Flame Forum

Jim Campbell

Jim Campbell serves as chief legal counsel with Alliance Defending Freedom, where he leads the U.S. Legal Advocacy team. In that role, Campbell oversees all U.S. litigation teams, Allied Legal Affairs, the Church and Ministry Alliance, and advocacy strategy.

Before joining ADF in March 2023, Campbell was the solicitor general in the office of Nebraska Attorney General Douglas J. Peterson and Michael T. Hilgers. In that position, he represented the state of Nebraska in cases before state and federal courts and oversaw all civil appeals for the state. In February 2023, Campbell argued Biden v. Nebraska before the U.S. Supreme Court, a case in which Nebraska and five other states challenged the Biden administration’s attempt to forgive over $400 billion in federal student loans for over 40 million people. In June 2023, the high court ruled for the states and declared the president’s program unlawful. Campbell earned a 2023 Supreme Court Best Brief Award from the National Association of Attorneys General for the brief he filed in that case.

Before joining the Nebraska attorney general’s office in January 2020, Campbell worked as senior counsel with ADF. In that role, he defended his clients’ religious freedom and freedom of speech, with a particular focus on appellate work. Campbell has also authored many articles and legal commentary pieces, including some published by USA Today and The Washington Post.

A native of northeastern Ohio, Campbell earned his Juris Doctor from the University of Akron School of Law, where he graduated summa cum laude in 2006. Following law school, he clerked for the Honorable Alice M. Batchelder of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit.

Robert Corn-Revere

Robert Corn-Revere has been a First Amendment litigator for more than four decades. In 2023, he joined FIRE from the law firm of Davis Wright Tremaine where he was a partner for 20 years. Before his time at DWT, he was a partner at Hogan & Hartson and served as legal advisor and later chief counsel to Federal Communications Commission Chairman James H. Quello.

Corn-Revere is a prominent writer, thinker, and advocate on free expression issues. In 2021, Cambridge University Press published his book, “The Mind of the Censor and the Eye of the Beholder: The First Amendment and the Censor’s Dilemma,” which explores how free expression became a part of America’s identity. He also co-authored the three-volume treatise, “Modern Communication Law,” published by West Group. In 2003, he successfully petitioned Governor George E. Pataki to grant the first posthumous pardon in New York history to the late comedian Lenny Bruce, who was convicted for “obscene” comedy routines.

Before joining FIRE full-time, Corn-Revere was a volunteer on FIRE’s Advisory Council. He also served as outside counsel for FIRE’s Stand Up For Speech Litigation Project, successfully litigating on behalf of college students and faculty whose First Amendment rights were violated.

He is regularly listed as a leading First Amendment and media law practitioner by The Best Lawyers in America, SuperLawyers Washington, D.C., and by Chambers USA. Best Lawyers in America named him as Washington, D.C.’s 2017 “Lawyer of the Year” in the areas of First Amendment Law and Litigation – First Amendment. He was again named as Best Lawyers’  “Lawyer of the Year” for First Amendment Law for 2019 and 2021, and in Media Law for 2022. He is listed in Washingtonian Magazine’s Top Lawyers Hall of Fame for Lifetime Achievement.

Jonathan Friedman

Jonathan Friedman, Ph.D., is the Sy Syms managing director of U.S. free expression programs at PEN America. He oversees research, advocacy, and education related to academic freedom, educational gag orders, book bans, and general free expression in schools, colleges, and universities.

An interdisciplinary scholar by training, Friedman has served as lead author on PEN America’s reports, Banned in the USA: The Growing Movement to Censor Books in Schools (2022), Banned in the USA: Rising School Book Bans Threaten Free Expression and Students’ First Amendment Rights (2022), Educational Gag Orders: Legislative Restrictions on the Freedom to Read, Learn, and Teach (2021), and Chasm in the Classroom: Campus Free Speech in a Divided America (2020). He also steered the production of PEN America’s Campus Free Speech Guide (2020). He regularly provides commentary for news media about educational censorship, and has published op-eds for CNN, The Washington Post, The Hill, The Daily Beast, New York Daily News, and Inside Higher Ed.

In this role, Friedman also drives forward PEN America’s efforts to catalyze a more informed, civic culture among the rising generation, on college campuses, and among the general public. He oversees PEN America’s Free Expression Advocacy Institutes for youth, as well as its centenary event series, Flashpoints: Free Speech in American History, Culture & Society. He has facilitated workshops and conducted advisory meetings with senior leaders, faculty, and administrators at dozens of colleges and universities across the country, and for numerous higher education organizations and professional academic associations.

Friedman has published sociological research on universities, nationalism, and globalization, and taught courses at New York University (NYU), Columbia University, and Bard College’s Open Society University Network. Formerly, he was part of a research team examining the production of knowledge on world regions at the Social Science Research Council, and served as administrative director of the Multinational Institute of American Studies, an exchange program for international scholars based at NYU. Friedman holds an MA and Ph.D. in international education from NYU, and has received awards for his teaching, research, and leadership. He was a 2019-2020 fellow of the University of California’s National Center for Free Speech and Civic Engagement.

Debi Ghate (moderator)

Debi Ghate is Partner at Steadfast and Initiative Director for the Liberty & Law Center’s “Voices for Liberty: Free Speech, Civil Rights and Social Progress” program. She also serves as Executive Fellow for the National Liberty Museum and the State Policy Network as well as a Strategic Advisor to Unite NY and other organizations. Ms. Ghate is a trained lawyer, previously practicing civil litigation in Ontario, Canada before moving to California to join the Ayn Rand Institute. At the Institute, she oversaw the education and policy programs before serving on leadership teams at two Foundations, including the Charles Koch Foundation and the Anthem Foundation for Objectivist Scholarship. She was previously the Senior Director of Grant Strategy at The Snider Foundation and most recently the Vice President of Strategy and Programs for Philanthropy Roundtable. Ms. Ghate serves on the boards of the National Liberty Museum, FAMM and the National Education and Empowerment Coalition.