General Counsel, Office of the Governor, State of Florida
As General Counsel to Governor DeSantis, David manages the legal operations of the Governor’s office. This includes advising on a broad variety of state and federal law issues, formulating litigation strategy for significant cases involving the Executive Branch, providing legal guidance and oversight to the state agencies that report to the Governor, and recommending candidates for judicial appointments, among numerous other responsibilities.
David previously served as General Counsel to the Florida House of Representatives, where he advised House leadership on constitutional and other legal matters and represented the House's interests in litigation. He was also General Counsel to the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation, where he managed the legal operations of Florida’s primary business regulatory agency. Prior to joining the Department, David practiced commercial litigation at Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner in Miami. He received his law degree, magna cum laude, from the University of Miami, where he served as president of the Federalist Society’s student chapter.
United States District Judge, Eastern District of Texas
Prior to taking the bench, Judge Barker served as Deputy Solicitor General of Texas, arguing appeals and public-law cases for the State. Before his state-government service, Judge Barker was an appellate and IP partner at Yetter Coleman in Houston. Before that, he spent four years in the Appellate Section of the DOJ’s Criminal Division. While there, he taught appellate advocacy at the National Advocacy Center, completed a Pegasus Scholarship with the English Inns of Court, and served on detail as a Special Assistant U.S. Attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia. Judge Barker served as a law clerk to Judge William Bryson on the Federal Circuit and Chief Judge John Walker on the Second Circuit. He earned his B.S. in computer engineering summa cum laude from Texas A&M and his J.D. from the University of Texas, where he graduated first in his class.
General Counsel, Rain
Christopher Grieco is General Counsel at Rain. Prior to this, Grieco served at the U.S. Department of Justice as Associate Deputy Attorney General in the Office of the Deputy Attorney General, and in the White House as Associate Counsel to the President at the Office of the White House Counsel.
He Received his J.D. from Stanford Law School and his B.A from Dartmouth College.
Partner, Lehotsky Keller LLP
The New York Times recognized Scott A. Keller as a “legal heavyweight,” who “is praised by opponents as a formidable advocate.”
Mr. Keller has argued 12 cases before the U.S. Supreme Court and 12 cases before the Texas Supreme Court. He is the only practicing lawyer to have argued at least 10 cases in both courts. Mr. Keller frequently represents parties in high stakes appeals, and he has argued many cases in federal courts of appeals throughout the nation. He has earned individual accolades from Lawdragon 500 Leading Litigators in America, Chambers, Legal 500, The American Lawyer, The National Law Journal, Law360, Super Lawyers, The Best Lawyers in America, and other publications.
Before founding Lehotsky Keller Cohn LLP, Mr. Keller headed Baker Botts LLP’s Supreme Court Practice. He also has significant experience at the highest levels in all three branches of government. Mr. Keller served as the Solicitor General of Texas, the State’s chief appellate litigator. He was U.S. Senator Ted Cruz’s chief counsel on the Senate Judiciary Committee. Mr. Keller was a law clerk for Justice Anthony Kennedy of the Supreme Court of the United States and Chief Judge Alex Kozinski of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. He was also a Bristow Fellow in the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of the Solicitor General.
Mr. Keller represents clients in cases where public communications strategy is crucial, and he has made numerous media appearances in major outlets such as The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, BBC, Fox News, NPR, and Politico. As a sought after speaker and writer, Mr. Keller’s articles have appeared in the Stanford Law Review, Virginia Law Review, and Texas Law Review. He has also served as an adjunct professor of constitutional litigation, Supreme Court practice, and federal courts at the University of Texas School of Law.
Justice, Texas Supreme Court
Justice Jane Bland has served on the Supreme Court of Texas since 2019. Before that, she served for six years as a state district judge in Houston and 15 years as a justice on the First Court of Appeals.
Justice Bland is the Court’s liaison to the Judicial Commission on Mental Health, the Texas Board of Legal Specialization, and the Texas Supreme Court Historical Society. She is the deputy liaison to the Court’s Rules Advisory Committee.
She earned her undergraduate and law degrees from the University of Texas. In law school, she was Vice-Chancellor, an editor of the Texas Law Review, and a member of the Order of the Coif. Following law school, Justice Bland clerked for the Honorable Thomas Gibbs Gee on the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.
Justice Bland is board-certified in civil appellate law and civil trial law. She began her practice at Baker Botts, where she handled trial and appellate matters. Before her appointment to the Court, she was a partner at Vinson & Elkins in Houston. She is a member of the American Law Institute.
Throughout her career, Justice Bland has been recognized for her work to improve our state’s judiciary. In 2010, Chief Justice John Roberts presented her with the William H. Rehnquist Award, given to a state court judge who exemplifies the highest level of judicial excellence, integrity, fairness, and professional ethics. The Texas Association of Civil Trial and Appellate Specialists has recognized her as the judge of the year four times. She has received several President’s Awards for her work with the Houston Bar Association and the Houston Young Lawyers Association.
Justice Bland previously chaired the board of Houston Volunteer Lawyers and the Oversight Committee for the Texas Pattern Jury Charges. She served on the Court’s Commission to Expand Civil Legal Services and the Board of Legal Specialization’s Civil Appellate Law Advisory Commission. She is a senior trustee of the UT Law School Foundation.
Justice Bland and her husband, Doug, have two children.
Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit
James C. Ho is a Circuit Judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. Before taking the bench on January 4, 2018, he was a partner and co-chair of the national Appellate and Constitutional Law practice group of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP.
As an appellate litigator for over a decade, including three years as the Solicitor General of Texas, Judge Ho presented 50 oral arguments in federal and state courts nationwide. He won numerous appeals, including three merits cases at the U.S. Supreme Court. He was routinely ranked among the nation’s leading lawyers by Benchmark, Chambers, Law360, The Legal 500, and The National Law Journal, among other publications. His work has been cited favorably by courts at every level of both the federal and state judiciaries. He won a Best Brief Award from the National Association of Attorneys General for every year that he served as solicitor general, and he is the only state solicitor general in history to be invited by the U.S. Supreme Court to express the views of a state.
Judge Ho has served in all three branches of the federal government. On the Senate Judiciary Committee, he served as chief counsel of the Subcommittees on the Constitution and Immigration under Senator John Cornyn. At the Justice Department, he served as Special Assistant to the Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights and an attorney-advisor at the Office of Legal Counsel. He clerked for Judge Jerry E. Smith of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and Justice Clarence Thomas of the U.S. Supreme Court.
His record of public service also includes appointments as vice chair of the Federal Judicial Evaluation Committee in Texas and co-chair of the National Asian Pacific American Bar Association Judiciary Committee, and as a member of the U.S. Magistrate Judge Merit Selection Panel for the Northern District of Texas, the U.S. delegation to the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, and the Continuity of Government Commission.
In addition, Judge Ho has served as an Adjunct Professor of Law at the University of Texas School of Law, where he taught seminars on U.S. Supreme Court Litigation and Religious Liberty. He has authored numerous articles in respected law reviews nationwide, including an annual feature on exemplary judicial writing for The Green Bag Almanac & Reader. He previously served as senior editor of The Green Bag and as co-editor of Pub. L. Misc.
Judge Ho graduated from Stanford University with honors and a B.A. in Public Policy in 1995, and the University of Chicago Law School with high honors in 1999. Before law school, he was a legislative aide to California State Senator Quentin Kopp. He and his wife Allyson live in Dallas, Texas, with their twin daughter and son.
Judge, United States District Court for the Eastern District of Texas
Judge Sean Jordan is a federal district judge for the Eastern District of Texas, Sherman Division. Prior to taking the bench, Judge Jordan worked on complex civil litigation and appellate cases for twenty-five years in both government service and private practice. He has managed the appellate sections of two large law firms and also previously served as Principal Deputy Solicitor General in the Office of the Solicitor General of Texas.
Judge Jordan received his B.A., summa cum laude, from the University of Texas at Austin and his J.D., with honors, from the University of Texas School of Law. Prior to attending UT Austin, he served in the U.S. Army as an infantryman and paratrooper in the 82nd Airborne Division.
District Judge, United States District Court, Northern District of Texas
Matthew J. Kacsmaryk serves as United States District Judge for the Northern District of Texas.
He previously served in the (1) private, (2) government, and (3) nonprofit sectors:
Judge Kacsmaryk is an Honors graduate of the University of Texas Law School, where he joined the Federalist Society and served as an Executive Editor of the Texas Review of Law & Politics. Judge Kacsmaryk co-founded the Fort Worth Lawyers Chapter in 2012, coordinated the 2018 Texas Chapters Conference hosted by the Fort Worth Lawyers Chapter, and presently serves on its Advisory Board.
District Judge, United States District Court for the Northern District of Texas
Judge Brantley Starr was appointed to United States District Court for the Northern District of Texas in August 2019. Before his appointment, Judge Starr was the Deputy First Assistant Attorney General of Texas. Prior to that appointment, he served as Deputy Attorney General for Legal Counsel. From 2011 to 2015, Judge Starr served as career staff attorney to Texas Supreme Court Justice Eva Guzman. From 2008 to 2011, he practiced at King & Spalding, LLP. He served in the Office of the Solicitor General from 2006 to 2008. Prior to that, Judge Starr clerked for then-Justice Don Willett on the Texas Supreme Court after serving at the Office of the Attorney General. Judge Starr received his law degree from the University of Texas School of Law and his bachelor of arts degree from Abilene Christian University in 2001. Judge Starr has taught the Origins of the Constitution Class at the University of Texas law, Texas A&M law, and SMU law.
Former Assistant Director of the Administrative Office, United States Courts
Noel Augustyn served as chief of staff to Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist at the Supreme Court of the United States, was assistant director of the Administrative Office of the United States Courts, deputy director of the Association of American Law Schools, the assistant dean at Boston College Law School and adjunct professor at Georgetown University Law Center. He practiced with firms in Massachusetts, Riyadh, Rome, and Washington, DC, most recently as Of Counsel with Seyfarth Shaw.
Prior to his work in the law, he taught English and was assistant dean at Ripon College in Wisconsin and Linfield College in Oregon. He is a graduate of Dartmouth College, Stanford University and Notre Dame Law School and did graduate work at Columbia University’s Parker School of Foreign and Comparative Law. He has contributed to numerous publications, ranging from the Journal of Supreme Court History and the American Journal of International Law, to the New Oxford Review and the Homiletic and Pastoral Review. He is married and the father of three children and three grandchildren and lives in Chevy Chase, Maryland.
Judge, United States District Court, District of Columbia
Judge Trevor N. McFadden was appointed to the United States District Court for the District of Columbia in 2017. He received his B.A. in 2001 from Wheaton College, IL, magna cum laude. In 2006, he received his J.D. from the University of Virginia School of Law, where he graduated Order of the Coif and was an editor for the Virginia Law Review.
Following graduation from law school, Judge McFadden clerked for Judge Steven Colloton, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit. He then joined the U.S. Department of Justice, where he served as Counsel to the Deputy Attorney General and as Assistant U.S. Attorney in the District of Columbia. Judge McFadden subsequently became a partner at Baker & McKenzie LLP in Washington, DC, where he focused on white collar investigations. He is also co-author of a treatise, Corporate Settlement Tools: DPAs, NPAs, and Cooperation Agreements.
After four years in private practice, Judge McFadden returned to the U.S. Department of Justice, where he was Deputy Assistant Attorney General and acted as the second-in-command of the Department's Criminal Division. As Deputy Assistant Attorney General, he managed the Division's Fraud and Appellate Sections.
Judge McFadden also has extensive experience in law enforcement. He served as an officer with the Fairfax County, VA, Police Department and as a deputy sheriff in Madison County, VA.
Judge, United States District Court for the Eastern District of Tennessee
On December 23, 2020, Katherine A. Crytzer was sworn in as a United States District Judge for the Eastern District of Tennessee following confirmation by the United States Senate. Judge Crytzer sits in Knoxville, Tennessee. Prior to her confirmation, Judge Crytzer served as Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General at the Department of Justice’s Office of Legal Policy in Washington, D.C., where she provided legal and policy advice to the Assistant Attorney General and Department of Justice Leadership. Before joining the Department of Justice’s Main Office, Judge Crytzer served as an Assistant United States Attorney in the United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Kentucky. In advance of entering public service, Judge Crytzer was a litigator at Kirkland & Ellis LLP. She began her legal career as a law clerk to The Honorable Raymond W. Gruender on the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit. Judge Crytzer earned her Juris Doctor, magna cum laude, from George Mason University’s Antonin Scalia School of Law and her Bachelor of Science, summa cum laude, from Middle Tennessee State University.
James C. Dever III serves as a United States District Judge for the Eastern District of North Carolina. President George W. Bush nominated Judge Dever (then age 39) in May 2002, and the United States Senate unanimously confirmed him. Before serving as a United States District Judge, Judge Dever served as a United States Magistrate Judge for fifteen months. He served as Chief Judge from October 2011 through October 2018.
Judge Dever received his B.B.A., with high honors, from the University of Notre Dame in 1984. He attended Notre Dame on a four-year ROTC scholarship. He was a Distinguished Military Graduate, was elected to Beta Gamma Sigma, and received the Raymond P. Kent Award (which is awarded to the graduating senior with the highest average in finance/economics classes). He received his J.D., with high honors, from Duke University School of Law in 1987. At Duke, he served as editor-in-chief of the Duke Law Journal, was elected to the Order of the Coif, and received numerous academic awards.
After graduating from law school, he served for one year as a law clerk for Judge J. Clifford Wallace of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. Following his clerkship, Judge Dever was the sole attorney entering active duty in the Air Force selected to serve in the Air Force General Counsel’s Honors Program at the Pentagon. While on active duty, he provided legal advice to and conducted litigation for the Secretary of the Air Force. He served on active duty in the Air Force at the Pentagon from October 1988 until September 1992. At the conclusion of his service, he received the Meritorious Service Medal.
Judge Dever then returned to North Carolina and joined Maupin Taylor & Ellis, P.A. in Raleigh. While in private practice, he engaged in a wide variety of complex civil litigation and served on the law firm’s management committee. He was repeatedly listed in the Best Lawyers in America and in Business North Carolina’s Legal Elite for Employment Law. Since 1997, Judge Dever has taught employment law and criminal procedure as an adjunct law professor at Campbell University’s Norman Adrian Wiggins School of Law. Since 2008, Judge Dever has co-taught a seminar on sentencing and punishment as a senior lecturing fellow at Duke University School of Law. Since 2009, he has taught criminal procedure as a senior lecturing fellow at Duke University School of Law. In 2014, Chief Justice John Roberts appointed Judge Dever to serve on the Advisory Committee on Criminal Rules, where Judge Dever served until 2021. Judge Dever also serves as a member of Duke Law School's Board of Visitors.
Judge Dever’s chambers are in Raleigh, North Carolina.
Executive Director, North Carolina Justice Center
Mr. Glazier has held his current position as Executive Director of the North Carolina Justice Center since 2015. The Justice Center focuses on anti-poverty work in the areas of education, immigration, health care, housing, workers’ rights, consumer law, and budget and tax policy.
Prior to his position as Executive Director of the Justice Center, Mr. Glazier served seven terms from 2003-2015 as state representative from Cumberland County in the North Carolina General Assembly. Mr. Glazier received multiple Legislator of Year Awards, and also received the Order of the Long Leaf Pine from Governor McCrory in 2015.
Mr. Glazier received his law degree from Wake Forest University School of Law in 1981 and his undergraduate degree from Penn State University in 1977.
Professor of Law, Notre Dame Law School
Professor Derek Muller is a nationally-recognized scholar in the field of election law. His research focuses on the role of states in the administration of federal elections, the constitutional contours of voting rights and election administration, the limits of judicial power in the domain of elections, and the Electoral College.
He has published more than two dozen academic works, and his op-eds have appeared in the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, and the Wall Street Journal. He has testified before Congress, and he is a contributor at the Election Law Blog. He is a co-author on a Federal Courts casebook published by Carolina Academic Press. He is also the co-reporter on a new Restatement of the Law, Election Litigation, an effort led by the American Law Institute.
Professor Muller teaches Election Law, Civil Procedure, and Evidence.
Partner, Nelson Mullins Riley & Scarborough LLP
Phil regularly represents management in labor/employment law and related matters. He advises clients on covenants not to compete and litigates claims involving restrictive covenants, trade secrets, and other business-related litigation. Phil also regularly defends management and employers in employment discrimination cases and counsels management on how to prevent or reduce the risk of these lawsuits.
Florida Office Managing Attorney, Institute for Justice
Justin Pearson is the Institute’s Florida Office Managing Attorney. He also coordinates aspects of the Institute’s national economic liberty efforts and personally directs IJ’s National Street Vending Initiative. Justin has devoted his career to vindicating the constitutional rights of small-business owners, and he has victoriously litigated on their behalf in trial and appellate courts across the nation.
Justin often wins in novel ways. He was the lead counsel in a federal appellate court victory vindicating the right of a Florida dairy creamery to tell the truth on its labels, which was the first victorious First Amendment challenge to a food standard of identity in U.S. history. His win against Little Rock’s ban on taxi competition was based on a provision in the Arkansas Constitution that had not been successfully relied upon in over half a century. And his victory against Fort Pierce’s food truck ban included the first preliminary injunction ever issued in this type of challenge anywhere in the nation.
In addition to litigation, Justin has testified to Florida Senate and House committees dozens of times, and provisions suggested by Justin have been enacted into law. The successful bills that Justin has actively supported include Florida’s 2021 cottage food, home-based business, and local occupational licensing reforms, Florida’s historic 2020 occupational licensing reform (which repealed the most occupational licensing barriers in U.S. history), Florida’s 2019 repeal of the certificate of need requirement for hospitals, Florida’s 2019 Fresh Start reform making it easier for individuals with criminal records to obtain employment, and Florida’s 2016 overhaul of its civil forfeiture laws.
Justin’s work has appeared in countless media outlets, and Justin has spoken to scores of law schools and attorney organizations across the nation. The law schools that have hosted Justin’s talks include Yale, the University of Chicago, Duke, NYU, Notre Dame, and the University of Michigan, among many others.
Prior to joining IJ, Justin founded and managed his own law practice to advocate for small-business owners, and Justin’s law practice was successful for many years before he made the decision to join IJ in 2012 to better fight against government power gone awry.
Justin received his law degree with honors from the University of Miami in 2002, where he was the Research and Writing Editor for, and was published in, the University of Miami Business Law Review. Justin received his undergraduate degree in business management from North Carolina State University. Justin has been honored by the Daily Business Review and Law.com for being one of South Florida’s “Most Effective Lawyers.”
United States District Judge, United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida
On December 20, 2019, Raag Singhal received his judicial commission to serve on the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida. Judge Singhal is the first Asian American in history to serve as an Article III judge in the jurisdiction of the Eleventh Circuit (Alabama, Georgia and Florida).
Immediately prior to becoming a federal judge, Judge Singhal spent eight years as a State Circuit Court Judge in Broward County, Florida, having been appointed by then-Governor Rick Scott in 2011. During that period of time, Singhal served, at times, in the Criminal, Civil and Mental Health divisions and was fortunate enough to sit as an Associate Judge on Florida’s Fourth District Court of Appeal on four occasions.
As a lawyer, Singhal gained experience at a civil litigation firm followed by three years as an Assistant State Attorney. After that, Singhal ran a successful criminal defense practice in Fort Lauderdale for eighteen years. During that time, he handled more than two hundred jury trials including thirty first-degree murder cases.
Judge Singhal has had leadership roles in many law-related groups. He is past-President of the Broward Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and the Stephen H. Booher Chapter of the American Inns of Court. He was on the Board of Directors of the Broward County Bar Association, and is a frequent speaker at events for various local Bar groups such as the Asian Pacific American Bar Association and the Federalist Society. Singhal was also Associate Dean of the Florida College for Advanced Judicial Studies upon his elevation to the federal court system.
Judge Singhal received his law degree from Wake Forest University School of Law in 1989 where he was very active in Moot Court activities, and was on the winning team of the J. Braxton Craven National Moot Court Competition (4th Amendment). He received his undergraduate degree in Political Science from Rice University in 1986.
Legal Fellow and Manager, Supreme Court and Appellate Advocacy Program, The Heritage Foundation
Zack is a Legal Fellow and Manager of the Supreme Court and Appellate Advocacy Program in the Edwin Meese III Center for Legal and Judicial Studies at The Heritage Foundation.
He previously served for several years as an Assistant United States Attorney in the Northern District of Florida. Prior to that, he spent two years as an associate in the Washington, D.C. office of Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton, which he joined after clerking for the Hon. Emmett R. Cox on the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit.
Smith received his undergraduate, master’s, and law degrees from the University of Florida. During law school, Smith served as the Editor in Chief of the Florida Law Review and served on the executive boards of several student organizations, including the UF Chapter of the Federalist Society.
United States District Judge, Eastern District of Pennsylvania
Paul S. Diamond is a District Judge for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, where he has served since 2004. He was nominated by President Bush to serve on the Third Circuit Court of Appeals in 2008, but no hearings were held in that election year. He graduated from the University of Pennsylvania Law School in 1977 and served as a state prosecutor in Philadelphia from 1977-1979 and then again from 1981 to 1983. From 1993 until 1995, he worked as treasurer and as counsel for the 1996 presidential campaign of United States Senator Arlen Specter. Paul is the author of Federal Grand Jury Practice and Procedure, Fifth Edition (2012).
Partner, Gibson Dunn & Crutcher LLP
Theodore B. Olson is a Partner in Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher’s Washington, D.C. office; a founder of the Firm’s Crisis Management, Sports Law, and Appellate and Constitutional Law Practice Groups.
Mr. Olson was Solicitor General of the United States during the period 2001-2004. From 1981-1984, he was Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Office of Legal Counsel in the U.S. Department of Justice. Except for those two intervals, he has been a lawyer with Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher in Los Angeles and Washington, D.C. since 1965.
Selected by Time magazine in 2010 as one of the 100 most influential people in the world, Mr. Olson is one of the nation’s premier appellate and United States Supreme Court advocates. He has argued 65 cases in the Supreme Court and has prevailed in over 75% of those cases. These include the two Bush v Gore cases arising out of the 2000 presidential election; Citizens United v Federal Election Commission; Hollingsworth v Perry, the case affirming the overturning of California’s Proposition 8, banning same-sex marriages; Murphy v NCAA, overturning a federal law prohibiting states from authorizing sports betting; and U.S. Dept. of Homeland Security v Regents of the Univ. of Calif., challenging the Trump Administration’s rescission of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (“DACA”). Mr. Olson’s practice is concentrated on appellate and constitutional law, federal legislation, media and commercial disputes, and assisting clients with strategies for the containment, management and resolution of major legal crises. He has handled cases at all levels of state and federal court systems throughout the United States. Mr. Olson co-authored “Redeeming the Dream, the Case for Marriage Equality” with David Boies. Both were featured in HBO’s award-winning documentary, “The Case Against 8.”
Mr. Olson's Supreme Court arguments have included cases involving separation of powers; federalism; voting rights; the Tenth Amendment; the First Amendment; the Equal Protection and Due Process Clauses; jury trial rights; punitive damages; takings of property; the Commerce Clause; administrative law; taxation; criminal law; sports wagering; copyright, patent and antitrust; securities; campaign finance; foreign sovereign immunities; telecommunications; the environment; the internet; the Supremacy Clause; and other federal constitutional and statutory questions. As Solicitor General, during the presidency of George W. Bush, Mr. Olson was the Government's principal advocate in the United States Supreme Court, responsible for supervising and coordinating all appellate litigation of the United States, and a legal adviser to the President and the Attorney General. As Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Counsel during the Reagan Administration, Mr. Olson was the Executive Branch's principal legal adviser, rendering legal guidance to the President and to the heads of the Executive Branch departments on a wide range of constitutional and federal statutory questions, and assisting in formulating and articulating the Executive Branch's position on constitutional issues.
Mr. Olson has served as private counsel to two Presidents, Ronald W. Reagan and George W. Bush, in addition to serving those two Presidents in high-level positions in the Department of Justice. He has twice been awarded the United States Department of Justice's Edmund J. Randolph Award, its highest award for public service and leadership, and also received the Department of Defense's Distinguished Public Service Award, its highest civilian award, for his advocacy in the courts of the United States, including the Supreme Court. He also received the American Bar Association Medal, its highest award for “exceptionally distinguished service by a lawyer or lawyers to the cause of American jurisprudence.” Mr. Olson is to receive the 2021 Jack Valenti Friend of the White House Fellows Award in the Fall of 2021 to be presented by the White House Fellows Foundation and Association.
Mr. Olson is a member of the Commission on White House Fellowships; a member of the Board of Trustees of the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation; a member of the Board of Visitors of the Federalist Society; the Board of Directors of the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University; and the 9/11 Pentagon Memorial Foundation. He was a visiting scholar at the National Constitution Center in 2007. He served on the President's Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board from 2006 to 2008; and of the Council of the Administrative Conference of the United States from 2010 to 2020. He was Co-Chair of the Knight Commission on the Information Needs of Communities in a Democracy from 2008-2009, and served two terms on the Board of Directors of the National Center for State Courts.
Mr. Olson is a Fellow of both the American College of Trial Lawyers and the American Academy of Appellate Lawyers. He has been repeatedly listed in legal publications as one of the nation’s leading appellate lawyers. The late New York Times columnist William Safire described Mr. Olson as his generation's "most persuasive advocate" before the Supreme Court and "the most effective Solicitor General in decades.”
Mr. Olson received his law degree in 1965 from the University of California at Berkeley (Boalt Hall) where he was a member of the California Law Review and Order of the Coif. He received his bachelor's degree from the University of the Pacific, where he was recognized as the outstanding graduating student in both forensics and journalism. He has written and lectured extensively on appellate advocacy, oral communication in the courtroom, civil justice reform, and constitutional and administrative law.
Wallace and Beverley Woodbury University Professor of Law; Co-director of the Litigation and Dispute Resolution Program, The George Washington University Law School
Stephen A. Saltzburg joined GW Law in 1990. Before that, he taught at the University of Virginia School of Law, and was named the first incumbent of the Class of 1962 Endowed Chair. In 1996, he founded and directed the master’s program in Litigation and Dispute Resolution at GW. He was named University Professor, the highest title a University can confer upon a faculty member, in 2004. The Chief Justice of the United States appointed him as reporter for, and then as a member of, the Advisory Committee on the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure and as a member of the Advisory Committee on the Federal Rules of Evidence. He was the reporter for the Civil Justice Reform Act Committee for the D.C. District Court before he became chair. He has served as a special master in two class action cases in the D.C. District Court, and continues to serve as a mediator for the U.S. Court of Appeals for D.C. He has mediated a variety of disputes involving public agencies and private litigants; served as a sole arbitrator, panel chair, and panel member in domestic arbitrations; and served as an arbitrator for the International Chamber of Commerce.
Professor Saltzburg held the following governmental positions: associate independent counsel in the Iran-Contra investigation; deputy assistant attorney general in the Criminal Division of the U.S. Department of Justice, the Attorney General’s ex-officio representative on the U.S. Sentencing Commission; and director of the U.S. Treasury Department Tax Refund Fraud Task Force. He was chair of the ABA Criminal Justice Section from 2007 to 2008, and represents the section in the ABA House of Delegates. He was appointed to the ABA Task Force on Terrorism and the Law and to the ABA Task Force on Gatekeeper Regulation and the Profession in 2001, and to the ABA President’s Advisory Group on Citizen Detention and Enemy Combatant Issues in 2002. In 2001 he was appointed by Chief Judge Edward R. Becker of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit as co-chair of the Task Force on the Selection of Lead Counsel in Class Actions, which published its final report in 2002. Professor Saltzburg is the author of numerous books and articles on evidence, procedure, and litigation.
Author of "The Nixon Conspiracy" (2021) and "The Real Watergate Scandal" (2015)
Geoff Shepard worked on President Nixon’s White House staff for five years, including serving as deputy counsel on his Watergate defense team. He testified as a government chain-of-custody witness in the Plumbers Trial and was subpoenaed for the same purpose in the Cover-up Trial. He possesses a “clearance letter” from the special prosecutor, stating he was never the object of an investigation by that office. Geoff has spent much of the past fifteen year researching and writing about the Watergate scandal. He has published three books, authored dozens of essays and made over fifty presentations challenging Watergate’s conventional narrative. Much of his work is based on recently uncovered internal files of the Watergate Special Prosecution Force, including their infamous “Road Map” that was the basis for the grand jury naming Nixon a cover-up co-conspirator and for the House Judiciary Committee urging his impeachment.
Judge, United States Court of Appeals, District of Columbia Circuit
LAURENCE HIRSCH SILBERMAN, senior circuit judge; recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom, June 19, 2008; born in York, PA, October 12, 1935; son of William Silberman and Anna (Hirsch); married to Rosalie G. Gaull on April 28, 1957 (deceased), married Patricia Winn on January 5, 2008; children: Robert Steven Silberman, Katherine DeBoer Fischer, and Anne Gaull Otis; B.A., Dartmouth College, 1957; LL.B., Harvard Law School, 1961; admitted to Hawaii Bar, 1962; District of Columbia Bar, 1973; associate, Moore, Torkildson and Rice, 1961–64; partner (Moore, Silberman and Schulze), Honolulu, 1964–67; attorney, National Labor Relations Board, Office of General Counsel, Appellate Division, 1967–69; Solicitor, Department of Labor, 1969–70; Under Secretary of Labor, 1970–73; partner, Steptoe and Johnson, 1973–74; Deputy Attorney General of the United States, 1974–75; Ambassador to Yugoslavia, 1975–77; President’s Special Envoy on ILO Affairs, 1976; senior fellow, American Enterprise Institute, 1977–78; visiting fellow, 1978–85; managing partner, Morrison and Foerster, 1978–79 and 1983–85; executive vice president, Crocker National Bank, 1979–83; lecturer, University of Hawaii, 1962–63; board of directors, Commission on Present Danger, 1978–85, Institute for Educational Affairs, New York, NY, 1981–85, member: General Advisory Committee on Arms Control and Disarmament, 1981–85; Defense Policy Board, 1981–85; vice chairman, State Department’s Commission on Security and Economic Assistance, 1983–84; American Bar Association (Labor Law Committee, 1965–72, Corporations and Banking Committee, 1973, Law and National Security Advisory Committee, 1981–85); Hawaii Bar Association Ethics Committee, 1965–67; Council on Foreign Relations, 1977–present; Judicial Conference Committee on Court Administration and Case Management, 1994; member, U.S. Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act Court of Review, 1996–2003; Adjunct Professor of Law (Administrative Law and Labor Law) Georgetown Law Center, 1987–94; 1997; Adjunct Professor of Law, Harvard Law School, 1994-95, Adjunct Professor of Law, New York University Law School, 1995–96; Distinguished Visitor from the Judiciary, Georgetown Law Center, 2003–2019; co-chairman of the President’s Commission on The Intelligence Capabilities of the United States Regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction, 2004–05; appointed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit by President Reagan on October 28, 1985.
Panel 2: Regulation vs. Innovation: Tech Disruption and the State’s Response
Eighth Annual Texas Chapters Conference
Austin, TXUT Alumni on the Bench
Eighth Annual Texas Chapters Conference
Austin, TXJudges Gone Wild: Bad Behavior and Bad Decisions in the Federal Courts
American Student Chapter
Washington, DCThe Federal Courts: What Happens When You're Nominated?
Georgetown University Student Chapter
Washington, DCAgency Deference and Administrative Law
Nashville Lawyers Chapter
Nashville, TNRevealing Documents from the Watergate Prosecutions
Paul S. Diamond, Theodore B. Olson, Stephen A. Saltzburg, Geoff Shepard, Laurence H. Silberman
The Watergate scandal culminated in the resignation of President Richard Nixon and the conviction of...
Panel 2: The Law of Democracy: Recent and Future Developments in Election Law
Inaugural North Carolina Chapters Conference
Raleigh, NCTopics
Pres. Biden Signs Camp Lejeune Justice Act Into Law
President Biden has signed the “Camp Lejeune Justice Act of 2022” (S.3373) into law. The Act...
Monumental Cases from the Supreme Court’s 2021-2022 Term and Should Unhappy Litigants be Encouraged to Protest at Judges' Homes
Broward County Lawyers Chapter
Fort Lauderdale, FLTopics
Arkansas State Conference NAACP v. Arkansas Board of Apportionment: Textualism in Action in a Voting Rights Act Case
On February 17, 2022, in Arkansas State Conference NAACP v. Arkansas Board of Apportionment, the...