Speaker biographies

Jack Goldsmith III is a visiting scholar at AEI and a professor at Harvard Law School. Professor Goldsmith previously served for two years in the Bush administration, first as special counsel to the general counsel of the Department of Defense and then as an assistant attorney general in the Office of Legal Counsel at the Department of Justice. Mr. Goldsmith has held faculty positions at the University of Virginia School of Law and the University of Chicago Law School, and practiced law privately as an associate at Covington & Burling. Prior to these positions, Mr. Goldsmith clerked for Justice Anthony M. Kennedy of the U.S. Supreme Court and Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, and served as a legal assistant to Judge George Aldrich on the Iran-U.S. Claims Tribunal in the Netherlands. At AEI, Mr. Goldsmith studies international law, sovereignty, and intelligence reform. In addition to Who Controls the Internet? (Oxford University Press Publication Date: March 2006) Mr. Goldsmith is coauthor, with Eric Posner, of The Limits of International Law (Oxford University Press, 2005).

Neal Katyal is a professor of law at the Georgetown University Law Center. Prior to joining the faculty at Georgetown, he was law clerk to Justice Stephen G. Breyer of the U.S. Supreme Court and to Judge Guido Calabresi of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals. During 1998–99, Professor Katyal served as national security adviser to the deputy attorney general at the U.S. Department of Justice. He was commissioned by President Clinton in 1999 to coauthor a report on ways the legal profession can enhance its pro bono activities and diversify the bar. He served as cocounsel to Vice President Al Gore in the Supreme Court case of Bush v. Palm Beach Canvassing Board in 2000, and was a visiting professor at Yale Law School in 2001–02 and Harvard Law School in 2002. His publications have appeared in Yale Law Journal, Harvard Law Review, University of Chicago Law Review, Stanford Law Review, Michigan Law Review, and Pennsylvania Law Review. His primary academic interests are Constitutional law (primarily separation of powers, constitutional legitimacy, presidential power, slavery, and affirmative action), criminal law (particularly cybercrime, conspiracy, architectural solutions to crime, and the role of deterrence), and education law.

Paul J. McNulty was sworn in as deputy attorney general of the United States on March 17, 2006. Prior to his confirmation by the Senate, he had served as acting deputy attorney general since November 1, 2005. Mr. McNulty has spent nearly his entire career in public service, with more than two decades of experience in federal and state government. From 2001 to 2006, he served as the United States attorney for the eastern district of Virginia. Under Mr. McNulty’s leadership, the U.S. Attorney’s Office in eastern Virginia grew more than 20 percent, and he made the prosecution of terrorism, gun violence, drug trafficking, and corporate fraud his top priorities. He successfully prosecuted many of our nation’s highest profile cases in the war on terror. Before becoming U.S. attorney, Mr. McNulty directed President Bush’s transition team for the Department of Justice and then served as principal associate deputy attorney general. In the prior Bush administration, he was the Justice Department’s director of policy and its chief spokesman. Mr. McNulty has over twelve years of experience in the United States Congress. He was chief counsel and director of legislative operations for the majority leader of the U.S. House of Representatives. He was also chief counsel to the House Subcommittee on Crime for eight years. During those years he was a principal draftsman of many antiterrorism, drug control, firearms, and antifraud statutes.

Benjamin Wittes is an editorial writer for the Washington Post. He writes on matters involving the federal courts, major federal investigations, law, and criminal justice. He wrote extensively about the Starr investigation and the impeachment of President Clinton. He is the author of Starr: A Reassessment (Yale University Press 2002).