principles. In 2023, he returned home to PLF.
A frequent commentator and public speaker, Mark regularly appears in print, on radio and TV, and before legislative committees across the country. His commentary and work has been featured in The Wall Street Journal, CBS News, The View, CBN, and Fox News. He is a regular guest each Thursday morning on SiriusXM’s POTUS channel, offering insight on Supreme Court cases and trends.
Mark earned both his undergraduate and law degrees with honors from the University of Florida. He clerked for U.S. District Judge Henry Lee Adams, Jr., and Florida state appellate Judge Emerson R. Thompson, Jr.—two mentors who deepened his commitment to the Bill of Rights, especially the Fourth, Fifth, and Fourteenth Amendments.
Mark serves on the Board of Trustees for the University of Florida College of Law, and he is a member of the boards of directors for both Americans United for Life, the nation’s oldest pro-life non-profit law firm, and Farm of the Child USA, a nonprofit that supports an orphanage and school for children in need in Honduras called La Finca del Niño.
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.
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