Senior Appellate Counsel, U.S. Navy
Stephanie Fisher recently completed six years as an active-duty Navy Judge Advocate and now serves in the Reserves. She will begin as a Trial Attorney in the Department of Justice’s National Security Division, Counterintelligence and Export Control Section, this summer (2026).
As a Judge Advocate, Stephanie served in numerous roles, including Senior Appellate Government Counsel, Legal Advisor to the Convening Authority for Military Commissions, Adjunct Professor of Law at the United States Naval Academy, and Trial Defense Counsel. She also completed temporary duty assignments with Naval Special Warfare Group 4, Submarine Squadron 6, and Commander, Navy Region Mid-Atlantic.
In her most recent role as Senior Appellate Government Counsel, she briefed and argued cases before the Navy-Marine Corps Court of Criminal Appeals and the Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces, where the courts affirmed more than 95% of the convictions she defended.
Before joining the JAG Corps, Stephanie clerked on the Arizona Supreme Court for the Honorable Justice William Montgomery. She earned her J.D. from Arizona State University’s Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law, where she served as a two-time Vice President of the Federalist Society student chapter. She earned her dual bachelor’s degree from the University of Michigan, where she was a four-year member of the varsity cheerleading team.
Stephanie currently serves on the DC Young Lawyer Chapter Board and the Armed Services Legal Network Executive Committee. In her free time, she enjoys skydiving, weightlifting, hiking, and traveling.
Deputy General Counsel, Office of the General Counsel, National Guard Bureau
Colonel Michael Mark Majors serves as Deputy General Counsel for the Office of the General Counsel, National Guard Bureau, with more than 27 years of military legal experience advising senior military leaders and government officials on military justice, administrative law, operational law, national security, and strategic policy. Throughout his career, he has served as a trusted legal advisor on complex issues spanning governance, risk management, compliance, homeland defense, and military operations.
As Deputy General Counsel, Colonel Majors advises senior National Guard leadership on legal and policy matters affecting more than 430,000 Soldiers and Airmen serving across the 54 states, territories, and the District of Columbia. In his primary role as Chief of the Strategic Engagement Division, he directs nationwide military legal professional development, accessions, and strategic engagement for more than 1,100 National Guard Judge Advocates and Legal Advisors. He develops and teaches National Guard legal education programs, authoring policy and regulatory guidance, and works closely with the Judge Advocate General's Corps, State Judge Advocates, and military legal organizations to strengthen legal readiness throughout the National Guard.
Colonel Majors has deployed in support of multinational operations in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Iraq, Bahrain, and Kosovo. His operational assignments include serving as Chief Deputy Legal Advisor for the NATO-led Kosovo Force (KFOR), advising senior commanders on the law of armed conflict, rules of engagement, international agreements, fiscal law, claims, and operational legal issues during a period of heightened regional instability following Russia's expanded invasion of Ukraine.
Colonel Majors is currently pursuing a Master of Laws (LL.M.) in Air and Space Law at the University of Mississippi School of Law, with a concentration in national security, space operations, commercial remote sensing, and international space law. He holds Master of Arts degrees in Defense and Strategic Studies from both the U.S. Army War College and the U.S. Naval War College, a Juris Doctor from Mississippi College School of Law, and a Bachelor of Science in Public Administration from Samford University.
He is admitted to practice law in the District of Columbia, Mississippi, and Alabama, as well as before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces and multiple federal courts. Colonel Majors serves on the Board of Directors of the Judge Advocate Association, is a Fellow of the Mississippi Bar, and is a frequent lecturer on military law, national security law, operational law, leadership, and emerging issues in air and space law. His military decorations include the Legion of Merit, the Defense Meritorious Service Medal (two awards), the Meritorious Service Medal (four awards), and the Combat Action Badge.
Director, International Legal Studies Program, Vanderbilt Law School
Michael Newton is an expert on terrorism, accountability, transnational justice, and conduct of hostilities issues. Over the course of his career, he has published more than 90 books, articles, op-eds and book chapters. He has been an expert witness in terrorism related trials and is admitted to the counsel list of the International Criminal Court, where, in 2018, he helped prepare the appeal of Jean-Pierre Bemba and participated in oral arguments in the Appeals Chamber. At Vanderbilt, he developed and teaches the innovative International Law Practice Lab, which provides expert assistance to judges, lawyers, legislatures, governments, and policy makers around the world. Professor Newton is most recently the editor of The United States Department of Defense Law of War Manual: Commentary and Critique, forthcoming from Cambridge University Press.
An authority on the law of armed conflict, Professor Newton served as the senior adviser to the Ambassador-at-Large for War Crimes Issues in the U.S. State Department from January 1999 to August 2002, during which he implemented a wide range of policy positions, including U.S. support to accountability mechanisms worldwide. He negotiated the “Elements of Crimes” for the International Criminal Court, and was the senior member of the team teaching international law to the first group of Iraqis who began to think about accountability mechanisms and a constitutional structure in November 2000. He shuttled to Baghdad repeatedly to aid international and Iraqi lawyers and jurists in drafting the Statute of the Iraqi High Tribunal while serving as the International Law Adviser to the Judicial Chambers from 2006 to 2008. He began assisting Iraqi officials, victims and civil society groups on legal issues associated with documentation and investigation of crimes committed by Da’esh on Iraqi soil days after Yazidi victims fled towards Mount Sinjar. He was the U.S. representative on the U.N. Planning Mission for the Sierra Leone Special Court and a founding member of its academic consortium. He is an elected member of the International Institute of Humanitarian Law and on the expert roster of Justice Rapid Response. In addition to teaching the Practice Lab, he develops and coordinates externships and educational opportunities for students interested in international legal issues, having supervised more than 150 such opportunities.
Professor Newton has served on the executive council of the American Society of International Law and as an invited expert for the Genocide Prevention Task Force established by the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum and the U.S. Institute of Peace. He is currently on the Advisory Board of the ABA International Criminal Court Project.
Professor Newton served in the U.S. Army more than 21 years, beginning with his commission from the U.S. Military Academy in May 1984 as an armor officer in the 4th Battalion, 68th Armor at Fort Carson, Colorado. After his selection for the Funded Legal Education Program, Newton served as chief of operational law with the Army Special Forces Command (Airborne) during Operation Desert Storm, and as the group judge advocate for the 7th Special Forces Group (Airborne). His deployments include Northern Iraq on Operation Provide Comfort to assist Kurdish civilians, and Haiti with 194th Armored Brigade (Separate), where he organized and led human rights and rules of engagement education for multinational forces, including police. He has taught international and operational law at the Judge Advocate General's School and Center in Charlottesville, Virginia, and taught international law at the United States Military Academy at West Point.
Founder and Principal, Fillmore Global Strategies LLC
Ambassador Nathan A. Sales is the founder and principal of Fillmore Global Strategies LLC, a consultancy that provides legal and strategic advisory services on matters at the intersection of law, policy, and diplomacy.
From 2017 to 2021, Ambassador Sales served at the U.S. Department of State as Under Secretary for Civilian Security, Democracy, and Human Rights (acting). He oversaw nine bureaus and offices led by Senate-confirmed principals, with 1,300 employees and a combined foreign assistance budget of more than $5 billion annually, and the mission of preventing and countering threats to civilian security, including terrorism, mass atrocities, and violations of human rights and the rule of law.
Concurrently, Ambassador Sales was Ambassador-at-Large and Coordinator for Counterterrorism. After being nominated by the President and unanimously confirmed by the U.S. Senate, he was sworn in on August 10, 2017. He served as the principal adviser to the Secretary of State on international counterterrorism matters, and led the State Department’s Counterterrorism Bureau, a 200-person team with an annual foreign assistance budget of $400 million. He was also the Special Presidential Envoy to the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS, leading U.S. relations with the 83-member Coalition and efforts to ensure the lasting defeat of ISIS in the Middle East and around the world.
While at the State Department, Ambassador Sales led the elements of the U.S. government’s China strategy promoting democratic values and human rights, including with respect to Hong Kong and Xinjiang. He oversaw the development and implementation of a wide range of U.S. government sanctions, including Global Magnitsky actions and Executive Order 13,936, targeting those responsible for undermining Hong Kong’s freedoms and autonomy. Ambassador Sales was the architect of the landmark 2017 UN Security Council Resolution 2396 on terrorist travel, and successfully pressed NATO to make counterterrorism a core Alliance mission. He led diplomatic engagements to persuade a dozen key partners in Europe and the Americas to designate Hizballah as a terrorist organization in its entirety. He launched the Western Hemisphere Counterterrorism Ministerial, in which heads of state and minister-level officials meet bianually to coordinate efforts against terrorist threats in the region. He led the U.S. government’s international efforts to combat white supremacist terrorism. Under his leadership, the State Department imposed terrorism sanctions on the Russian Imperial Movement – the first-ever U.S. designation of white supremacist terrorists.
Before joining the State Department, Ambassador Sales was Of Counsel at the law firm Kirkland & Ellis LLP (formerly Bancroft PLLC). He was also a tenured law professor, teaching and writing in the fields of administrative law, constitutional law, and national security law. His scholarship has been cited by the U.S. Supreme Court multiple times.
Ambassador Sales previously was Deputy Assistant Secretary for Policy at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. He led DHS’s efforts to draft and implement legislation that strengthened the security of and expanded the Visa Waiver Program (which allows citizens of certain countries to travel to the United States without a visa). He headed the U.S. delegation in talks with seven countries to implement the new security measures and was the Secretary of Homeland Security’s Special Envoy to South Korea.
Ambassador Sales also served at the Office of Legal Policy at the U.S. Department of Justice, where he worked on regulatory initiatives, counterterrorism, and judicial confirmations. In 2005, he managed DOJ’s “war room” for the confirmation of Chief Justice John Roberts. He received the Attorney General’s Award for Exceptional Service – the Justice Department’s highest honor – for his role in drafting the USA PATRIOT Act, as well as the Attorney General’s Distinguished Service Award for his work on judicial confirmations.
In addition to his work at Fillmore Global Strategies, Ambassador Sales is a nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council and a senior advisor at the Soufan Group, a global intelligence and security consultancy. He serves on a number of advisory boards, including for the Counter-Extremism Project (a nonprofit and nonpartisan international policy organization formed to combat the growing threat from extremist ideologies), the Secure Community Network (the official safety and security organization for the North American Jewish community), and the Sue J. Henry Center for Pre-Law Education at Miami University.
An Ohio native, Ambassador Sales received his B.A., summa cum laude, from Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, where he was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. He earned his J.D., magna cum laude, from Duke Law School, where he was Research Editor of the Duke Law Journal and joined the Order of the Coif. After law school, he clerked for the Honorable David B. Sentelle of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit.
Senior Legal Fellow and Manager, National Security Law Program, The Heritage Foundation
Charles “Cully” Stimson is a widely recognized expert in national security, homeland security, crime control, drug policy and immigration. A senior legal fellow at The Heritage Foundation since 2007, Stimson became Manager of the National Security Law Program in Heritage’s Institute for Constitutional Government in April 2013 after serving as Heritage’s chief of staff for a year.
Stimson writes and lectures on policy issues such as the law of armed conflict, terrorist detainee policy and interrogations, the Geneva Conventions, military commissions, the Patriot Act and FISA, criminal law and the death penalty, immigration and the war on drugs. As chief of staff to then-Heritage President Edwin J. Feulner, he was a key adviser on public policy matters as well as manager of Feulner’s office staff and Heritage’s day-to-day operations.
Stimson’s many research papers, op-eds and articles include special reports such as “Adult Time for Adult Crime,” a comprehensive study on the constitutionality of life sentences for teen-age murderers, and Sexual Assault in the Military: Understanding the Problem and How to Fix It, a ground-breaking paper detailing the inner workings of the military justice system compared to its civilian counterpart. His work on criminal and immigration law has been cited in briefs before the U.S. Supreme Court.
He testifies before the U.S. Senate and House on national security issues, and recently testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee on the Law of Armed Conflict, Law of War, and the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force.
Before joining the think tank in 2007, Stimson served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Detainee Affairs. He advised then-Secretaries of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and Robert Gates and coordinated the Pentagon’s global detention policy and operations, including at Guantanamo Bay and in Iraq and Afghanistan. He was chairman of detainee-related panels such as the Defense Senior Leadership Oversight Committee, and the Special Detainee Follow Up Group. He represented the United States before the U.N. in Geneva, Switzerland in May 2006 where he led the DOD delegation in defense of the United States’ Second Period Report on the Convention Against Torture.
An accomplished trial lawyer, Stimson worked as a prosecutor at the local, state and federal levels, where he concentrated on violent crimes such as homicide, sexual assault and domestic violence. A third generation naval officer, Cully also served as a military prosecutor, defense counsel, and recently served as Deputy Chief Judge of the Navy-Marine Corps Trial Judiciary. He continues to serve, with the rank of Captain, as the Commanding Officer of the Preliminary Hearing Unit.
Stimson’s thousands of media interviews and appearances include Fox News Channel, MSNBC, CNN, BBC, NPR and C-SPAN. He has been quoted by most major newspapers, including The Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and London Times.
A businessman and educator by training, Stimson is Vice Chairman of his family’s commercial real estate company in Seattle. Before 9/11, he was a Vice President at a New York-based global financial services and insurance brokerage firm where ran the private equity mergers and acquisitions D.C. operation.
Stimson holds a law degree from the George Mason University School of Law, where he later taught as an Adjunct Professor of Law. He is a graduate of Kenyon College, where he was Captain of the men’s varsity soccer team and an All-Conference player. He also studied at Harvard and Exeter universities. An avid soccer player and triathlete, he serves as Chairman of the Board of the United States Soccer Foundation, the charitable giving arm of U.S. Soccer.
Provost & Chief Academic Officer, Bryant University
An acclaimed international law and national security expert experienced in academic, law, and government service settings, Provost Glenn M. Sulmasy brings a distinguished record of Higher Education leadership and academic achievement to his position as Bryant’s first university Provost and Chief Academic Officer.
Sulmasy previously served as Deputy University Counsel and later led the Humanities Department at the United States Coast Guard Academy (USCGA), in New London, CT. Additionally, he served as Professor of Law at USCGA and has been involved in higher education since 1997.
In addition to serving on the faculties of the Academy and the U.S. Naval War College, Sulmasy has lectured in the fields of International Law, U.S. Constitutional Law, and National Security at numerous universities and think tanks. He has also served as a National Security and Human Rights Fellow at the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School.
A former fellow in Homeland Security and National Security Law for the Center for National Policy in Washington D.C., Sulmasy lectures extensively on the law of armed conflict, international law, and national security matters. He is widely published internationally on national security matters, and as an expert has been featured in the LA Times, on CBS News Radio, National Public Radio, CNN International, US News & World Report, the New York Times and the San Francisco Chronicle, Al-Jazeera America, MSNBC, Fox News and numerous other national media outlets. He is the author of The National Security Court System – A Natural Evolution of Justice in an Age of Terror (Oxford University Press) and Co-Editor of International Law Challenges – Homeland Security and Combating Terrorism (2005).
Sulmasy was educated at the U.S. Coast Guard Academy, University of Baltimore School of Law (cum laude), UC Berkeley School of Law (Boalt Hall) and the Harvard Kennedy School.
Provost Sulmasy, his wife Marla, and seven children hail from Old Lyme, CT and Smithfield, RI.
Fellow, National Security Institute, Antonin Scalia Law School, George Mason University
Vince Vitkowsky chaired the Executive Committee of the Federalist Society’s International and National Security Law and Policy Practice Group for over a decade. He is also a Fellow at the National Security Institute of George Mason University Law School. Vince spent 45 years in private practice, primarily in AmLaw 100/200 firms and their spin-offs. His practice included domestic and international commercial arbitration and litigation, as well as cyber risks and liabilities. Vince's current focus is on national security policy, artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, and counterterrorism. He has often written and spoken on national security and other public policy issues. Among other affiliations, Vince has been an Adjunct Fellow at the Center for Law and Counterterrorism of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, a member of the Executive Committee of the American Branch of the International Law Association, and Co-Chair of the Committee on Interventions and Trial Observations of the International Bar Association’s Human Rights Institute. He received his B.A. from Northwestern University and his J.D. from Cornell Law School.
Agnes Williams Sesquicentennial Professor of Federal Courts, Georgetown Law
Stephen I. Vladeck is a professor of law at the Georgetown University Law Center, and is a nationally recognized expert on the federal courts; the Supreme Court; national security law; and military justice.
Vladeck is author of the New York Times bestselling book, “The Shadow Docket: How the Supreme Court Uses Stealth Rulings to Amass Power and Undermine the Republic,” which won the 2023 Writers’ League of Texas Book Award for Non-Fiction and was a finalist for the 2024 ABA Silver Gavel Award for Media and the Arts. Vladeck is also a highly regarded appellate advocate, having argued three cases before the U.S. Supreme Court and over a dozen before various lower federal civilian and military courts. He has received numerous awards for his influential and widely cited legal scholarship, his prolific popular writing, his teaching, and his service to the legal profession—including the 2024 University of Texas President’s Research Impact Award and his selection by the Order of the Coif to serve as its Distinguished Visiting Professor for 2025.
Vladeck is CNN’s Supreme Court analyst and editor and author of “One First,” a popular weekly newsletter about the Supreme Court. Together with Bobby Chesney, Vladeck co-hosts the popular and award-winning “National Security Law Podcast.” He is also a co-author of Aspen Publishers’ leading national security law and counterterrorism law casebooks. And he is a member of the Board of Trustees of EarthJustice—the nation’s premier nonprofit public interest environmental law organization.
Vladeck graduated from Yale Law School in 2004—where he was executive editor of the Yale Law Journal and won the Harlan Fiske Stone Prize for outstanding moot court oralist and shared the Potter Stewart Prize for best moot court team performance. After law school, he clerked for the Honorable Marsha S. Berzon on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and the Honorable Rosemary Barkett on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. He earned a B.A. summa cum laude with Highest Distinction in History and Mathematics from Amherst College in 2001—where he wrote his senior thesis on “Leipzig’s Shadow: The War Crimes Trials of the First World War and Their Implications from Nuremberg to the Present.” A native New Yorker and hopeless Mets fan, Vladeck lives in the District with his wife, Karen (Founder and Managing Partner of Risepoint Search Partners); their daughters, Madeleine and Sydney; and their eleven-year-old pug, Roxanna.
Senior Fellow, Governance Studies, The Brookings Institution
Benjamin Wittes is a senior fellow in Governance Studies at The Brookings Institution. He co-founded and is the editor-in-chief of the Lawfare blog, which is devoted to sober and serious discussion of "Hard National Security Choices," and is a member of the Hoover Institution's Task Force on National Security and Law. He is the author of Detention and Denial: The Case for Candor After Guantanamo, published in November 2011, co-editor of Constitution 3.0: Freedom and Technological Change, published in December 2011, and editor of Campaign 2012: Twelve Independent Ideas for Improving American Public Policy (Brookings Institution Press, May 2012). He is also writing a book on data and technology proliferation and their implications for security. He is the author of Law and the Long War: The Future of Justice in the Age of Terror, published in June 2008 by The Penguin Press, and the editor of the 2009 Brookings book, Legislating the War on Terror: An Agenda for Reform.
His previous books include Starr: A Reassessment, published in 2002 by Yale University Press, and Confirmation Wars: Preserving Independent Courts in Angry Times, published in 2006 by Rowman & Littlefield and the Hoover Institution.
Between 1997 and 2006, he served as an editorial writer for The Washington Post specializing in legal affairs. Before joining the editorial page staff of The Washington Post, Wittes covered the Justice Department and federal regulatory agencies as a reporter and news editor at Legal Times. His writing has also appeared in a wide range of journals and magazines including The Atlantic, Slate, The New Republic, The Wilson Quarterly, The Weekly Standard, Policy Review, and First Things.
Benjamin Wittes was born in Boston, Massachusetts. He graduated from Oberlin College in 1990, and he has a black belt in taekwondo.
Founder and Principal, Fillmore Global Strategies LLC
Ambassador Nathan A. Sales is the founder and principal of Fillmore Global Strategies LLC, a consultancy that provides legal and strategic advisory services on matters at the intersection of law, policy, and diplomacy.
From 2017 to 2021, Ambassador Sales served at the U.S. Department of State as Under Secretary for Civilian Security, Democracy, and Human Rights (acting). He oversaw nine bureaus and offices led by Senate-confirmed principals, with 1,300 employees and a combined foreign assistance budget of more than $5 billion annually, and the mission of preventing and countering threats to civilian security, including terrorism, mass atrocities, and violations of human rights and the rule of law.
Concurrently, Ambassador Sales was Ambassador-at-Large and Coordinator for Counterterrorism. After being nominated by the President and unanimously confirmed by the U.S. Senate, he was sworn in on August 10, 2017. He served as the principal adviser to the Secretary of State on international counterterrorism matters, and led the State Department’s Counterterrorism Bureau, a 200-person team with an annual foreign assistance budget of $400 million. He was also the Special Presidential Envoy to the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS, leading U.S. relations with the 83-member Coalition and efforts to ensure the lasting defeat of ISIS in the Middle East and around the world.
While at the State Department, Ambassador Sales led the elements of the U.S. government’s China strategy promoting democratic values and human rights, including with respect to Hong Kong and Xinjiang. He oversaw the development and implementation of a wide range of U.S. government sanctions, including Global Magnitsky actions and Executive Order 13,936, targeting those responsible for undermining Hong Kong’s freedoms and autonomy. Ambassador Sales was the architect of the landmark 2017 UN Security Council Resolution 2396 on terrorist travel, and successfully pressed NATO to make counterterrorism a core Alliance mission. He led diplomatic engagements to persuade a dozen key partners in Europe and the Americas to designate Hizballah as a terrorist organization in its entirety. He launched the Western Hemisphere Counterterrorism Ministerial, in which heads of state and minister-level officials meet bianually to coordinate efforts against terrorist threats in the region. He led the U.S. government’s international efforts to combat white supremacist terrorism. Under his leadership, the State Department imposed terrorism sanctions on the Russian Imperial Movement – the first-ever U.S. designation of white supremacist terrorists.
Before joining the State Department, Ambassador Sales was Of Counsel at the law firm Kirkland & Ellis LLP (formerly Bancroft PLLC). He was also a tenured law professor, teaching and writing in the fields of administrative law, constitutional law, and national security law. His scholarship has been cited by the U.S. Supreme Court multiple times.
Ambassador Sales previously was Deputy Assistant Secretary for Policy at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. He led DHS’s efforts to draft and implement legislation that strengthened the security of and expanded the Visa Waiver Program (which allows citizens of certain countries to travel to the United States without a visa). He headed the U.S. delegation in talks with seven countries to implement the new security measures and was the Secretary of Homeland Security’s Special Envoy to South Korea.
Ambassador Sales also served at the Office of Legal Policy at the U.S. Department of Justice, where he worked on regulatory initiatives, counterterrorism, and judicial confirmations. In 2005, he managed DOJ’s “war room” for the confirmation of Chief Justice John Roberts. He received the Attorney General’s Award for Exceptional Service – the Justice Department’s highest honor – for his role in drafting the USA PATRIOT Act, as well as the Attorney General’s Distinguished Service Award for his work on judicial confirmations.
In addition to his work at Fillmore Global Strategies, Ambassador Sales is a nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council and a senior advisor at the Soufan Group, a global intelligence and security consultancy. He serves on a number of advisory boards, including for the Counter-Extremism Project (a nonprofit and nonpartisan international policy organization formed to combat the growing threat from extremist ideologies), the Secure Community Network (the official safety and security organization for the North American Jewish community), and the Sue J. Henry Center for Pre-Law Education at Miami University.
An Ohio native, Ambassador Sales received his B.A., summa cum laude, from Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, where he was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. He earned his J.D., magna cum laude, from Duke Law School, where he was Research Editor of the Duke Law Journal and joined the Order of the Coif. After law school, he clerked for the Honorable David B. Sentelle of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit.
Senior Legal Fellow and Manager, National Security Law Program, The Heritage Foundation
Charles “Cully” Stimson is a widely recognized expert in national security, homeland security, crime control, drug policy and immigration. A senior legal fellow at The Heritage Foundation since 2007, Stimson became Manager of the National Security Law Program in Heritage’s Institute for Constitutional Government in April 2013 after serving as Heritage’s chief of staff for a year.
Stimson writes and lectures on policy issues such as the law of armed conflict, terrorist detainee policy and interrogations, the Geneva Conventions, military commissions, the Patriot Act and FISA, criminal law and the death penalty, immigration and the war on drugs. As chief of staff to then-Heritage President Edwin J. Feulner, he was a key adviser on public policy matters as well as manager of Feulner’s office staff and Heritage’s day-to-day operations.
Stimson’s many research papers, op-eds and articles include special reports such as “Adult Time for Adult Crime,” a comprehensive study on the constitutionality of life sentences for teen-age murderers, and Sexual Assault in the Military: Understanding the Problem and How to Fix It, a ground-breaking paper detailing the inner workings of the military justice system compared to its civilian counterpart. His work on criminal and immigration law has been cited in briefs before the U.S. Supreme Court.
He testifies before the U.S. Senate and House on national security issues, and recently testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee on the Law of Armed Conflict, Law of War, and the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force.
Before joining the think tank in 2007, Stimson served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Detainee Affairs. He advised then-Secretaries of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and Robert Gates and coordinated the Pentagon’s global detention policy and operations, including at Guantanamo Bay and in Iraq and Afghanistan. He was chairman of detainee-related panels such as the Defense Senior Leadership Oversight Committee, and the Special Detainee Follow Up Group. He represented the United States before the U.N. in Geneva, Switzerland in May 2006 where he led the DOD delegation in defense of the United States’ Second Period Report on the Convention Against Torture.
An accomplished trial lawyer, Stimson worked as a prosecutor at the local, state and federal levels, where he concentrated on violent crimes such as homicide, sexual assault and domestic violence. A third generation naval officer, Cully also served as a military prosecutor, defense counsel, and recently served as Deputy Chief Judge of the Navy-Marine Corps Trial Judiciary. He continues to serve, with the rank of Captain, as the Commanding Officer of the Preliminary Hearing Unit.
Stimson’s thousands of media interviews and appearances include Fox News Channel, MSNBC, CNN, BBC, NPR and C-SPAN. He has been quoted by most major newspapers, including The Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and London Times.
A businessman and educator by training, Stimson is Vice Chairman of his family’s commercial real estate company in Seattle. Before 9/11, he was a Vice President at a New York-based global financial services and insurance brokerage firm where ran the private equity mergers and acquisitions D.C. operation.
Stimson holds a law degree from the George Mason University School of Law, where he later taught as an Adjunct Professor of Law. He is a graduate of Kenyon College, where he was Captain of the men’s varsity soccer team and an All-Conference player. He also studied at Harvard and Exeter universities. An avid soccer player and triathlete, he serves as Chairman of the Board of the United States Soccer Foundation, the charitable giving arm of U.S. Soccer.
Provost & Chief Academic Officer, Bryant University
An acclaimed international law and national security expert experienced in academic, law, and government service settings, Provost Glenn M. Sulmasy brings a distinguished record of Higher Education leadership and academic achievement to his position as Bryant’s first university Provost and Chief Academic Officer.
Sulmasy previously served as Deputy University Counsel and later led the Humanities Department at the United States Coast Guard Academy (USCGA), in New London, CT. Additionally, he served as Professor of Law at USCGA and has been involved in higher education since 1997.
In addition to serving on the faculties of the Academy and the U.S. Naval War College, Sulmasy has lectured in the fields of International Law, U.S. Constitutional Law, and National Security at numerous universities and think tanks. He has also served as a National Security and Human Rights Fellow at the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School.
A former fellow in Homeland Security and National Security Law for the Center for National Policy in Washington D.C., Sulmasy lectures extensively on the law of armed conflict, international law, and national security matters. He is widely published internationally on national security matters, and as an expert has been featured in the LA Times, on CBS News Radio, National Public Radio, CNN International, US News & World Report, the New York Times and the San Francisco Chronicle, Al-Jazeera America, MSNBC, Fox News and numerous other national media outlets. He is the author of The National Security Court System – A Natural Evolution of Justice in an Age of Terror (Oxford University Press) and Co-Editor of International Law Challenges – Homeland Security and Combating Terrorism (2005).
Sulmasy was educated at the U.S. Coast Guard Academy, University of Baltimore School of Law (cum laude), UC Berkeley School of Law (Boalt Hall) and the Harvard Kennedy School.
Provost Sulmasy, his wife Marla, and seven children hail from Old Lyme, CT and Smithfield, RI.
Fellow, National Security Institute, Antonin Scalia Law School, George Mason University
Vince Vitkowsky chaired the Executive Committee of the Federalist Society’s International and National Security Law and Policy Practice Group for over a decade. He is also a Fellow at the National Security Institute of George Mason University Law School. Vince spent 45 years in private practice, primarily in AmLaw 100/200 firms and their spin-offs. His practice included domestic and international commercial arbitration and litigation, as well as cyber risks and liabilities. Vince's current focus is on national security policy, artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, and counterterrorism. He has often written and spoken on national security and other public policy issues. Among other affiliations, Vince has been an Adjunct Fellow at the Center for Law and Counterterrorism of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, a member of the Executive Committee of the American Branch of the International Law Association, and Co-Chair of the Committee on Interventions and Trial Observations of the International Bar Association’s Human Rights Institute. He received his B.A. from Northwestern University and his J.D. from Cornell Law School.
Agnes Williams Sesquicentennial Professor of Federal Courts, Georgetown Law
Stephen I. Vladeck is a professor of law at the Georgetown University Law Center, and is a nationally recognized expert on the federal courts; the Supreme Court; national security law; and military justice.
Vladeck is author of the New York Times bestselling book, “The Shadow Docket: How the Supreme Court Uses Stealth Rulings to Amass Power and Undermine the Republic,” which won the 2023 Writers’ League of Texas Book Award for Non-Fiction and was a finalist for the 2024 ABA Silver Gavel Award for Media and the Arts. Vladeck is also a highly regarded appellate advocate, having argued three cases before the U.S. Supreme Court and over a dozen before various lower federal civilian and military courts. He has received numerous awards for his influential and widely cited legal scholarship, his prolific popular writing, his teaching, and his service to the legal profession—including the 2024 University of Texas President’s Research Impact Award and his selection by the Order of the Coif to serve as its Distinguished Visiting Professor for 2025.
Vladeck is CNN’s Supreme Court analyst and editor and author of “One First,” a popular weekly newsletter about the Supreme Court. Together with Bobby Chesney, Vladeck co-hosts the popular and award-winning “National Security Law Podcast.” He is also a co-author of Aspen Publishers’ leading national security law and counterterrorism law casebooks. And he is a member of the Board of Trustees of EarthJustice—the nation’s premier nonprofit public interest environmental law organization.
Vladeck graduated from Yale Law School in 2004—where he was executive editor of the Yale Law Journal and won the Harlan Fiske Stone Prize for outstanding moot court oralist and shared the Potter Stewart Prize for best moot court team performance. After law school, he clerked for the Honorable Marsha S. Berzon on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and the Honorable Rosemary Barkett on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. He earned a B.A. summa cum laude with Highest Distinction in History and Mathematics from Amherst College in 2001—where he wrote his senior thesis on “Leipzig’s Shadow: The War Crimes Trials of the First World War and Their Implications from Nuremberg to the Present.” A native New Yorker and hopeless Mets fan, Vladeck lives in the District with his wife, Karen (Founder and Managing Partner of Risepoint Search Partners); their daughters, Madeleine and Sydney; and their eleven-year-old pug, Roxanna.
Senior Fellow, Governance Studies, The Brookings Institution
Benjamin Wittes is a senior fellow in Governance Studies at The Brookings Institution. He co-founded and is the editor-in-chief of the Lawfare blog, which is devoted to sober and serious discussion of "Hard National Security Choices," and is a member of the Hoover Institution's Task Force on National Security and Law. He is the author of Detention and Denial: The Case for Candor After Guantanamo, published in November 2011, co-editor of Constitution 3.0: Freedom and Technological Change, published in December 2011, and editor of Campaign 2012: Twelve Independent Ideas for Improving American Public Policy (Brookings Institution Press, May 2012). He is also writing a book on data and technology proliferation and their implications for security. He is the author of Law and the Long War: The Future of Justice in the Age of Terror, published in June 2008 by The Penguin Press, and the editor of the 2009 Brookings book, Legislating the War on Terror: An Agenda for Reform.
His previous books include Starr: A Reassessment, published in 2002 by Yale University Press, and Confirmation Wars: Preserving Independent Courts in Angry Times, published in 2006 by Rowman & Littlefield and the Hoover Institution.
Between 1997 and 2006, he served as an editorial writer for The Washington Post specializing in legal affairs. Before joining the editorial page staff of The Washington Post, Wittes covered the Justice Department and federal regulatory agencies as a reporter and news editor at Legal Times. His writing has also appeared in a wide range of journals and magazines including The Atlantic, Slate, The New Republic, The Wilson Quarterly, The Weekly Standard, Policy Review, and First Things.
Benjamin Wittes was born in Boston, Massachusetts. He graduated from Oberlin College in 1990, and he has a black belt in taekwondo.
Provost & Chief Academic Officer, Bryant University
An acclaimed international law and national security expert experienced in academic, law, and government service settings, Provost Glenn M. Sulmasy brings a distinguished record of Higher Education leadership and academic achievement to his position as Bryant’s first university Provost and Chief Academic Officer.
Sulmasy previously served as Deputy University Counsel and later led the Humanities Department at the United States Coast Guard Academy (USCGA), in New London, CT. Additionally, he served as Professor of Law at USCGA and has been involved in higher education since 1997.
In addition to serving on the faculties of the Academy and the U.S. Naval War College, Sulmasy has lectured in the fields of International Law, U.S. Constitutional Law, and National Security at numerous universities and think tanks. He has also served as a National Security and Human Rights Fellow at the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School.
A former fellow in Homeland Security and National Security Law for the Center for National Policy in Washington D.C., Sulmasy lectures extensively on the law of armed conflict, international law, and national security matters. He is widely published internationally on national security matters, and as an expert has been featured in the LA Times, on CBS News Radio, National Public Radio, CNN International, US News & World Report, the New York Times and the San Francisco Chronicle, Al-Jazeera America, MSNBC, Fox News and numerous other national media outlets. He is the author of The National Security Court System – A Natural Evolution of Justice in an Age of Terror (Oxford University Press) and Co-Editor of International Law Challenges – Homeland Security and Combating Terrorism (2005).
Sulmasy was educated at the U.S. Coast Guard Academy, University of Baltimore School of Law (cum laude), UC Berkeley School of Law (Boalt Hall) and the Harvard Kennedy School.
Provost Sulmasy, his wife Marla, and seven children hail from Old Lyme, CT and Smithfield, RI.
Provost & Chief Academic Officer, Bryant University
An acclaimed international law and national security expert experienced in academic, law, and government service settings, Provost Glenn M. Sulmasy brings a distinguished record of Higher Education leadership and academic achievement to his position as Bryant’s first university Provost and Chief Academic Officer.
Sulmasy previously served as Deputy University Counsel and later led the Humanities Department at the United States Coast Guard Academy (USCGA), in New London, CT. Additionally, he served as Professor of Law at USCGA and has been involved in higher education since 1997.
In addition to serving on the faculties of the Academy and the U.S. Naval War College, Sulmasy has lectured in the fields of International Law, U.S. Constitutional Law, and National Security at numerous universities and think tanks. He has also served as a National Security and Human Rights Fellow at the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School.
A former fellow in Homeland Security and National Security Law for the Center for National Policy in Washington D.C., Sulmasy lectures extensively on the law of armed conflict, international law, and national security matters. He is widely published internationally on national security matters, and as an expert has been featured in the LA Times, on CBS News Radio, National Public Radio, CNN International, US News & World Report, the New York Times and the San Francisco Chronicle, Al-Jazeera America, MSNBC, Fox News and numerous other national media outlets. He is the author of The National Security Court System – A Natural Evolution of Justice in an Age of Terror (Oxford University Press) and Co-Editor of International Law Challenges – Homeland Security and Combating Terrorism (2005).
Sulmasy was educated at the U.S. Coast Guard Academy, University of Baltimore School of Law (cum laude), UC Berkeley School of Law (Boalt Hall) and the Harvard Kennedy School.
Provost Sulmasy, his wife Marla, and seven children hail from Old Lyme, CT and Smithfield, RI.
Provost & Chief Academic Officer, Bryant University
An acclaimed international law and national security expert experienced in academic, law, and government service settings, Provost Glenn M. Sulmasy brings a distinguished record of Higher Education leadership and academic achievement to his position as Bryant’s first university Provost and Chief Academic Officer.
Sulmasy previously served as Deputy University Counsel and later led the Humanities Department at the United States Coast Guard Academy (USCGA), in New London, CT. Additionally, he served as Professor of Law at USCGA and has been involved in higher education since 1997.
In addition to serving on the faculties of the Academy and the U.S. Naval War College, Sulmasy has lectured in the fields of International Law, U.S. Constitutional Law, and National Security at numerous universities and think tanks. He has also served as a National Security and Human Rights Fellow at the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School.
A former fellow in Homeland Security and National Security Law for the Center for National Policy in Washington D.C., Sulmasy lectures extensively on the law of armed conflict, international law, and national security matters. He is widely published internationally on national security matters, and as an expert has been featured in the LA Times, on CBS News Radio, National Public Radio, CNN International, US News & World Report, the New York Times and the San Francisco Chronicle, Al-Jazeera America, MSNBC, Fox News and numerous other national media outlets. He is the author of The National Security Court System – A Natural Evolution of Justice in an Age of Terror (Oxford University Press) and Co-Editor of International Law Challenges – Homeland Security and Combating Terrorism (2005).
Sulmasy was educated at the U.S. Coast Guard Academy, University of Baltimore School of Law (cum laude), UC Berkeley School of Law (Boalt Hall) and the Harvard Kennedy School.
Provost Sulmasy, his wife Marla, and seven children hail from Old Lyme, CT and Smithfield, RI.
Provost & Chief Academic Officer, Bryant University
An acclaimed international law and national security expert experienced in academic, law, and government service settings, Provost Glenn M. Sulmasy brings a distinguished record of Higher Education leadership and academic achievement to his position as Bryant’s first university Provost and Chief Academic Officer.
Sulmasy previously served as Deputy University Counsel and later led the Humanities Department at the United States Coast Guard Academy (USCGA), in New London, CT. Additionally, he served as Professor of Law at USCGA and has been involved in higher education since 1997.
In addition to serving on the faculties of the Academy and the U.S. Naval War College, Sulmasy has lectured in the fields of International Law, U.S. Constitutional Law, and National Security at numerous universities and think tanks. He has also served as a National Security and Human Rights Fellow at the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School.
A former fellow in Homeland Security and National Security Law for the Center for National Policy in Washington D.C., Sulmasy lectures extensively on the law of armed conflict, international law, and national security matters. He is widely published internationally on national security matters, and as an expert has been featured in the LA Times, on CBS News Radio, National Public Radio, CNN International, US News & World Report, the New York Times and the San Francisco Chronicle, Al-Jazeera America, MSNBC, Fox News and numerous other national media outlets. He is the author of The National Security Court System – A Natural Evolution of Justice in an Age of Terror (Oxford University Press) and Co-Editor of International Law Challenges – Homeland Security and Combating Terrorism (2005).
Sulmasy was educated at the U.S. Coast Guard Academy, University of Baltimore School of Law (cum laude), UC Berkeley School of Law (Boalt Hall) and the Harvard Kennedy School.
Provost Sulmasy, his wife Marla, and seven children hail from Old Lyme, CT and Smithfield, RI.
Founder and Principal, Fillmore Global Strategies LLC
Ambassador Nathan A. Sales is the founder and principal of Fillmore Global Strategies LLC, a consultancy that provides legal and strategic advisory services on matters at the intersection of law, policy, and diplomacy.
From 2017 to 2021, Ambassador Sales served at the U.S. Department of State as Under Secretary for Civilian Security, Democracy, and Human Rights (acting). He oversaw nine bureaus and offices led by Senate-confirmed principals, with 1,300 employees and a combined foreign assistance budget of more than $5 billion annually, and the mission of preventing and countering threats to civilian security, including terrorism, mass atrocities, and violations of human rights and the rule of law.
Concurrently, Ambassador Sales was Ambassador-at-Large and Coordinator for Counterterrorism. After being nominated by the President and unanimously confirmed by the U.S. Senate, he was sworn in on August 10, 2017. He served as the principal adviser to the Secretary of State on international counterterrorism matters, and led the State Department’s Counterterrorism Bureau, a 200-person team with an annual foreign assistance budget of $400 million. He was also the Special Presidential Envoy to the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS, leading U.S. relations with the 83-member Coalition and efforts to ensure the lasting defeat of ISIS in the Middle East and around the world.
While at the State Department, Ambassador Sales led the elements of the U.S. government’s China strategy promoting democratic values and human rights, including with respect to Hong Kong and Xinjiang. He oversaw the development and implementation of a wide range of U.S. government sanctions, including Global Magnitsky actions and Executive Order 13,936, targeting those responsible for undermining Hong Kong’s freedoms and autonomy. Ambassador Sales was the architect of the landmark 2017 UN Security Council Resolution 2396 on terrorist travel, and successfully pressed NATO to make counterterrorism a core Alliance mission. He led diplomatic engagements to persuade a dozen key partners in Europe and the Americas to designate Hizballah as a terrorist organization in its entirety. He launched the Western Hemisphere Counterterrorism Ministerial, in which heads of state and minister-level officials meet bianually to coordinate efforts against terrorist threats in the region. He led the U.S. government’s international efforts to combat white supremacist terrorism. Under his leadership, the State Department imposed terrorism sanctions on the Russian Imperial Movement – the first-ever U.S. designation of white supremacist terrorists.
Before joining the State Department, Ambassador Sales was Of Counsel at the law firm Kirkland & Ellis LLP (formerly Bancroft PLLC). He was also a tenured law professor, teaching and writing in the fields of administrative law, constitutional law, and national security law. His scholarship has been cited by the U.S. Supreme Court multiple times.
Ambassador Sales previously was Deputy Assistant Secretary for Policy at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. He led DHS’s efforts to draft and implement legislation that strengthened the security of and expanded the Visa Waiver Program (which allows citizens of certain countries to travel to the United States without a visa). He headed the U.S. delegation in talks with seven countries to implement the new security measures and was the Secretary of Homeland Security’s Special Envoy to South Korea.
Ambassador Sales also served at the Office of Legal Policy at the U.S. Department of Justice, where he worked on regulatory initiatives, counterterrorism, and judicial confirmations. In 2005, he managed DOJ’s “war room” for the confirmation of Chief Justice John Roberts. He received the Attorney General’s Award for Exceptional Service – the Justice Department’s highest honor – for his role in drafting the USA PATRIOT Act, as well as the Attorney General’s Distinguished Service Award for his work on judicial confirmations.
In addition to his work at Fillmore Global Strategies, Ambassador Sales is a nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council and a senior advisor at the Soufan Group, a global intelligence and security consultancy. He serves on a number of advisory boards, including for the Counter-Extremism Project (a nonprofit and nonpartisan international policy organization formed to combat the growing threat from extremist ideologies), the Secure Community Network (the official safety and security organization for the North American Jewish community), and the Sue J. Henry Center for Pre-Law Education at Miami University.
An Ohio native, Ambassador Sales received his B.A., summa cum laude, from Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, where he was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. He earned his J.D., magna cum laude, from Duke Law School, where he was Research Editor of the Duke Law Journal and joined the Order of the Coif. After law school, he clerked for the Honorable David B. Sentelle of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit.
Senior Legal Fellow and Manager, National Security Law Program, The Heritage Foundation
Charles “Cully” Stimson is a widely recognized expert in national security, homeland security, crime control, drug policy and immigration. A senior legal fellow at The Heritage Foundation since 2007, Stimson became Manager of the National Security Law Program in Heritage’s Institute for Constitutional Government in April 2013 after serving as Heritage’s chief of staff for a year.
Stimson writes and lectures on policy issues such as the law of armed conflict, terrorist detainee policy and interrogations, the Geneva Conventions, military commissions, the Patriot Act and FISA, criminal law and the death penalty, immigration and the war on drugs. As chief of staff to then-Heritage President Edwin J. Feulner, he was a key adviser on public policy matters as well as manager of Feulner’s office staff and Heritage’s day-to-day operations.
Stimson’s many research papers, op-eds and articles include special reports such as “Adult Time for Adult Crime,” a comprehensive study on the constitutionality of life sentences for teen-age murderers, and Sexual Assault in the Military: Understanding the Problem and How to Fix It, a ground-breaking paper detailing the inner workings of the military justice system compared to its civilian counterpart. His work on criminal and immigration law has been cited in briefs before the U.S. Supreme Court.
He testifies before the U.S. Senate and House on national security issues, and recently testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee on the Law of Armed Conflict, Law of War, and the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force.
Before joining the think tank in 2007, Stimson served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Detainee Affairs. He advised then-Secretaries of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and Robert Gates and coordinated the Pentagon’s global detention policy and operations, including at Guantanamo Bay and in Iraq and Afghanistan. He was chairman of detainee-related panels such as the Defense Senior Leadership Oversight Committee, and the Special Detainee Follow Up Group. He represented the United States before the U.N. in Geneva, Switzerland in May 2006 where he led the DOD delegation in defense of the United States’ Second Period Report on the Convention Against Torture.
An accomplished trial lawyer, Stimson worked as a prosecutor at the local, state and federal levels, where he concentrated on violent crimes such as homicide, sexual assault and domestic violence. A third generation naval officer, Cully also served as a military prosecutor, defense counsel, and recently served as Deputy Chief Judge of the Navy-Marine Corps Trial Judiciary. He continues to serve, with the rank of Captain, as the Commanding Officer of the Preliminary Hearing Unit.
Stimson’s thousands of media interviews and appearances include Fox News Channel, MSNBC, CNN, BBC, NPR and C-SPAN. He has been quoted by most major newspapers, including The Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and London Times.
A businessman and educator by training, Stimson is Vice Chairman of his family’s commercial real estate company in Seattle. Before 9/11, he was a Vice President at a New York-based global financial services and insurance brokerage firm where ran the private equity mergers and acquisitions D.C. operation.
Stimson holds a law degree from the George Mason University School of Law, where he later taught as an Adjunct Professor of Law. He is a graduate of Kenyon College, where he was Captain of the men’s varsity soccer team and an All-Conference player. He also studied at Harvard and Exeter universities. An avid soccer player and triathlete, he serves as Chairman of the Board of the United States Soccer Foundation, the charitable giving arm of U.S. Soccer.
Provost & Chief Academic Officer, Bryant University
An acclaimed international law and national security expert experienced in academic, law, and government service settings, Provost Glenn M. Sulmasy brings a distinguished record of Higher Education leadership and academic achievement to his position as Bryant’s first university Provost and Chief Academic Officer.
Sulmasy previously served as Deputy University Counsel and later led the Humanities Department at the United States Coast Guard Academy (USCGA), in New London, CT. Additionally, he served as Professor of Law at USCGA and has been involved in higher education since 1997.
In addition to serving on the faculties of the Academy and the U.S. Naval War College, Sulmasy has lectured in the fields of International Law, U.S. Constitutional Law, and National Security at numerous universities and think tanks. He has also served as a National Security and Human Rights Fellow at the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School.
A former fellow in Homeland Security and National Security Law for the Center for National Policy in Washington D.C., Sulmasy lectures extensively on the law of armed conflict, international law, and national security matters. He is widely published internationally on national security matters, and as an expert has been featured in the LA Times, on CBS News Radio, National Public Radio, CNN International, US News & World Report, the New York Times and the San Francisco Chronicle, Al-Jazeera America, MSNBC, Fox News and numerous other national media outlets. He is the author of The National Security Court System – A Natural Evolution of Justice in an Age of Terror (Oxford University Press) and Co-Editor of International Law Challenges – Homeland Security and Combating Terrorism (2005).
Sulmasy was educated at the U.S. Coast Guard Academy, University of Baltimore School of Law (cum laude), UC Berkeley School of Law (Boalt Hall) and the Harvard Kennedy School.
Provost Sulmasy, his wife Marla, and seven children hail from Old Lyme, CT and Smithfield, RI.
Fellow, National Security Institute, Antonin Scalia Law School, George Mason University
Vince Vitkowsky chaired the Executive Committee of the Federalist Society’s International and National Security Law and Policy Practice Group for over a decade. He is also a Fellow at the National Security Institute of George Mason University Law School. Vince spent 45 years in private practice, primarily in AmLaw 100/200 firms and their spin-offs. His practice included domestic and international commercial arbitration and litigation, as well as cyber risks and liabilities. Vince's current focus is on national security policy, artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, and counterterrorism. He has often written and spoken on national security and other public policy issues. Among other affiliations, Vince has been an Adjunct Fellow at the Center for Law and Counterterrorism of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, a member of the Executive Committee of the American Branch of the International Law Association, and Co-Chair of the Committee on Interventions and Trial Observations of the International Bar Association’s Human Rights Institute. He received his B.A. from Northwestern University and his J.D. from Cornell Law School.
Agnes Williams Sesquicentennial Professor of Federal Courts, Georgetown Law
Stephen I. Vladeck is a professor of law at the Georgetown University Law Center, and is a nationally recognized expert on the federal courts; the Supreme Court; national security law; and military justice.
Vladeck is author of the New York Times bestselling book, “The Shadow Docket: How the Supreme Court Uses Stealth Rulings to Amass Power and Undermine the Republic,” which won the 2023 Writers’ League of Texas Book Award for Non-Fiction and was a finalist for the 2024 ABA Silver Gavel Award for Media and the Arts. Vladeck is also a highly regarded appellate advocate, having argued three cases before the U.S. Supreme Court and over a dozen before various lower federal civilian and military courts. He has received numerous awards for his influential and widely cited legal scholarship, his prolific popular writing, his teaching, and his service to the legal profession—including the 2024 University of Texas President’s Research Impact Award and his selection by the Order of the Coif to serve as its Distinguished Visiting Professor for 2025.
Vladeck is CNN’s Supreme Court analyst and editor and author of “One First,” a popular weekly newsletter about the Supreme Court. Together with Bobby Chesney, Vladeck co-hosts the popular and award-winning “National Security Law Podcast.” He is also a co-author of Aspen Publishers’ leading national security law and counterterrorism law casebooks. And he is a member of the Board of Trustees of EarthJustice—the nation’s premier nonprofit public interest environmental law organization.
Vladeck graduated from Yale Law School in 2004—where he was executive editor of the Yale Law Journal and won the Harlan Fiske Stone Prize for outstanding moot court oralist and shared the Potter Stewart Prize for best moot court team performance. After law school, he clerked for the Honorable Marsha S. Berzon on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and the Honorable Rosemary Barkett on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. He earned a B.A. summa cum laude with Highest Distinction in History and Mathematics from Amherst College in 2001—where he wrote his senior thesis on “Leipzig’s Shadow: The War Crimes Trials of the First World War and Their Implications from Nuremberg to the Present.” A native New Yorker and hopeless Mets fan, Vladeck lives in the District with his wife, Karen (Founder and Managing Partner of Risepoint Search Partners); their daughters, Madeleine and Sydney; and their eleven-year-old pug, Roxanna.
Senior Fellow, Governance Studies, The Brookings Institution
Benjamin Wittes is a senior fellow in Governance Studies at The Brookings Institution. He co-founded and is the editor-in-chief of the Lawfare blog, which is devoted to sober and serious discussion of "Hard National Security Choices," and is a member of the Hoover Institution's Task Force on National Security and Law. He is the author of Detention and Denial: The Case for Candor After Guantanamo, published in November 2011, co-editor of Constitution 3.0: Freedom and Technological Change, published in December 2011, and editor of Campaign 2012: Twelve Independent Ideas for Improving American Public Policy (Brookings Institution Press, May 2012). He is also writing a book on data and technology proliferation and their implications for security. He is the author of Law and the Long War: The Future of Justice in the Age of Terror, published in June 2008 by The Penguin Press, and the editor of the 2009 Brookings book, Legislating the War on Terror: An Agenda for Reform.
His previous books include Starr: A Reassessment, published in 2002 by Yale University Press, and Confirmation Wars: Preserving Independent Courts in Angry Times, published in 2006 by Rowman & Littlefield and the Hoover Institution.
Between 1997 and 2006, he served as an editorial writer for The Washington Post specializing in legal affairs. Before joining the editorial page staff of The Washington Post, Wittes covered the Justice Department and federal regulatory agencies as a reporter and news editor at Legal Times. His writing has also appeared in a wide range of journals and magazines including The Atlantic, Slate, The New Republic, The Wilson Quarterly, The Weekly Standard, Policy Review, and First Things.
Benjamin Wittes was born in Boston, Massachusetts. He graduated from Oberlin College in 1990, and he has a black belt in taekwondo.
Provost & Chief Academic Officer, Bryant University
An acclaimed international law and national security expert experienced in academic, law, and government service settings, Provost Glenn M. Sulmasy brings a distinguished record of Higher Education leadership and academic achievement to his position as Bryant’s first university Provost and Chief Academic Officer.
Sulmasy previously served as Deputy University Counsel and later led the Humanities Department at the United States Coast Guard Academy (USCGA), in New London, CT. Additionally, he served as Professor of Law at USCGA and has been involved in higher education since 1997.
In addition to serving on the faculties of the Academy and the U.S. Naval War College, Sulmasy has lectured in the fields of International Law, U.S. Constitutional Law, and National Security at numerous universities and think tanks. He has also served as a National Security and Human Rights Fellow at the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School.
A former fellow in Homeland Security and National Security Law for the Center for National Policy in Washington D.C., Sulmasy lectures extensively on the law of armed conflict, international law, and national security matters. He is widely published internationally on national security matters, and as an expert has been featured in the LA Times, on CBS News Radio, National Public Radio, CNN International, US News & World Report, the New York Times and the San Francisco Chronicle, Al-Jazeera America, MSNBC, Fox News and numerous other national media outlets. He is the author of The National Security Court System – A Natural Evolution of Justice in an Age of Terror (Oxford University Press) and Co-Editor of International Law Challenges – Homeland Security and Combating Terrorism (2005).
Sulmasy was educated at the U.S. Coast Guard Academy, University of Baltimore School of Law (cum laude), UC Berkeley School of Law (Boalt Hall) and the Harvard Kennedy School.
Provost Sulmasy, his wife Marla, and seven children hail from Old Lyme, CT and Smithfield, RI.
Exploring the Landscape of Military Law and Best Practices for JAGs
Jesse Burbank, Stephanie Fisher, Mark Majors, Michael A. Newton
Military law encompasses a wide range of legal disciplines, including criminal law, national security, government...
U.S. Drone Policy in the Middle East: The Legal, Moral, and Political Implications
Drones, the Constitution, & the President
International Law Weekend Panels of Special Interest
New York, New YorkNational Security Challenges 2012
New York, New YorkGuantanamo Bay and the Trial of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed: A National Security Perspective
Panel One: Detention, Interrogation and Trial of Terrorist Suspects – 10 Years Later
Nathan A. Sales, Charles "Cully" Stimson, Glenn M. Sulmasy, Vincent Vitkowsky, Stephen I. Vladeck, Benjamin Wittes
The legal ambiguities associated with the classification, interrogation and adjudication of al Qaeda members alleged...
Panel One: Detention, Interrogation and Trial of Terrorist Suspects – 10 Years Later
Nathan A. Sales, Charles "Cully" Stimson, Glenn M. Sulmasy, Vincent Vitkowsky, Stephen I. Vladeck, Benjamin Wittes
The legal ambiguities associated with the classification, interrogation and adjudication of al Qaeda members alleged...
Panel One: Detention, Interrogation and Trial of Terrorist Suspects – 10 Years Later
2012 National Security Symposium
Washington, DCThe Trial of Khalid Sheikh Mohammad, Libya, the Arab Spring and Other National Security Concerns
Mineola, New York