Braden Boucek serves as the Director of Litigation for Southeastern Legal Foundation.

Braden is a seasoned constitutional litigator and is proud to have spent over two decades fighting for liberty and the rule of law. 

In his role as Director of Litigation, Braden manages litigation and advises on policy for Southeastern Legal Foundation. Prior to joining SLF in 2021, Braden was the Vice President for Legal Affairs at a state-based public interest law firm and policy center. For nearly 14 years before joining the freedom-based law movement, Braden served as a state and federal prosecutor in the Nashville and Memphis areas. While serving at the Justice Department, he was singled out for special recognition on multiple occasions. Braden has successfully litigated jury trials at both the state and federal level and argued dozens of cases before state and federal appellate courts. He received his undergraduate degree from the University of Richmond and his law degree from Florida State University College of Law. 

Both in and out of the courtroom, Braden works to promote individual liberty, the rule of law, and accountability in government. He regularly testifies before state legislatures, has drafted model legislation, and publishes legal scholarship. Braden is a recognized constitutional scholar, frequent speaker, commentator, and published author. His work and that of Southeastern Legal Foundation is regularly covered by national media and you will frequently hear or see him on the radio, podcasts, and television. 

Braden is an active member of the Federalist Society where he serves as an expert on the Federalist Society’s Regulatory Transparency Project State and local Working Group. He is also an active member of his community and church. He lives in the Nashville area with his wife and two children.
 

David A. Cortman serves as senior counsel and vice president of U.S. litigation with Alliance Defending Freedom. He joined ADF in 2005 and currently supervises a team of nearly 40 attorneys and legal staff who specialize in constitutional law, focusing on religious freedom, sanctity of life, and marriage and family.

Cortman has successfully litigated hundreds of constitutional law cases in all levels of federal and state court. He has also argued cases in the U.S. Supreme Court, most recently in Trinity Lutheran Church v. Comer, securing a 7-2 victory that challenged Missouri’s denial of a church’s participation in a playground resurfacing program solely because the church is a religious organization. Cortman also argued Reed v. Town of Gilbert, securing a 9-0 ruling that prohibits the government from discriminating against religious speech while favoring political speech. He has served as lead counsel in Conestoga Wood Specialties v. Burwell, successfully challenging Obamacare’s abortion pill mandate, which forces employers to provide healthcare coverage that includes abortion-inducing drugs in violation of their religious convictions; ACSTO v. Winn, successfully defending Arizona’s school choice tuition tax credit program; and Geneva College v. Burwell and Southern Nazarene University v. Burwell, challenging the abortion pill mandate as applied to non-profit religious organizations. He was co-counsel in Town of Greece v. Galloway, successfully defending the freedom of Americans to pray at public meetings.

Cortman has appeared as a guest and has written opinion pieces for numerous major media outlets. He earned his J.D. from Regent University School of Law in 1996, graduating magna cum laude. He is a member of the state bar in Georgia, Florida, Arizona, and the District of Columbia, and is admitted to practice in over two dozen federal courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court. He also teaches legal courses on the U.S. Constitution and civil rights.

Wen Fa is a senior attorney with Pacific Legal Foundation. He has litigated cases in all of PLF’s practice areas and focuses on equality before the law and free speech. Having immigrated to America from Beijing, Wen believes that individualism and innovation are critical to human flourishing in the United States and around the world. He relishes the opportunity to advance these ideals though his litigation and communication.

Wen was one of the primary attorneys in two of PLF’s recent Supreme Court cases: Minnesota Voters Alliance v. Mansky and Cedar Point Nursery v. Hassid. He has fought to vindicate equality before the law in numerous cases, in which he represented parents and students fighting against racial discrimination in Hartford, St. Louis, and New York. As the Geza and Cynthia Karakas Attorney for Free Speech, Wen represented a university professor, an army veteran, and a gay musician in their challenge to the California Department of Motor Vehicles’ vague prohibition on speech it considers “offensive to good taste and decency.”

In addition to litigation, Wen promotes principles of individualism and opportunity in the court of public opinion. In 2021, he testified before Congress about PLF cases regarding equality before the law. Wen has published op-eds in The Wall Street Journal, San Francisco Chronicle, and City Journal. He has talked about PLF cases in podcasts, on television, and in speeches to students at Georgetown, Berkeley, University of Southern California, and other law schools around the country.

Wen graduated with a bachelor’s degree in finance from the University of Texas-Dallas, a master’s degree in political theory from the London School of Economics, where he studied under libertarian scholar Chandran Kukathas, and a law degree from the University of Michigan. Prior to joining PLF, Wen worked at the Human Rights Initiative and the Austin chapter of the Institute for Justice. Wen is licensed to practice law in California, Texas, and several federal district and appellate courts, including the Supreme Court of the United States.

When he’s not hard at work, Wen enjoys playing and watching sports, listening to podcasts, and traveling. Wen lives in Northern California with two dogs and a mischievous cat, who he found and rescued from a Green Acres parking lot in 2018.

Sam is General Counsel and Litigation Director for the Kansas Justice Institute. He is responsible for developing and implementing the Institute’s comprehensive litigation strategy.

Sam has litigated in state and federal courts since 2006. He has sued governments who overstepped their bounds in matters involving free speech and unlawful intrusions; defended countless people against the government; and fought to protect the rights of citizens, so they remain free to pursue the lives they wish.
 
Creativity and passion are his hallmarks and firmly believes that if you do not fight for your rights, you will lose them.
 
Sam was raised in Leawood, Kansas. He earned his Political Science and Juris Doctor degrees from the University of Kansas.

Charles “Cully” Stimson is a widely recognized policy expert in crime control, national security, immigration, homeland security, and drug policy at The Heritage Foundation. Stimson is Deputy Director of the Edwin Meese III Center for Legal and Judicial Studies, Manager of the National Security Law Program, Senior Legal Fellow, and Senior Advisor to the President. He has also served as the Chief of Staff at Heritage three times and ran the transition for three Heritage presidential changes of command.

Before joining the think tank in 2007, Stimson served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Detainee Affairs. He advised then-Secretaries of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and Robert Gates and coordinated the Pentagon’s global detention policy and operations, including at Guantanamo Bay and in Iraq and Afghanistan.

An accomplished trial lawyer, Stimson worked as a prosecutor in San Diego, Maryland, and as an Assistant United States Attorney in the United States Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia. As a prosecutor, he concentrated on violent crimes such as homicide, sexual assault and domestic violence.

A third-generation naval officer, Cully served in the Navy Judge Advocate General’s Corps (JAG) for 30 years, including three tours on active duty. During his active duty and reserve career, he served as a military defense counsel, prosecutor, as Deputy Chief Judge of the Navy-Marine Corps Trial Judiciary, and the Commanding Officer of the Preliminary Hearing Unit among other assignments. He retired from the Navy JAG Corps as a Captain on February 1, 2022, after 30 years of service.

Stimson holds a law degree from the George Mason University School of Law, where he later taught as an Adjunct Professor of Law. He is a graduate of Kenyon College, where he was Captain of the men’s varsity soccer team and an All-Conference player. He also studied at Harvard and Exeter universities. An avid soccer player and triathlete, he serves as Chairman of the Board of the United States Soccer Foundation, the charitable giving arm of U.S. Soccer.

Chris Schandevel serves as senior counsel on Alliance Defending Freedom’s Appellate Advocacy Team. In that role, he represents ADF clients of all stripes at the appellate level, preserving lower-court victories and seeking to overturn unjust results.

Among other clients, he has represented a faith-based pregnancy resource center and adoption agency, a Christian photographer, a college student and conservative student group, a former Planned Parenthood clinic manager, female track-and-field athletes, and a high-school French teacher. Schandevel also was on the team of attorneys who successfully represented the Thomas More Law Center in the U.S. Supreme Court. And he regularly represents clients in friend-of-the-court briefs filed in state and federal appellate courts and in the U.S. Supreme Court.

Before joining ADF, Schandevel served as an assistant attorney general in the Criminal Appeals Section at the Office of the Attorney General of Virginia. During his five years in that office, Schandevel briefed and argued 14 appeals in the Supreme Court of Virginia and more than 60 appeals in the Court of Appeals of Virginia. Before his time at the Virginia attorney general’s office, Schandevel clerked for the Honorable Stephen R. McCullough on the Court of Appeals of Virginia.

Schandevel earned his J.D. from the University of Virginia School of Law in 2012. During law school, he founded a student organization called Advocates for Life at Virginia Law. He also completed ADF’s Blackstone Legal Fellowship and was commissioned as a Blackstone Fellow in 2010 after an internship with ADF’s Center for Life. Schandevel earned his B.A. in Social Work from Harding University in 2009.

A member of the state bar of Virginia, Schandevel is admitted to practice before the U.S. Supreme Court and various state and federal trial and appellate courts.

Nick Reaves joined Becket as Counsel in 2018. His practice focuses on First Amendment and appellate litigation. While at Becket, Nick has worked on precedent-setting religious liberty cases nationwide. Nick provided crucial support to a Buddhist prisoner who was denied his First Amendment rights in the execution chamber, was counsel of record on an amicus brief supporting the right of a Muslim prisoner to observe Ramadan, and represented a Seventh-day Adventist fired by Walmart for requesting a Sabbath accommodation. In 2022, Nick joined the Yale Law School as a Visiting Clinical Lecturer in Law. Nick’s academic writings have been published by the Yale Law Journal Forum, the Notre Dame Law Review, and the Virginia Journal of Social Policy & the Law, among others.

Before joining Becket, Nick was a litigation associate at Jones Day in Washington, D.C. His practice included both appellate and trial court litigation. While at the firm, Nick argued cases in both the federal appellate and district courts, helped counsel clients in numerous bet-the-company matters, took a religious asylum case to trial, and oversaw a sensitive internal investigation which could have exposed a Fortune 100 company to billions of dollars in liability. Nick also clerked on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit.

Nick graduated from the University of Virginia School of Law in 2015. He served on the Managing Board of the Virginia Law Review and was elected to the Order of the Coif (graduating in the top 10% of the class). While in law school, Nick published a note on crisis chaplaincy programs which won first prize in a nationwide writing competition. He also participated in the Supreme Court Litigation Clinic at the University of Virginia and studied legal ethics in Germany and Poland as part of the Fellowship at Auschwitz for the Study of Professional Ethics. Nick graduated magna cum laude with a double major in Economics and Political Science in the Glynn Family Honors Program at the University of Notre Dame.

“Mollie Ziegler Hemingway is a senior editor at The Federalist. She is Senior Journalism Fellow at Hillsdale College. A Fox News contributor, she is a regular member of the Fox News All-Stars panel on “Special Report with Bret Baier.” Her work has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, USA Today, the Los Angeles Times, the Guardian, the Washington Post, CNN, National Review, GetReligion, Ricochet, Christianity Today, Federal Times, Radio & Records, and many other publications. Mollie was a 2004 recipient of a Phillips Foundation Journalism Fellowship and a 2014 Lincoln Fellow of the Claremont Institute. She is the co-author of the book Justice on Trial: The Kavanaugh Confirmation and the Future of the Court.”

Rob Bluey oversees The Heritage Foundation’s communications strategy, leading an award-winning team that excels at rapid response, multimedia productions, compelling storytelling, and effective marketing.

As vice president of communications at Heritage, Bluey is responsible for building innovative media campaigns and digital assets that reach millions of people with conservative policy solutions. Under this leadership, he has significantly expanded Heritage’s digital footprint, earning the No. 1 ranking among think tanks for best use of internet and social media.

Bluey, an accomplished journalist, is the founding editor of The Daily Signal, a respected source of policy-based news and analysis. It was launched by Heritage in June 2014 to provide insightful, credible reporting and influential commentary on policy issues from a conservative perspective. He currently serves as executive editor and co-host of “The Daily Signal Podcast.”

Combining his background in journalism with a passion for communications, Bluey’s goal is to strengthen Heritage’s position as the go-to policy organization with solutions to America’s biggest issues. His team is responsible for promoting the think tank’s content to traditional media outlets as well as digital platforms—from Facebook and Twitter to Instagram and YouTube.

Since becoming vice president of communications in 2017, Bluey has expanded Heritage’s role in marketing and multimedia. He oversaw a $1.1 million national advertising campaign in advance of the 2020 election and bolstered Heritage’s reach with documentary storytelling and 10 podcast shows.

Heritage President Kay C. James honored him with the President’s Award in 2018. “He built a team that is remarkable for its can-do spirit, positive energy, and fantastic output. And he did all of this with a smile on his face and a laugh not too far behind," James said. “Our communications department is a true resource for, and inspiration to, the entire conservative movement.”

Bluey joined Heritage in 2007 after five years as a reporter and editor in Washington, D.C.

While reporting for Cybercast News Service, he was the first journalist to challenge the authenticity of documents used by CBS News anchor Dan Rather in 2004 to question President Bush’s service in the Texas Air National Guard.

As online editor of Human Events, he transformed it into a popular destination for conservative journalism. He also served as managing editor of the venerable print edition of the newspaper.

Bluey also served as a journalism fellow at the Student Press Law Center, where he helped student journalists and educators facing censorship and promoted press freedom.

Upon joining Heritage, Bluey’s first assignment was as liaison to conservative bloggers and host of the Bloggers Briefing, a weekly meeting he co-founded in 2006. Within a year, he was named editor-in-chief of Heritage.org and oversaw creation of the rapid-response policy blog, The Foundry, and its daily e-newsletter, Morning Bell.

“He’s an online entrepreneurial genius,” Terry Jeffery, Cybercast News Service editor-in-chief, told Politics magazine. “He’s taught people how to bypass the establishment media, and that’s been so valuable to the conservative movement.”

In 2012, he co-founded the Future of Journalism Summit and Breitbart Awards in partnership with the Franklin Center for Government & Public Integrity.

Bluey serves on the board of visitors for The Fund for American Studies’ journalism and communications program. He frequently speaks about journalism and communications. Campaigns & Elections magazine named him a “Rising Star” in 2008. Politico placed him among Washington’s “Top 50 Politicos.”

In 2018, America’s Future recognized him with the Buckley Award. “Rob has made a significant impact in spreading the ideas of liberty and free markets across the nation, reaching new and wider audiences through his work at The Heritage Foundation and the founding of its multimedia arm, The Daily Signal.”

Bluey was born and raised near Utica, N.Y. He graduated from Ithaca College, and was editor of its award-winning newspaper, The Ithacan.

He currently resides in Northern Virginia with his wife and three children. He’s enjoyed giving back to his community, serving as a warden at his church, youth baseball coach, and volunteer sports photographer.

Aaron Rice serves as the Director of the Mississippi Justice Institute and is passionate about the vital role the Constitution plays in protecting our most precious freedoms.

After the September 11 terrorist attacks, Aaron felt called to serve his country. He joined the Marine Corps and was deployed to Iraq with the 3rd Battalion, 25th Marines; the battalion would go on to suffer the highest number of casualties of any in the Iraq war. Aaron received the Purple Heart for sustaining combat injuries that resulted in the loss of his left leg below the knee.

Upon returning home, Aaron earned a degree in political science from Mississippi State University and was awarded the national Truman Scholarship to pursue his graduate studies. He earned his law degree from the University of Mississippi School of Law, where he developed an interest in constitutional law.

In 2008, Aaron was elected to serve as a Delegate to the Republican National Convention. He also served on campaigns for Governor Haley Barbour and Senator Roger Wicker.
Prior to joining the Mississippi Justice Institute, Aaron built his career as a litigation attorney at a nationally recognized law firm in Mississippi. Aaron is a Fellow of the American Board of Trial Advocates (ABOTA) National Trial College at Harvard Law School, and a Graduate of the International Association of Defense Counsel (IADC) Trial Academy at Stanford Law School. He is also a recipient of the 2019 Buckley Award in recognition for his leadership in the conservative movement and has been named one of Mississippi's Top 50 Most Influential leaders.

Aaron is a Deacon at Madison Heights Church, PCA. He and his wife, Kelly, live in Madison with their four children, Clark, Griffin, Ramsey, and Miles.

J. Christian Adams serves as President and General Counsel of the Public Interest Legal Foundation. He is also the founder of the Election Law Center, PLLC. He served from 2005 to 2010 in the Voting Section at the United States Department of Justice. He is the author of the New York Times bestseller Injustice: Exposing the Racial Agenda of the Obama Justice Department which examines the Department’s election and voting rights record.  He litigates election law cases throughout the United States and brought the first private party litigation resulting in the cleanup of corrupted voter rolls under the National Voter Registration Act of 1993. He represented multiple presidential campaigns in election litigation. He successfully litigated the landmark case of United States v. Ike Brown in the Southern District of Mississippi, the first case brought under the Voting Rights Act on behalf of a discriminated-against white minority in Noxubee County. He has handled election cases in twenty states and the territory of Guam. He received the Department of Justice award for outstanding service and numerous other Justice Department performance awards. Prior to his time at the Justice Department, he served as General Counsel to the South Carolina Secretary of State. He also serves as legal editor at PJMedia.com, an internet news publication and appears frequently on Fox News and has appeared at National Review, Breitbart, the Washington Examiner, American Spectator, Washington Times and other publications. He has a law degree from the University of South Carolina School of Law. He is a member of the South Carolina and Virginia Bars.     

John Kramer is widely recognized as freedom’s PR man.

Since joining the Institute for Justice in 1992, Kramer’s strategic media relations work—coupled with IJ’s litigation—has protected homes and small businesses nationwide from eminent domain abuse, and secured the rights of entrepreneurs to earn an honest living when the government sought to shut them out.  Kramer’s work in the court of public opinion helped ensure that First Amendment protections were extended to the Internet and he directed the successful PR effort to strike down a federal law that made it a felony to compensate bone marrow donors—a victory that has the potential to save thousands of American lives each year.

Applying market-based principles, he has helped the Institute for Justice and many organizations across the Freedom Movement to personalize, humanize and dramatize their stories of individual liberty thereby more effectively conveying them through the mainstream media.  Kramer directed the media relations in 10 landmark U.S. Supreme Court cases:
Zelman v. Simmons-Harris, in which the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of school choice;

• Swedenburg v. Kelly, in which the Supreme Court vindicated economic liberty by permitting the interstate shipment of wine directly to consumers;
• Kelo v. City of New London, the eminent domain case which led to a nationwide backlash against this often-abused power of government;
• District of Columbia v. Heller, in which the Supreme Court struck down D.C.’s ban on hand guns and held that the Second Amendment to the U.S.  Constitution protects an individual’s right to possess a firearm for private use;
• Arizona Christian School Tuition Organization v.  Winn, in which the Supreme Court dismissed a frivolous legal challenge aimed at halting Arizona’s highly successful and popular private school scholarship tax credit program.
• Arizona Freedom Club PAC v. Bennett, in which the Supreme Court struck down the “matching funds” provision of Arizona’s campaign finance “Clean Elections” Act as an unconstitutional violation of free speech.
• Timbs v. Indiana, a unanimous opinion by Justice Ginsburg in which the Court held that the Eighth Amendment’s Excessive Fines Clause applies in state and local proceedings.  The ruling prohibited states and local governments from imposing excessive fines, fees and forfeitures, just as it prohibits the federal government from doing so.
• Tennessee Wine and Spirits Retailers Association v. Blair, a 7-2 opinion which was a broadside indictment of economic protectionism.  IJ successfully challenged Tennessee’s law that requires someone to reside in the state for two years before they can receive a liquor license and 10 years before that license can be renewed.
• Espinoza v. Montana Department of Revenue, which held that the U.S. Constitution does not allow states to discriminate against religious parents or schools if policymakers choose to enact a private educational choice program to empower parents to choose the educational environment best suited to their own children.
• Brownback v. King, which will decide whether to create a huge loophole that would allow law enforcement officers and other government officials who violate the constitutional rights of Americans to escape accountability for their actions.

In 2018, Kramer received The Thomas Roe Award, the highest honor presented by the State Policy Network in recognition of those whose achievements have greatly advanced the free market philosophy through leadership, innovation and accomplishment in public policy.

His work has appeared in The Wall Street Journal, USA Today and The New York Times, among other news outlets and was featured in the 2017 movie Little Pink House, a major Hollywood movie starring Catherine Keener, which tells the behind-the-scenes story of IJ’s Kelo eminent domain case.  (Kramer and his media relations work are portrayed in the movie.  He was paid a fifth of bourbon for his life rights for the movie, the same amount paid to John Wayne when he appeared on the television show, The Beverly Hillbillies.)

His work spotlighting eminent domain abuse was featured by Mike Wallace on 60 Minutes.  His media relations work, video script writing and billboard campaigns for the Institute for Justice have earned him some of the top awards given by the Public Relations Society of America, the International Association of Business Communicators, the Outdoor Advertising Association of America and other organizations.  Kramer was featured as a “Voice of Authority” on public relations and the law in the nation’s leading public relations textbook, “The Practice of Public Relations,” by Fraser Seitel.

Kramer received a bachelor’s degree in journalism from New Mexico State University. In 2014, NMSU selected him as a distinguished alumnus, an honor given to fewer than 450 alumni since the award’s inception in 1956. He received his graduate training in journalism at the University of Nevada-Reno, where he taught introductory journalism.

In addition to being an accomplished oil painter, Kramer’s acclaimed novel, Blythe—an allegory on the spread of AIDS across society and the search for a cure—was released in 2017.  That novel is now being turned into an opera titled, Isabella.

Kramer is a member of the Cosmos Club in Washington, D.C.

John G. Malcolm oversees The Heritage Foundation’s work to increase understanding of the Constitution and the rule of law as vice president of the Institute for Constitutional Government and director of the think tank’s Edwin Meese III Center for Legal and Judicial Studies.

Malcolm, who also is Heritage’s Ed Gilbertson and Sherry Lindberg Gilbertson senior legal fellow, brings to the challenge a wealth of legal expertise and experience in both the public and private sectors.

Before being named director of the Meese Center in July 2013, Malcolm spearheaded the center’s rule of law programs. His research and writing as senior legal fellow focused on criminal law, immigration, national security, religious liberty and intellectual property.

The Meese Center works to educate government officials, the media and the public about the Constitution and legal principles -- and how they affect public policy. The center was founded in 2001 and overseen until early 2013 by the conservative icon whose name it bears, former Attorney General Edwin Meese III.

In addition to his duties at Heritage, Malcolm is past chairman of the Criminal Law Practice Group of the Federalist Society, and also serves on the board of trustees of the Washington National Opera, and the board of directors of the Legal Services Corporation, which promotes equal access to justice and provides grants for high-quality civil legal assistance to low-income Americans; Boys Town Washington, D.C., which provides homes and services to troubled children and families who are edging toward crisis; and the Barber Family Foundation, which dispenses college scholarship funds to the children of deserving veterans.

Before joining Heritage in 2012, Malcolm was general counsel at the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom as well as a distinguished practitioner in residence at Pepperdine Law School. An independent and bipartisan panel, USCIRF reviews reported violations of religious freedom around the world and makes policy recommendations to the president, the secretary of state and Congress.

From 2004 to 2009, Malcolm was executive vice president and director of worldwide anti-piracy operations for the Motion Picture Association of America.

He served as a deputy assistant attorney general in the Department of Justice’s Criminal Division from 2001 to 2004, where he oversaw sections on computer crime and intellectual property, domestic security, child exploitation and obscenity, and special investigations. Immediately prior to that, he was a founding partner in the Atlanta law firm of Malcolm & Schroeder, LLP.

From 1990 to 1997, Malcolm was an assistant U.S. attorney in Atlanta, assigned to the fraud and public corruption section, and also an associate independent counsel, investigating fraud and abuse in the Department of Housing and Urban Development. He was honored with the Director’s Award for Superior Performance for his work as an assistant U.S. attorney in the successful prosecution of Walter Leroy Moody Jr., who assassinated an 11th Circuit judge and the head of the Savannah chapter of the NAACP.

Malcolm began his law career as a law clerk to a federal district court judge and a federal appellate court judge as well as an associate at the Atlanta-based law firm of Sutherland, Asbill & Brennan (now Eversheds Sutherland).

Malcolm is a graduate of Harvard Law School and holds a bachelor’s degree in economics from Columbia College. Born in New York City, he grew up in Tenafly, N.J. He and his wife, Mary Lee, currently reside in Washington, D.C. They have two adult children, Andy and Amanda.   

Robert “Bob” N. Driscoll counsels corporations, financial institutions, governmental entities, and individuals in judicial proceedings, government and internal investigations, and criminal and civil cases. A former Deputy Assistant Attorney General and Chief of Staff of the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), Bob brings to his practice his substantial governmental and legal experience to advise clients in matters investigated by legislative branch bodies or committees of the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives, as well as executive branch agencies.

Bob advocates for government entities, individuals, and private institutions in civil rights-related litigation and investigations and represents jurisdictions, senior elected officials, and educational institutions targeted by the DOJ. Previously, he was counsel of record and wrote amicus briefs in four civil rights-related matters before the U.S. Supreme Court. Bob also assists corporations, boards of directors, and general committees in answering allegations of wrongdoing raised by whistleblowers or minority shareholders. Bob advises corporate witnesses before relevant bodies, and assists with, and negotiates, subpoenas and other congressional requests for information. Additionally, he conducts internal investigations on behalf of publicly traded and privately held companies and enjoys the mystery-solving aspects of these processes.

Representing individuals involved in prominent investigations, Bob is a seasoned and skilled advocate accustomed to handling matters in the public eye. (Former high profile clients include White House Chief of Staff, Deputy Secretary and General Counsel of Cabinet Agencies, White House Director of Personnel Security, U.S. Special Envoy, U.S. Ambassador, and witnesses in the 2016 election investigation by the Department of Justice Special Counsel and the House and Senate Intelligence Committees, among others.) He has personally testified before House and Senate Committees, which enhances his ability to help his clients prepare for their own testimonies and investigations. Bob places a high premium on putting his clients at ease and guiding them through media-coverage barrages.   

Mr. Vecchione is a Senior Litigation Counsel for the non-profit New Civil Liberties Alliance representing clients against the Administrative State.  He was previously President and CEO of the non-profit Cause of Action Institute, also advancing the constitutional order.  He practiced at a number of D.C. area firms,  including the eponymous John J. Vecchione Law, PLLC.  Mr. Vecchione focuses his practice on strategic litigation in the federal district and appellate courts, including the Supreme Court of the United States. He is an experienced trial and appellate advocate having tried cases and argued appeals across the country. He is a member of the bars of the State of New York, the District of Columbia, and the Commonwealth of Virginia, as well as the Supreme Court of the United States and many federal courts. His cases are reported in scores of published opinions. He has also published pieces advancing the freedom agenda and constitutional order in the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Times and many other forums.  . He lives in Virginia with his wife Rebecca, sons Tommy and Joe.   

Zack is a legal fellow in the Meese Center for Legal and Judicial Studies and co-manager of the Supreme Court and Appellate Advocacy Program 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.

Edwin Meese III, the prominent conservative leader, thinker and elder statesman, continues a quarter-century formal association with The Heritage Foundation as the leading think tank’s Ronald Reagan Distinguished Fellow Emeritus.

In that capacity, Meese oversees special projects and acts as an ambassador for Heritage within the conservative movement.

Meese was chairman of Heritage’s Center for Legal and Judicial Studies from its founding in 2001 until what he calls his “semi-retirement” on Feb. 1, 2013.

He joined Heritage in 1988 as the think tank's first Ronald Reagan Distinguished Fellow -- the only policy chair in the country to be officially named for the 40th president. His work focused on keeping President Reagan’s legacy of conservative principles alive in public debate and discourse.

The legal center now bears his name, in recognition of Meese’s contributions to the rule of law and the nation’s understanding of constitutional law. Its mission is to educate government officials, the media and the public about the Constitution and legal principles -- and how they affect public policy.

Perhaps best known as U.S. attorney general during Reagan’s second term, Meese’s service to the conservative icon stretched from the California governor’s mansion in 1966 to the White House in 1981 before he went to the Department of Justice four years later.

His Heritage “hats” kept Meese among the major conservative voices in national policy debates at an age when most men and women enjoyed quiet retirements.

In 2006, for example, Meese was named to the Iraq Study Group, a special presidential commission dedicated to examining the best resolutions for America's involvement in Iraq. In the past few years he wrote and spoke about constitutional topics ranging from religious liberty to the responsibility of Supreme Court justices.

Immediately after Reagan's death in 2004, and in the years since, Meese often agreed to major media appearances to discuss the lasting impact of his old friend, mentor and boss. He has summarized the Reagan legacy in three accomplishments: Reagan cut taxes and kept them low. He worked to defeat and end the Soviet Union and its worldwide push for communism. And he restored America's faith in itself after years of failure and "malaise."

"I admired him as a leader and cherish his friendship," Meese wrote in a 2004 essay for Heritage members and supporters. "Ronald Reagan had strong convictions. He was committed to the principles that had led to the founding of our nation. And he had the courage to follow his convictions against all odds."

Edwin Meese III was born Dec. 2, 1931, to Edwin Jr. and Leone Meese in Oakland, Calif. He graduated from Yale University in 1953 and holds a law degree from the University of California-Berkeley.

Meese spent much of his adult life working for Reagan, first after the former actor, sports announcer and athlete was elected as California’s governor in 1966 and then when he sought and won the presidency in 1980.

Reagan never forgot Meese's loyalty and hard work. During a press conference at which reporters questioned Meese's actions at the Justice Department, Reagan replied: "If Ed Meese is not a good man, there are no good men."

During the Reagan governorship, Meese served as executive assistant and chief of staff from 1969 through 1974 and as legal affairs secretary from 1967 through 1968. He previously was deputy district attorney in Alameda County, Calif.

From January 1981 to February 1985, Meese held the position of counsellor to the president -- the senior job on the White House staff -- and functioned as Reagan's chief policy adviser. In 1985, he received Government Executive magazine's annual award for excellence in management.

Meese served as the 75th attorney general of the United States from February 1985 to August 1988. As the nation's chief law enforcement officer, he directed the Justice Department and led international efforts to combat terrorism, drug trafficking and organized crime.

Meese’s relationship with Heritage began when he met with senior management to discuss the think tank's landmark policy guide, Mandate for Leadership, prepared for the incoming administration. Meese later recalled that Reagan personally handed out copies of the 1,093-page book to members of his Cabinet and asked them to read it. Nearly two-thirds of Mandate's 2,000 recommendations would be adopted or attempted by the Reagan administration.

More than a decade after joining Heritage, Meese assumed the chairmanship of its Center for Legal and Judicial Studies. Under his guidance, the center counseled White House staffers, Justice Department officials and Senate Judiciary Committee members on the importance of filling judicial vacancies with qualified men and women who are committed to interpreting the Constitution according to the founding document's original meaning.

Meese headed the legal center's Advisory Board for the writing and editing of the best-selling book, The Heritage Guide to the Constitution (Regnery, 2005). In it, 109 experts walked readers through a clause-by-clause analysis of the Constitution. Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) was among those keeping the reference work handy during Judiciary Committee hearings on Supreme Court nominees.

Meese's other books include “Leadership, Ethics and Policing” (Prentice Hall, 2004); “Making America Safer” (Heritage, 1997); and “With Reagan: The Inside Story” (Regnery Gateway, 1992).He wrote the Introduction to a well-received 2010 book on the “overcriminalization” trend, “One Nation Under Arrest,” by Heritage veterans Paul Rosenzweig and Brian W. Walsh.

He also is a distinguished visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University in California and lectures, writes and consults throughout the United States on a variety of subjects.

As both attorney general and counsellor to Reagan, Meese was a member of the Cabinet and the National Security Council. He served as chairman of the Domestic Policy Council and the National Drug Policy Board. After Reagan won the White House in the 1980 election, Meese headed the transition team. During the campaign, he was the Reagan-Bush Committee's senior official.

Meese had a career outside government and politics. From 1977 to 1981, he was a law professor at the University of San Diego, where he also directed the Center for Criminal Justice Policy and Management.

He was an executive in the aerospace and transportation industry as vice president for administration of Rohr Industries Inc. in Chula Vista, Calif. He left Rohr to return to the practice of law, doing corporate and general work in San Diego County.

A retired colonel in the Army Reserve, Meese remains active in numerous civic and educational organizations.

He and his wife, Ursula, have two grown children and reside in McLean, Va.

Roger Clegg is President and General Counsel of the Center for Equal Opportunity. He focuses on legal issues arising from civil rights laws–including the regulatory impact on business and the problems in higher education created by affirmative action. A former Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the Reagan and Bush administrations, Clegg held the second highest positions in both the Civil Rights Division (1987-91) and in the Environment and Natural Resources Division (1991-93). He has held several other positions at the U.S. Justice Department, including Assistant to the Solicitor General (1985-87), Associate Deputy Attorney General (1984-85), and Acting Assistant Attorney General in the Office of Legal Policy (1984). Clegg is a graduate of Yale University Law School (1981). He currently lives in Yorktown, Virginia.

Robert Alt is the president and chief executive officer of The Buckeye Institute, where he also serves on the Board of Trustees.

Alt’s leadership has catalyzed The Buckeye Institute’s exponential growth since he took the organization’s helm in 2012. He is the founder of Buckeye’s Economic Research Center (ERC) and Legal Center.

Alt is a distinguished scholar with particular expertise in legal policy including criminal justice, national security, and constitutional law. Prior to heading The Buckeye Institute, Alt was a director in The Heritage Foundation’s Center for Legal and Judicial Studies under former U.S. Attorney General Edwin Meese III.

Alt is a frequent speaker at universities and law schools across the country, and his writings have appeared in countless publications. Alt is a longtime contributor to National Review Online and its Bench Memos blog. He has provided commentary on CNN, Fox News Channel, PBS and its affiliates, and numerous syndicated radio programs for more than two decades.

In 2004, Alt spent five months in Iraq as a war correspondent.

Alt has testified before Congress multiple times—including at the confirmation hearings for Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan—before the Federal Election Commission regarding matters of constitutional and administrative law, and before numerous state legislatures and committees.

Alt serves on the Federalist Society’s Columbus Lawyers Chapter Board, and previously taught national security law, criminal law, and legislation at Case Western Reserve University School of Law.

Alt earned his J.D. from The University of Chicago Law School, where he was Symposium Editor and the winner of the Mulroy Prize for Excellence in Appellate Advocacy as well as research assistant to renowned law professor Richard Epstein. Following law school, Alt clerked for Judge Alice Batchelder on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. Alt graduated with his B.A. in political science and philosophy magna cum laude from Azusa Pacific University where he won the Outstanding Senior Award in Political Science.

Kimberly Hermann serves as General Counsel for Southeastern Legal Foundation. 

Kim has worked with Southeastern Legal Foundation since 2009. Her belief in liberty and desire to serve started at a young age – instilled by her parents’ dedication to hard work, family values, and love for America. 

After earning her undergraduate degree in Analytical Finance and graduate degree in Accounting from Wake Forest University, Kim worked as a licensed CPA with an international accounting firm. But her strong belief in individual liberty, the rule of law, and accountability in government led her to pursue a career in law. While in law school at Georgia State University College of Law, Kim served as a law clerk at SLF. After graduating, Kim worked at a private law firm in Atlanta where she specialized in financial and business litigation, but continued to serve SLF in a pro bono capacity. In 2013, Kim returned to SLF full-time and is proud to dedicate her career to the freedom-based law movement. 

Kim advances liberty through litigation in federal and state trial and appellate courts on issues ranging from government overreach, free speech, property rights, and economic liberty. In addition to representing clients, Kim testifies before state legislatures, has drafted several pieces of model legislation, and regularly publishes legal articles. Through SLF’s 1A Project, she trains thousands of college students every year on how to stand up for their First Amendment rights. Her work and that of Southeastern Legal Foundation is regularly covered by national media and you will frequently hear or see her on radio, podcasts, and television. 

Kim is an active member of the Federalist Society where she serves as an expert on the Federalist Society’s Regulatory Transparency Project State and local Working Group. She is also an active member of her community and when she isn’t fighting for liberty, you can find her at her children’s school or on the sports fields cheering them on. She lives in the Atlanta area with her husband and two children.