Executive Director, Center for Election Confidence
Lisa L. Dixon serves as the Executive Director of the Center for Election Confidence (formerly known as Lawyers Democracy Fund). Lisa is also a consultant for the Republican National Lawyers Association, serving as their Legal Counsel. Previously, Lisa practiced at Holtzman Vogel, where she specialized in tax-exempt organizations, campaign finance and election law, and lobbying compliance.
During law school, she interned for the Office of Chief Counsel, Procedure and Administration, at the Internal Revenue Service and at the Center for Law and Religious Freedom. Before law school, she served as the Assistant Student Division Director at The Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies and interned at The Heritage Foundation’s Center for Legal and Judicial Studies.
Lisa earned a J.D. from the University of Virginia School of Law, an M.A. in History from the University of Virginia, and a B.A. in History from Hillsdale College. After 18 years on the East Coast, mostly in northern Virginia, she recently returned to her native Michigan, where she lives with her husband and three sons.
Senior Attorney, Pacific Legal Foundation
Oliver Dunford joined the Pacific Legal Foundation in March 2017. He litigates across the country to defend and advance individual liberty and the rule of law. Oliver’s cases involve the separation of powers, economic liberty, property rights, and the First Amendment.
Oliver remains inspired by the Classical Liberal ideals upon which our Founders declared independence and secured the blessings of liberty. The Constitution’s promises, however, are not self-executing. As James Madison explained, “In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.” Oliver feels lucky that his work helps oblige the government to control itself—to the end that all individuals may pursue their rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
Before joining PLF, Oliver clerked at the Ohio Supreme Court and the Ohio Court of Appeals, and spent more than a decade in private practice working on complex commercial litigation. Originally from Cleveland, Oliver is a graduate of the University of Dayton and Cleveland-Marshall College of Law, where he was a managing editor for the Cleveland State Law Review. Oliver is admitted to the state bars of Florida, California, and Ohio, as well as several federal courts including the United States Supreme Court.
Oliver spends all of his free time following the Cleveland Indians.
Partner, Phelps Dunbar LLP
Mike Hurst is a partner with Phelps Dunbar LLP where he optimizes his in-depth knowledge of the court system, investigative and prosecutorial agencies, the regulatory arena, and the public policy realm to help clients facing government investigations, enforcement actions, regulatory matters, general litigation and policy issues. Mike currently serves as the General Counsel of the Republican National Committee and as Chairman of the Mississippi Republican Party. He previously served as the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Mississippi from 2017-2021, and with over 20 years of experience before judges, juries and policy makers, handling some of the largest and most high-profile cases in Mississippi, he's known for untangling the most complex legal issues.
As U.S. Attorney, Mike was described as a “hard charger,” leading efforts to combat violent crime, human trafficking and public corruption, among many other issues, throughout Mississippi. He almost tripled prosecutions in the U.S. Attorney’s Office over a three-year period, resulting in the most indictments and federal defendants indicted in a one-year period in Mississippi history. He created innovative and national award-winning crime-fighting solutions, like “Project EJECT,” and he established the first statewide, multilevel and multidisciplinary human trafficking body, the Mississippi Human Trafficking Council, to comprehensively and holistically address this criminal scourge.
During his tenure as U.S. Attorney, Mike oversaw some of the biggest cases in Mississippi history: the largest health care fraud scheme (Wade Walters, et. al.), the largest Ponzi scheme (Lamar Adams), the largest False Claims Act health care fraud settlement (Region 8), and the largest nursing home False Claim Act settlement (Hyperion). In addition, as Chief Federal Law Enforcement Officer for the Southern District, Mike coordinated the largest single-state immigration worksite enforcement operation in our nation’s history, involving hundreds of federal law enforcement agents covering seven different locations operated by multiple companies.
Mike’s no show pony – he’s a work horse. Before his tenure as U.S. Attorney, Mike was an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Mississippi for more than eight years. He handled some of the most difficult and complex cases in that office, dealing with white collar crimes, public corruption and financial fraud, including numerous jury trials before almost every federal judge in the Southern District.
He also has experience in the private sector. He has practiced law in Washington, D.C., and has served as a litigator and general counsel for a conservative nonprofit. He also has extensive experience in public policy, having served as the Legislative Director to a U.S. Congressman and as Counsel to the House Judiciary Committee.
Mike has also testified before both the United States Senate and the U.S. House of Representatives on issues ranging from crime to Presidential pardons. He has worked on all sides of the legal, regulatory, investigative, prosecutorial and policy spectrum. The incredible insight gained from this varied experience enables him to find a path forward for clients, no matter how complicated the case.
Senior Litigation Counsel, Washington Legal Foundation
Zac joined WLF in 2025 as Senior Litigation Counsel. In that role, he regularly represents WLF and other clients as counsel of record in cases before the U.S. Supreme Court and the federal appellate courts. Before arriving at WLF, Zac served as counsel to Commissioner Allen Dickerson of the Federal Election Commission. Zac also spent eight years litigating First Amendment cases as a staff attorney for the Institute for Free Speech, where he represented clients in federal and state cases across the country. He received his J.D. from George Mason University’s School of Law, where he participated in GMU’s Wiley Rein Supreme Court clinic.
Solicitor General, Iowa Office of the Attorney General
Eric Wessan serves as Iowa’s Solicitor General in the Iowa Attorney General’s Office. In that role, Wessan leads Iowa’s litigation before State and federal appellate courts, including the Iowa and U.S. Supreme Courts. Before that role, Wessan worked on complex commercial litigation at two large law firms in Chicago. Wessan also served as a law clerk for the Honorable James C. Ho on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and for the Honorable John F. Kness on the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. Wessan is a graduate of the University of Chicago Law School, with honors, and of the University of Chicago.
Professor, Associate Dean for Faculty Research, Catholic University of America, Columbus School of Law
José Joel Alicea is the inaugural St. Robert Bellarmine Professor of Law, Associate Dean for Faculty Research, and Director of the Law School’s Center for the Constitution and the Catholic Intellectual Tradition. He has also served as a Visiting Professor at Duke Law School and Notre Dame Law School. Prior to joining the Catholic Law faculty, Professor Alicea practiced law for several years at the law firm of Cooper & Kirk, PLLC, where he specialized in constitutional litigation. He previously served as a law clerk for Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr., on the United States Supreme Court and for Judge Diarmuid F. O'Scannlain on the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.
Professor Alicea’s scholarship has focused on constitutional theory. His scholarship has appeared, or is forthcoming, in the Yale Law Journal, the University of Pennsylvania Law Review, the Virginia Law Review, and the Notre Dame Law Review, among other publications. He has also been active in public debates about constitutional law, testifying before Congress and publishing essays in places like The New York Times, City Journal, and National Affairs.
Professor Alicea is a Fellow at the Columbus School of Law's Center for Religious Liberty and a Nonresident Fellow at The American Enterprise Institute. He is the recipient of several research and teaching awards, including the student-selected Professor of the Year teaching award.
Director, Project on Criminal Justice, Cato Institute
Matthew Cavedon is the Director of the Cato Institute’s Project on Criminal Justice. He focuses on reforming plea-driven mass adjudication, ensuring police accountability, and defending constitutional criminal originalism. Cavedon’s scholarship has been published (or is forthcoming in) publications including the Arizona State Law Journal, Cato Supreme Court Review, Seattle University Law Review, and Georgetown Journal of Law and Public Policy. Formerly a Georgia public defender and fellow at the Institute for Justice, Cavedon has taught law school courses on criminal law and procedure, as well as the First Amendment. Cavedon clerked for a U.S. district court and the Supreme Court of Georgia. He came to Cato following a fellowship at the Emory University Center for the Study of Law and Religion.
Senior Counsel, Chair, Religious Institutions and Education Practice Groups, First Liberty Institute
Jeremy Dys, Esq., is Senior Counsel for First Liberty.
Dys earned his law degree from West Virginia University College of Law in 2005. After law school, Dys clerked for the Hon. Russell M. Clawges, Jr., chief judge of the Circuit Court of Monongalia County in Morgantown, West Virginia. For six years prior to joining First Liberty Institute, Dys led a public policy organization where he led research and advocacy efforts on matters of life, marriage, and religious freedom.
Dys graduated from Taylor University in 2001 with a Bachelor of Arts, cum laude, degree in Communication Studies, with minors in U.S. History and Philosophy. During his undergraduate career, Dys studied at the American Studies Program in Washington, D.C., where he interned with the late David Orgon Coolidge as part of the Marriage Law Project of the Ethics and Public Policy Center.
In support of his clients, Dys has made numerous appearances in local, state, and national television, print, and radio outlets. His written commentaries have been featured at the Wall Street Journal, FoxNews.com, New York Daily News, TheHill.com, Des Moines Register, Dallas Morning News, DailySignal.com, Washington Examiner, Indianapolis Star, Charleston Gazette-Mail, Outcomes Magazine, TheFederalist.com, and others.
Supreme Court & Appellate Litigation Chair, Lex Politica; Of Counsel, Alliance Defending Freedom
Erin Morrow Hawley serves as Chair of Lex Politica's Supreme Court and Appellate Practice overseeing the firm’s strategic appellate litigation and critical motions practice in the trial courts. Erin is an experienced litigator who represents clients in constitutional, regulatory, and appellate matters in federal and state courts throughout the country.
Erin has represented dozens of clients before the Supreme Court of the United States, served as lead counsel in high-profile cases raising novel constitutional and statutory issues, and authored numerous successful petitions for certiorari and briefs in opposition. She has argued in state and federal appellate and trial courts throughout the country, including the Supreme Court of the United States. Erin represents diverse clients in high-stakes litigation from state governments to faith-based nonprofits to Fortune 100 companies. She possesses expertise on a wide range of subject matters including administrative law, the First Amendment, religious liberty, federal jurisdiction, federal preemption, equitable jurisdiction, tax law, the Affordable Care Act, and Title IX.
Erin represents clients in cases where public communications strategy is paramount. She is a sought-after speaker and writer, has testified multiple times before Congress, and is a frequent presenter on constitutional and administrative law issues, including at the Oxford Union, the National Federalist Society Convention, and university campuses across the country. She is a frequent commentator to media outlets, including Fox News, MSNBC, the Wall Street Journal, WORLD, USA Today, the Federalist, and the Hill.
Erin previously oversaw Alliance Defending Freedom’s--where she still serves as Of Counsel--litigation strategies to empower women and protect the dignity of life, defend pregnancy centers’ First Amendment rights from government overreach, and safeguard Americans’ freedoms from the ever-encroaching administrative state.
Vice President for Legal Strategy, Stand Together
Casey Mattox is Vice President for Legal Strategy at Stand Together and Senior Advisor at
Americans for Prosperity. In these roles he advocates for and creates strategies and
partnerships to ensure a constitutionally limited government that protects the civil liberties of all
Americans. Prior to joining Stand Together and AFP Casey’s legal career focused on defending
the First Amendment rights of students, faculty, healthcare workers and religious organizations.
Casey has a J.D. from Boston College School of Law and an undergraduate degree from the
University of Virginia. You can find him on Twitter at @CaseyMattox_ and on LinkedIn at
@Casey-Mattox-ST.
E.I. White Chair and Distinguished Professor of Law and Kauffman Professor of Entrepreneurship and Innovation, Syracuse University College of Law
Professor Robin Paul Malloy is the E.I. White Chair and Distinguished Professor of Law, and the Kauffman Professor of Entrepreneurship and Innovation. He is a leading expert on property, real estate transactions, land use law and zoning, and on law, markets, and marketization. He has pioneered work on land use and disability law. He is also recognized as a leading legal scholar on the jurisprudence of Adam Smith. Several of his works on market theory and law are translated into Chinese, Spanish, and Japanese. Professor Malloy has published twenty books (four with Cambridge University Press) and over 30 scholarly articles, in addition to numerous book chapters and essays. His latest book is titled Law and the Invisible Hand; A Theory of Adam Smith’s Jurisprudence (Cambridge 2021). He is a series editor on collections for Cambridge University Press, Routledge, and Edward Elgar. Malloy’s casebook on Real Estate Transactions (with Smith, now in its 6th edition) is the leading book on the subject and is used at law schools across the country. His casebook on Land Use Law and Zoning is now in its second edition (with Malagrino). Malloy has been the Sun Life Research Fellow at Oxford University, U.K.; the Dickenson Dees Fellow at University of Durham, U.K.; and for three consecutive summers served as a teaching fellow in China (Beijing and Shanghai) with the Committee on Legal Education Exchange with China. He currently serves on the International Advisory Board for the Law and Economics Program at St. Gallens University, Switzerland, and is a member of the Turin School of Local Regulation, Turin, Italy.
Malloy is the founding president of the Association for Law, Property, and Society. He currently serves on the Board of the Veterans Health Research Institute of CNY. He served on the Board of the National Italian American Bar Association for 20 years and was Vice Chair of the Zoning Board of Appeal for the Town of DeWitt, NY for 10 years. He has also served on numerous committees of the Association of American Law Schools.
Professor of Economics, Trinity University
I am an enthusiastic teacher, and I bring my passion for learning in the classroom. In my research, I work in the history of economic thought, specializing in the 18th century. My focus is on Adam Smith, David Hume, monetary theories, and the Scottish Enlightenment.
I analyze how self-interest interacts with other motivational drives, with systematic biases, and with the surrounding institutional environment. I also explore the links between the Scottish Enlightenment and the results from behavioral economics, evolutionary biology, and neuroeconomics.
I regularly publish in History of Political Economy (HOPE), The Journal of the History of Economic Thought (JHET), and History of Economic Ideas (HEI). I wrote the Routledge Guidebook of Smith's Wealth of Nations (2020).
The European Society for the History of Economic Thought awarded my HOPE 2008 "The Adam Smith Problem in Reverse: Self-Interest in Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations, and Theory of Moral Sentiments" the prize of Best Article of Year (2009). I was the book review editor for the Journal of the History of Economic Thought, the vice-president of the History of Economics Society, and i am the current president of the International Adam Smith Society and the current president of the History of Economics Society.
Executive Vice President, The Federalist Society
Dean Reuter is Executive Vice President at the Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies. He has served in two federal government agency Offices of the Inspector General, as Counsel to the Inspector General and Deputy Inspector General, responsible for policing the use of federal funds granted and contracted through those agencies. As such, he helped conduct and oversee criminal investigations across the country. He is the principal author of the non-fiction book, The Hidden Nazi: The Untold Story of America's Deal with the Devil, and editor of Liberty’s Nemesis: The Unchecked Expansion of the State and Confronting Terror: 9/11 and the Future of American National Security. He was appointed by the President and served as Vice-Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Corporation for National and Community Service, and recently served as an appointee on the U.S. Commission on Presidential Scholars. He is a graduate of Hood College (BA with Honors) and the University of Maryland School of Law.
Professor Emeritus, George Mason University
Vernon L. Smith, often called the "father of experimental economics", is a leading scholar celebrated for transforming economics into an experimental science. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences in 2002 for his pioneering work in using laboratory experiments to test economic theories, particularly regarding market mechanisms and price formation.
Smith served as Professor of Economics and Law from 2001 to 2008 at George Mason University. He founded the Interdisciplinary Center for Economic Science (ICES) at Mason, and served as a fellow of the Mercatus Center. He remains a Professor Emeritus at Mason, where a building on the Arlington campus is named in his honor.
Currently, Smith is a professor at Chapman University within the Argyros School of Business and Economics and the Fowler School of Law. At Chapman, he established the Economic Science Institute, a research center dedicated to the continued study of experimental methods in economics and across other disciplines.
An alum of Caltech (B.S.), the University of Kansas (M.A.), and Harvard University (Ph.D.), Smith has held previous appointments at universities including Purdue, Brown, and the University of Arizona.
Tazewell Taylor Professor of Law and William H. Cabell Research Professor, William & Mary Law School
Jonathan H. Adler joined the William & Mary law faculty as the Tazwell Taylor Professor of Law and William H. Cabell Research Professor in 2025. Prior to joining the faculty, he was the inaugural Johan Verheij Memorial Professor of Law and the founding Director of the Coleman P. Burke Center for Environmental Law at the Case Western Reserve University School of Law.
Professor Adler is the author or editor of seven books, including Climate Liberalism: Perspectives on Liberty, Property and Pollution (Palgrave, 2023), Marijuana Federalism: Uncle Sam and Mary Jane (Brookings Institution Press, 2020), Business and the Roberts Court (Oxford University Press, 2016) and Rebuilding the Ark: New Perspectives on Endangered Species Act Reform (AEI Press, 2011).
His articles have appeared in publications ranging from the Harvard Environmental Law Review and Yale Journal on Regulation to the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, and Washington Post. He has testified before Congress a dozen times, and his work has been cited in the U.S. Supreme Court. A 2024 study identified Professor Adler as the seventh most cited legal academic in administrative and environmental law from 2019 to 2023.
Professor Adler is a contributing editor to Civitas Outlook and a regular contributor to the popular legal blog, The Volokh Conspiracy. A regular commentator on constitutional and regulatory issues, he has appeared on numerous radio and television programs, ranging from the PBS Newshour and National Public Radio to the Fox News Channel and Entertainment Tonight.
Professor Adler is a senior fellow at the Property & Environment Research Center in Bozeman, Montana. In 2018, Professor Adler was elected to membership in the American Law Institute and helped co-found the organization Checks and Balances. In 2024, Professor Adler was appointed a public member of the Administrative Conference of the United States.
Professor Adler clerked for the Honorable David B. Sentelle on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.
Executive Director, Alliance For Consumers; President & CEO, American Juris Link
O.H. Skinner is the President & CEO of American Juris Link, a nonprofit dedicated to accelerating nonprofit litigation to advance freedom, liberty, and the rule of law. O.H. has a long track record in facilitating strategic nonprofit litigation in his role as the Executive Director at Alliance For Consumers as well as from his time serving Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich in senior positions, including as Arizona Solicitor General. O.H. is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and Harvard Law School. Prior to joining the Arizona Attorney General's Office, O.H. practiced at WilmerHale and Ropes & Gray in Boston, and clerked for the Hon. J.L. Edmondson of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. In 2023, O.H. was a Wasserstein Public Interest Fellow at Harvard Law School, where he counseled students as a Harvard-identified “outstanding public interest attorney.”
Partner, Luther Strange & Associates
Annie Donaldson Talley is Partner at Luther Strange and Associates. She recently departed the White House after serving as Deputy Assistant to the President and Deputy Counsel to the President. Over the past four years, she provided outside counsel to the Donald J. Trump for President campaign; helped stand up and manage the White House Counsel’s Office; interfaced with agencies across the federal government; and advised the President of the United States, White House Counsel, Chief of Staff and other senior staff across the Executive Office of the President on a broad range of issues from regulatory reform to executive nominations to the day-to-day issues facing the Administration.
Prior to her White House service, Annie Donaldson Talley counseled clients in the non-profit, for-profit, political, and government sectors, as well as high-profile individuals in private practice at Jones Day and Patton Boggs. She provided strategic counseling to clients structuring their affairs to ensure compliance with a web of state and federal laws and represented clients in complex, multi-faceted investigations, leading teams navigating issues of intense public scrutiny.
Annie Donaldson Talley is also a veteran of three presidential campaigns and served in state government. She holds a B.A., summa cum laude, from the University of Alabama and a J.D. from Harvard Law School, where she served on the Harvard Law Review. She lives in Montgomery, Alabama with her husband, Brett.
Solicitor General, West Virginia
Michael Williams is the Solicitor General for the State of West Virginia. In that role, Michael represents the State in appeals before state and federal courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court. Michael also coordinates strategic affirmative litigation on the State’s behalf, including litigation against the federal government.
Before joining the Attorney General’s Office, Michael co-led the complex briefing and appeals group at a Michigan boutique firm, representing Fortune 50 companies and others in actions across the country. He also practiced in the litigation groups of two Washington, D.C. firms and clerked with the Appellate Division of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Maine.
Michael’s work has been honored with a Best Brief Award from the National Associationof Attorneys General and a Leader in the Law Award from Michigan Lawyers Weekly. He often speaks and writes on appellate-related issues.
Michael clerked twice in the Fourth Circuit: once with then-Chief Judge Deborah Chasanow of the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland and later with Judge G. Steven Agee of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. He attended George Washington University Law School and Bates College.
Executive Director, Committee for Justice
Ashley Baker is Executive Director of the Committee for Justice and founder of the Alliance on Antitrust coalition. Her work focuses on antitrust law, technology regulation, administrative-agency authority, the Supreme Court, and judicial nominations. She closely follows the Federal Trade Commission and the Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division, with particular attention to merger review, agency procedure, and the effects of regulation on American innovation and competitiveness. She is also founder of the Alliance on Antitrust Coalition.
Ashley has testified before the United States Senate on antitrust law. Her writing has appeared in Fox News, USA Today, The Boston Globe, The Hill, RealClearPolitics, The American Spectator, and other national publications. She also provides policy analysis through congressional testimony and correspondence, regulatory comments, and public commentary.
Ashley serves on the Federalist Society’s Regulatory Transparency Project and Antitrust and Consumer Protection Practice Group Executive Committee. She is also active in the Republican National Lawyers Association and has spoken on the Supreme Court and the federal judiciary. An authority on the judicial-confirmation process, she worked closely on the successful confirmation efforts for Justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh, as well as multiple federal appellate judges.
Associate Attorney, Gibson Dunn
Logan Billman is an associate in the Washington, D.C. office of Gibson Dunn and a member of the firm’s Litigation Department. His practice focuses on antitrust and competition law, including merger investigations and conduct matters before the Federal Trade Commission, the U.S. Department of Justice Antitrust Division, and state attorneys general. Logan represents clients in complex private and government antitrust litigation and has significant experience in FTC merger challenges, including litigating and counseling clients through all phases of agency enforcement proceedings. His practice spans strategic counseling, investigative compliance, and trial advocacy in high-stakes competition matters. Logan received his J.D. from Georgetown University Law Center, magna cum laude and Order of the Coif, where he served as Managing Editor of the Georgetown Journal of Law & Public Policy. During law school, he interned with the U.S. Department of Justice Antitrust Division and the Federal Trade Commission. He earned a B.A. in Economics from American University.
Senior Advisor for Competition and International Affairs, Office of Chairman Andrew N. Ferguson, FTC
Partner and Co-Founder, Simonsen Sussman LLP
Shaoul is a Partner and Co-Founder of Simonsen Sussman LLP and a seasoned antitrust practitioner with extensive experience in private and government practice.
Most recently, Shaoul served as the Associate Director for Litigation in the Bureau of Competition at the Federal Trade Commission. During his tenure, he oversaw the Bureau’s expansive litigation portfolio, focusing on strategic case development and successful outcomes. During his time in the Bureau’s Front Office, Shaoul worked on several high-profile and complex cases including the Kroger-Albertsons merger challenge, which addressed consolidation in the retail grocery sector, and the FTC’s lawsuit to unwind Illumina's acquisition of Grail in the Fifth Circuit, the first successful challenge to a vertical merger in 40 years. Additionally, Shaoul played an instrumental role in the FTC’s landmark monopolization case against Meta.
Apart from his litigation work at FTC, Shaoul played a pivotal role in shaping the FTC and DOJ 2023 Merger Guidelines, which introduced new measures aimed at addressing market consolidation and modernizing merger enforcement standards to reflect contemporary market realities and economics. Shaoul led the efforts to reform the premerger notification process under the Hart-Scott-Rodino (HSR) Act. These reforms, which came into effect in 2025, included significant updates to streamline filing procedures, improve transparency, and strengthen regulatory oversight to ensure compliance with evolving antitrust laws. Shaoul also led the drafting of several amicus briefs filed by the U.S. government in landmark antitrust cases, including the FTC’s amicus brief during the remedy phase of the Epic v. Google case, which was cited favorably by the court.
Shaoul previously served as Attorney Advisor to former FTC Chair Lina Khan. Prior to his roles at the FTC, Shaoul was in private practice and served as a legal fellow at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. Shaoul holds a J.D. from Fordham University and a B.A. from Bard College Berlin.
Shaoul serves on the board of the American Economic Liberties Project and as a Senior Advisor at Columbia Law School, where he focuses on academic antitrust research, exploring innovative approaches to competition policy, and modern market dynamics.
Executive Director, Center for Election Confidence
Lisa L. Dixon serves as the Executive Director of the Center for Election Confidence (formerly known as Lawyers Democracy Fund). Lisa is also a consultant for the Republican National Lawyers Association, serving as their Legal Counsel. Previously, Lisa practiced at Holtzman Vogel, where she specialized in tax-exempt organizations, campaign finance and election law, and lobbying compliance.
During law school, she interned for the Office of Chief Counsel, Procedure and Administration, at the Internal Revenue Service and at the Center for Law and Religious Freedom. Before law school, she served as the Assistant Student Division Director at The Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies and interned at The Heritage Foundation’s Center for Legal and Judicial Studies.
Lisa earned a J.D. from the University of Virginia School of Law, an M.A. in History from the University of Virginia, and a B.A. in History from Hillsdale College. After 18 years on the East Coast, mostly in northern Virginia, she recently returned to her native Michigan, where she lives with her husband and three sons.
Senior Attorney, Pacific Legal Foundation
Oliver Dunford joined the Pacific Legal Foundation in March 2017. He litigates across the country to defend and advance individual liberty and the rule of law. Oliver’s cases involve the separation of powers, economic liberty, property rights, and the First Amendment.
Oliver remains inspired by the Classical Liberal ideals upon which our Founders declared independence and secured the blessings of liberty. The Constitution’s promises, however, are not self-executing. As James Madison explained, “In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.” Oliver feels lucky that his work helps oblige the government to control itself—to the end that all individuals may pursue their rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
Before joining PLF, Oliver clerked at the Ohio Supreme Court and the Ohio Court of Appeals, and spent more than a decade in private practice working on complex commercial litigation. Originally from Cleveland, Oliver is a graduate of the University of Dayton and Cleveland-Marshall College of Law, where he was a managing editor for the Cleveland State Law Review. Oliver is admitted to the state bars of Florida, California, and Ohio, as well as several federal courts including the United States Supreme Court.
Oliver spends all of his free time following the Cleveland Indians.
Partner, Phelps Dunbar LLP
Mike Hurst is a partner with Phelps Dunbar LLP where he optimizes his in-depth knowledge of the court system, investigative and prosecutorial agencies, the regulatory arena, and the public policy realm to help clients facing government investigations, enforcement actions, regulatory matters, general litigation and policy issues. Mike currently serves as the General Counsel of the Republican National Committee and as Chairman of the Mississippi Republican Party. He previously served as the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Mississippi from 2017-2021, and with over 20 years of experience before judges, juries and policy makers, handling some of the largest and most high-profile cases in Mississippi, he's known for untangling the most complex legal issues.
As U.S. Attorney, Mike was described as a “hard charger,” leading efforts to combat violent crime, human trafficking and public corruption, among many other issues, throughout Mississippi. He almost tripled prosecutions in the U.S. Attorney’s Office over a three-year period, resulting in the most indictments and federal defendants indicted in a one-year period in Mississippi history. He created innovative and national award-winning crime-fighting solutions, like “Project EJECT,” and he established the first statewide, multilevel and multidisciplinary human trafficking body, the Mississippi Human Trafficking Council, to comprehensively and holistically address this criminal scourge.
During his tenure as U.S. Attorney, Mike oversaw some of the biggest cases in Mississippi history: the largest health care fraud scheme (Wade Walters, et. al.), the largest Ponzi scheme (Lamar Adams), the largest False Claims Act health care fraud settlement (Region 8), and the largest nursing home False Claim Act settlement (Hyperion). In addition, as Chief Federal Law Enforcement Officer for the Southern District, Mike coordinated the largest single-state immigration worksite enforcement operation in our nation’s history, involving hundreds of federal law enforcement agents covering seven different locations operated by multiple companies.
Mike’s no show pony – he’s a work horse. Before his tenure as U.S. Attorney, Mike was an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Mississippi for more than eight years. He handled some of the most difficult and complex cases in that office, dealing with white collar crimes, public corruption and financial fraud, including numerous jury trials before almost every federal judge in the Southern District.
He also has experience in the private sector. He has practiced law in Washington, D.C., and has served as a litigator and general counsel for a conservative nonprofit. He also has extensive experience in public policy, having served as the Legislative Director to a U.S. Congressman and as Counsel to the House Judiciary Committee.
Mike has also testified before both the United States Senate and the U.S. House of Representatives on issues ranging from crime to Presidential pardons. He has worked on all sides of the legal, regulatory, investigative, prosecutorial and policy spectrum. The incredible insight gained from this varied experience enables him to find a path forward for clients, no matter how complicated the case.
Senior Litigation Counsel, Washington Legal Foundation
Zac joined WLF in 2025 as Senior Litigation Counsel. In that role, he regularly represents WLF and other clients as counsel of record in cases before the U.S. Supreme Court and the federal appellate courts. Before arriving at WLF, Zac served as counsel to Commissioner Allen Dickerson of the Federal Election Commission. Zac also spent eight years litigating First Amendment cases as a staff attorney for the Institute for Free Speech, where he represented clients in federal and state cases across the country. He received his J.D. from George Mason University’s School of Law, where he participated in GMU’s Wiley Rein Supreme Court clinic.
Solicitor General, Iowa Office of the Attorney General
Eric Wessan serves as Iowa’s Solicitor General in the Iowa Attorney General’s Office. In that role, Wessan leads Iowa’s litigation before State and federal appellate courts, including the Iowa and U.S. Supreme Courts. Before that role, Wessan worked on complex commercial litigation at two large law firms in Chicago. Wessan also served as a law clerk for the Honorable James C. Ho on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and for the Honorable John F. Kness on the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. Wessan is a graduate of the University of Chicago Law School, with honors, and of the University of Chicago.
Director, Project on Criminal Justice, Cato Institute
Matthew Cavedon is the Director of the Cato Institute’s Project on Criminal Justice. He focuses on reforming plea-driven mass adjudication, ensuring police accountability, and defending constitutional criminal originalism. Cavedon’s scholarship has been published (or is forthcoming in) publications including the Arizona State Law Journal, Cato Supreme Court Review, Seattle University Law Review, and Georgetown Journal of Law and Public Policy. Formerly a Georgia public defender and fellow at the Institute for Justice, Cavedon has taught law school courses on criminal law and procedure, as well as the First Amendment. Cavedon clerked for a U.S. district court and the Supreme Court of Georgia. He came to Cato following a fellowship at the Emory University Center for the Study of Law and Religion.
Senior Counsel, Chair, Religious Institutions and Education Practice Groups, First Liberty Institute
Jeremy Dys, Esq., is Senior Counsel for First Liberty.
Dys earned his law degree from West Virginia University College of Law in 2005. After law school, Dys clerked for the Hon. Russell M. Clawges, Jr., chief judge of the Circuit Court of Monongalia County in Morgantown, West Virginia. For six years prior to joining First Liberty Institute, Dys led a public policy organization where he led research and advocacy efforts on matters of life, marriage, and religious freedom.
Dys graduated from Taylor University in 2001 with a Bachelor of Arts, cum laude, degree in Communication Studies, with minors in U.S. History and Philosophy. During his undergraduate career, Dys studied at the American Studies Program in Washington, D.C., where he interned with the late David Orgon Coolidge as part of the Marriage Law Project of the Ethics and Public Policy Center.
In support of his clients, Dys has made numerous appearances in local, state, and national television, print, and radio outlets. His written commentaries have been featured at the Wall Street Journal, FoxNews.com, New York Daily News, TheHill.com, Des Moines Register, Dallas Morning News, DailySignal.com, Washington Examiner, Indianapolis Star, Charleston Gazette-Mail, Outcomes Magazine, TheFederalist.com, and others.
Supreme Court & Appellate Litigation Chair, Lex Politica; Of Counsel, Alliance Defending Freedom
Erin Morrow Hawley serves as Chair of Lex Politica's Supreme Court and Appellate Practice overseeing the firm’s strategic appellate litigation and critical motions practice in the trial courts. Erin is an experienced litigator who represents clients in constitutional, regulatory, and appellate matters in federal and state courts throughout the country.
Erin has represented dozens of clients before the Supreme Court of the United States, served as lead counsel in high-profile cases raising novel constitutional and statutory issues, and authored numerous successful petitions for certiorari and briefs in opposition. She has argued in state and federal appellate and trial courts throughout the country, including the Supreme Court of the United States. Erin represents diverse clients in high-stakes litigation from state governments to faith-based nonprofits to Fortune 100 companies. She possesses expertise on a wide range of subject matters including administrative law, the First Amendment, religious liberty, federal jurisdiction, federal preemption, equitable jurisdiction, tax law, the Affordable Care Act, and Title IX.
Erin represents clients in cases where public communications strategy is paramount. She is a sought-after speaker and writer, has testified multiple times before Congress, and is a frequent presenter on constitutional and administrative law issues, including at the Oxford Union, the National Federalist Society Convention, and university campuses across the country. She is a frequent commentator to media outlets, including Fox News, MSNBC, the Wall Street Journal, WORLD, USA Today, the Federalist, and the Hill.
Erin previously oversaw Alliance Defending Freedom’s--where she still serves as Of Counsel--litigation strategies to empower women and protect the dignity of life, defend pregnancy centers’ First Amendment rights from government overreach, and safeguard Americans’ freedoms from the ever-encroaching administrative state.
Vice President for Legal Strategy, Stand Together
Casey Mattox is Vice President for Legal Strategy at Stand Together and Senior Advisor at
Americans for Prosperity. In these roles he advocates for and creates strategies and
partnerships to ensure a constitutionally limited government that protects the civil liberties of all
Americans. Prior to joining Stand Together and AFP Casey’s legal career focused on defending
the First Amendment rights of students, faculty, healthcare workers and religious organizations.
Casey has a J.D. from Boston College School of Law and an undergraduate degree from the
University of Virginia. You can find him on Twitter at @CaseyMattox_ and on LinkedIn at
@Casey-Mattox-ST.
Executive Director, Committee for Justice
Ashley Baker is Executive Director of the Committee for Justice and founder of the Alliance on Antitrust coalition. Her work focuses on antitrust law, technology regulation, administrative-agency authority, the Supreme Court, and judicial nominations. She closely follows the Federal Trade Commission and the Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division, with particular attention to merger review, agency procedure, and the effects of regulation on American innovation and competitiveness. She is also founder of the Alliance on Antitrust Coalition.
Ashley has testified before the United States Senate on antitrust law. Her writing has appeared in Fox News, USA Today, The Boston Globe, The Hill, RealClearPolitics, The American Spectator, and other national publications. She also provides policy analysis through congressional testimony and correspondence, regulatory comments, and public commentary.
Ashley serves on the Federalist Society’s Regulatory Transparency Project and Antitrust and Consumer Protection Practice Group Executive Committee. She is also active in the Republican National Lawyers Association and has spoken on the Supreme Court and the federal judiciary. An authority on the judicial-confirmation process, she worked closely on the successful confirmation efforts for Justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh, as well as multiple federal appellate judges.
Associate Attorney, Gibson Dunn
Logan Billman is an associate in the Washington, D.C. office of Gibson Dunn and a member of the firm’s Litigation Department. His practice focuses on antitrust and competition law, including merger investigations and conduct matters before the Federal Trade Commission, the U.S. Department of Justice Antitrust Division, and state attorneys general. Logan represents clients in complex private and government antitrust litigation and has significant experience in FTC merger challenges, including litigating and counseling clients through all phases of agency enforcement proceedings. His practice spans strategic counseling, investigative compliance, and trial advocacy in high-stakes competition matters. Logan received his J.D. from Georgetown University Law Center, magna cum laude and Order of the Coif, where he served as Managing Editor of the Georgetown Journal of Law & Public Policy. During law school, he interned with the U.S. Department of Justice Antitrust Division and the Federal Trade Commission. He earned a B.A. in Economics from American University.
Senior Advisor for Competition and International Affairs, Office of Chairman Andrew N. Ferguson, FTC
Partner and Co-Founder, Simonsen Sussman LLP
Shaoul is a Partner and Co-Founder of Simonsen Sussman LLP and a seasoned antitrust practitioner with extensive experience in private and government practice.
Most recently, Shaoul served as the Associate Director for Litigation in the Bureau of Competition at the Federal Trade Commission. During his tenure, he oversaw the Bureau’s expansive litigation portfolio, focusing on strategic case development and successful outcomes. During his time in the Bureau’s Front Office, Shaoul worked on several high-profile and complex cases including the Kroger-Albertsons merger challenge, which addressed consolidation in the retail grocery sector, and the FTC’s lawsuit to unwind Illumina's acquisition of Grail in the Fifth Circuit, the first successful challenge to a vertical merger in 40 years. Additionally, Shaoul played an instrumental role in the FTC’s landmark monopolization case against Meta.
Apart from his litigation work at FTC, Shaoul played a pivotal role in shaping the FTC and DOJ 2023 Merger Guidelines, which introduced new measures aimed at addressing market consolidation and modernizing merger enforcement standards to reflect contemporary market realities and economics. Shaoul led the efforts to reform the premerger notification process under the Hart-Scott-Rodino (HSR) Act. These reforms, which came into effect in 2025, included significant updates to streamline filing procedures, improve transparency, and strengthen regulatory oversight to ensure compliance with evolving antitrust laws. Shaoul also led the drafting of several amicus briefs filed by the U.S. government in landmark antitrust cases, including the FTC’s amicus brief during the remedy phase of the Epic v. Google case, which was cited favorably by the court.
Shaoul previously served as Attorney Advisor to former FTC Chair Lina Khan. Prior to his roles at the FTC, Shaoul was in private practice and served as a legal fellow at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. Shaoul holds a J.D. from Fordham University and a B.A. from Bard College Berlin.
Shaoul serves on the board of the American Economic Liberties Project and as a Senior Advisor at Columbia Law School, where he focuses on academic antitrust research, exploring innovative approaches to competition policy, and modern market dynamics.
A Seat at the Sitting - March 2026
Lisa L. Dixon, Oliver Dunford, Mike Hurst, Zac Morgan, Eric Wessan
Each month, a panel of constitutional experts convenes to discuss the Court’s upcoming docket sitting...
A Seat at the Sitting - March 2026
Topics
Professor J. Joel Alicea Named 37th Recipient of the Federalist Society’s Joseph Story Award
The Federalist Society is delighted to announce that Professor J. Joel Alicea of The Catholic...
Prof. J. Joel Alicea's Remarks Upon Receiving Joseph Story Award
J. Joel Alicea
Thank you to Sheldon Gilbert, Lee Otis, and the award committee for this tremendous honor....
FACE Act
Matthew P. Cavedon, Jeremy Dys, Erin M. Hawley, Casey Mattox
Is the FACE Act being enforced as Congress originally intended or has its selected application...
FACE Act
Friend or Foe?
The FTC’s Pre-Merger Notification Rule on Appeal
Why Adam Smith Still Matters: 250 Years of The Wealth of Nations
Robin P. Malloy, Maria P. Paganelli, Dean Reuter, Vernon L. Smith
Published in the same pivotal year as the Declaration of Independence, An Inquiry into the...
Suncor Energy v. Boulder County: Federalism, Judicial Power, and the Future of Climate Litigation
Jonathan H. Adler, O.H. Skinner, Annie Donaldson Talley, Michael R. Williams
In Suncor Energy, Inc., v. Commissioners of Boulder County, the Supreme Court will consider whether...
The FTC’s Pre-Merger Notification Rule on Appeal
Ashley Baker, Logan Billman, Maxwell Gottschall, Jana Seidl, Shaoul Sussman
The Federal Trade Commission’s recent overhaul of the Hart-Scott-Rodino Act (HSR) premerger notification rule represents...