President, Harned Strategies LLC
Karen Harned is President at Harned Strategies LLC. Previously, she served as Executive Director of the National Federation of Independent Business Small Business Legal Center, a post she held from 2002-2022. Prior to joining the Legal Center, Ms. Harned was an attorney at a Washington, D.C. law firm specializing in food and drug law, where she represented several small and large businesses and their respective trade associations before Congress and federal agencies. She also served as Assistant Press Secretary to U.S. Senator Don Nickles of Oklahoma from August of 1989 to March of 1993. Ms. Harned received her B.A. from the University of Oklahoma in 1989 and her J.D. from The George Washington University National Law Center in 1995. She is admitted to practice in the District of Columbia.
As Executive Director of the NFIB Small Business Legal Center, Ms. Harned commented regularly on small business cases before federal and state courts, as well as the U.S. Supreme Court. She has appeared on Fox News, Fox Business, NBC Nightly News, CNN, CNBC and MSNBC, as well as National Public Radio, CBS Radio, and radio outlets across the country. Her opinion editorials and articles regarding healthcare, lawsuit abuse, regulation, and other issues important to small business have been published in newspapers and other publications nationwide.
Ms. Harned has testified before Congress on the small business impact of regulation and the civil justice system. Additionally, she has conducted numerous webinars and legal compliance seminars for small business owners across the country on issues relating to employment law, including unionization and immigration.
General Counsel, University of Kentucky & Former Solicitor General of Virginia, University of Kentucky
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).
Senior Legal Fellow, Edwin Meese III Institute for the Rule of Law, Advancing American Freedom
Attorney and Legal Commentator
John Shu is an attorney and legal commentator. His focus areas include constitutional law, securities & corporate law, antitrust law, administrative law, politics, and international affairs. Mr. Shu has lectured and published on a wide variety of issues.
Mr. Shu served President George H.W. Bush and President George W. Bush. He also served Judge Stanley Sporkin, U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, who was Director of Enforcement at the U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission and General Counsel at the Central Intelligence Agency, and Judge Paul Roney, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit, who was Presiding Judge of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review.
Mr. Shu is a member of the National Committee on U.S. - China Relations, the Pacific Council on International Policy, and the Foreign Policy Association.
The ADA Opening Doors for the Plaintiff ’s Bar: How Ambiguities in Title III Inhibit Access, Increase Litigation, and Hurt Business
Elizabeth A. Gaudio, Karen Harned
“I also want to say a special word to our friends in the business community,”...
Bar Watch Bulletin February 16, 2006
Over the past 72 hours, the American Bar Association has received much press attention for...
Bar Watch Bulletin February 15, 2006
The American Bar Association's Midyear Meeting took place in Chicago from Wednesday, February 8 until...
Bar Watch Bulletin February 12, 2006
The American Bar Association's Midyear Meeting takes place in Chicago from Wednesday, February 8 until...
Bar Watch Bulletin February 2006
Recommendation 108A, sponsored by the Section of Individual Rights and the Council on Racial and...
Toward a Simpler Standard for Abrogating Sovereign Immunity
William Thro
In recent terms, the Supreme Court has repeatedly addressed issues related to the states’ sovereign...
The Help America Vote Act of 2002 - A Statutory Primer
Hans A. Von Spakovsky
The Help America Vote Act of 2002 (HAVA) was signed into law by President Bush...
Recent Gay Marriage Rulings
John Shu
Gay marriage litigation continues to occur in various forms among the several states. In the...
Bar Watch Bulletin August 9, 2005
President Greco held a news conference Monday morning to discuss his plans for the coming...
Bar Watch Bulletin August 7, 2005
The ABA meeting in Chicago, Illinois included several panel discussions, highlights of which we report...