Attorney General of Tennessee
Jonathan Skrmetti was sworn in to an eight-year term as Tennessee’s Attorney General and Reporter on September 1, 2022.
Prior to his current role, General Skrmetti served as Chief Counsel to Governor Bill Lee and as Chief Deputy Attorney General to his predecessor, Tennessee Attorney General Herbert Slatery.
Before working for the State of Tennessee, General Skrmetti was a partner at Butler Snow LLP in Memphis. His legal career began with nearly a decade as a federal prosecutor. He worked at the Civil Rights Division at Main Justice and then at the Memphis U.S. Attorney’s Office and prosecuted sex traffickers, corrupt government officials, and violent white supremacists. In addition, General Skrmetti taught cyberlaw as an adjunct professor at the University of Memphis.
General Skrmetti earned honors degrees from George Washington University, the University of Oxford, and Harvard Law School, where he was editor-in-chief of the Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy. Following law school, Jonathan clerked for Judge Steven Colloton on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit. He lives in Franklin, Tennessee, with his wife and four children.
General Counsel, xAI and X
Associate Professor of Politics, Hillsdale College
Higher education is one of the few remaining environments where human beings can be at leisure to read, think, and study. Hillsdale College is one of the few remaining places in higher education where students are actively encouraged and required to engage in those activities. This opportunity to be at leisure to think about the most fundamental and pressing questions of modern life is precious and transformative.
As a first-year undergraduate at a liberal arts college, my own life was changed over several evenings of reading in the library about the history of the French Revolution. It was in that moment that I realized the importance of the perennial and perplexing questions in which we engage in the liberal arts setting. I switched my major to political science, history, and philosophy, and have never looked back.
In my graduate studies, I focused extensively on political theory, but my current thinking and research are directed to understanding the political institutions that determine how politics works in America. I am especially interested in understanding the modern administrative state, Congress, and political parties. We must grapple with the interaction of these institutions, and how they relate to the basic principles of American constitutionalism, if we want to preserve and restore constitutional government in the United States.
In my teaching, I aim to engage students in a common enterprise, where we think together and discuss fundamental questions. My goal is not to instruct, but to educate students. That requires active and thoughtful engagement rather than passively receiving information. I am blessed to be at a place like Hillsdale where the students are drawn to this model of education and thrive in such an environment.
Distinguished Fellow, Hudson Institute
Christopher DeMuth is a distinguished fellow at Hudson Institute. He was president of the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research (AEI) from 1986 to 2008 and was the D.C. Searle Senior Fellow at AEI from 2008 to 2011.
Mr. DeMuth was raised in Kenilworth, Illinois, and attended the Lawrenceville School (1964), Harvard College (A.B. 1968), and the University of Chicago Law School (J.D. 1973). He served as staff assistant to President Richard M. Nixon from 1969 to 1970, working first for Daniel P. Moynihan (then assistant to the President for Urban Affairs) on urban policy matters and then as chairman of the White House Task Force on Environmental Policy. Following law school, he practiced regulatory, antitrust, and general corporate law with Sidley & Austin in Chicago (1973-1976) and was associate general counsel of the Consolidated Rail Corporation (Conrail) in Philadelphia (1976-1977).
From 1977 to 1981, Mr. DeMuth was lecturer in public policy at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, and director of the Harvard Faculty Project on Regulation. There he taught courses on law, economics, and regulatory policy and conducted and sponsored research on health, safety, environmental, and economic regulation.
Returning to Washington in 1981, Mr. DeMuth served as administrator for information and regulatory affairs in the U.S. Office of Management and Budget, and as executive director of the Presidential Task Force on Regulatory Relief during President Ronald Reagan’s first term of office. From 1984 to 1986, he was managing director of Lexecon Inc., a law-and-economics consulting firm; in 1986, he was also publisher and editor-in-chief of Regulation magazine. He was elected president of the American Enterprise Institute in December 1986.
Many of Mr. DeMuth’s articles, lectures, and occasional talks are posted on his website (https://www.ccdemuth.com).
Vice President, Networks, The Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies
Nathan Kaczmarek is Vice President for Networks at the Federalist Society. He began his legal career in Detroit representing nationwide clients in all phases of healthcare litigation and complex medical malpractice claims. He has since served as a Senior Legal and Policy Advisor in the U.S. House of Representatives and as Counsel for the Subcommittee on Regulatory Affairs and Federal Management in the U.S. Senate. Prior to overseeing the Networks, he was Director of the Practice Groups, the Regulatory Transparency Project, and the Article I Initiative for the Federalist Society.
Nathan holds degrees from Hillsdale College and Thomas M. Cooley Law School. He is a Liaison Representative for The Administrative Conference of the United States. He also serves as Vice President of the Associates of St. John Bosco, a Virginia based non-profit dedicated to Catholic high school and college students.
Open Minds with Hon. Jonathan Skrmetti & James Burnham
Jonathan Skrmetti, James M. Burnham
Jonathan Skrmetti, Attorney General of Tennessee, joins James Burnham to discuss the ways his educational...
Bureaucracy in America
Joseph Postell
Administrative agencies, and extensive regulation of the economy, have always existed in America. But from...
Necessary & Proper Episode 3: Congress and the Dilemma of Fiscal Restraint
Christopher C. DeMuth, Nathan Kaczmarek
Christopher DeMuth, Distinguished Fellow at the Hudson Institute, discusses the current state of the 115th Congress...