On May 23, Congressman Hakeem Jeffries ’97 will address graduating JD students at NYU Law’s Convocation at Madison Square Garden. Ana Palacio, former Spanish minister of foreign affairs, will address the LLM graduates in an afternoon ceremony.
Jeffries represents New York’s eighth congressional district, which includes parts of Brooklyn and Queens. In his role as chairman of the Democratic Caucus, he is the fifth-highest ranking Democrat in the House. He also serves on the House Judiciary Committee and House Budget Committee. Jeffries was the lead Democratic sponsor of the First Step Act, a prison reform law that expanded rehabilitation services for prisoners and provided opportunities for reduced sentences for nonviolent offenders. He has been involved in the passage of several key pieces of legislation, including the Music Modernization Act, which updated the permissions process for digital performance and clarified other aspects of copyright law, and the Keep America’s Refuges Operational Act, which provides appropriations for wildlife refuges.
At NYU Law, Jeffries served on the NYU Law Review, then clerked for US District Judge Harold Baer Jr. in the Southern District of New York after graduation. He practiced law for several years at Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison and worked as a litigator in-house at Viacom Inc. and CBS.
Ana Palacio is an international lawyer and founder of Palacio y Asociados, a law firm specializing in international arbitration and commercial and regulatory law. From 2002 to 2004, she was Spain’s minister of foreign affairs and from 2004 to 2006, she served as a member of the Spanish Parliament where she chaired the Joint Committee of the two Houses for European Union Affairs. She has been senior vice president and general counsel of the World Bank Group and secretary general of the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes. She served on Spain’s Council of State, the supreme advising body to the Spanish government, from 2012 to 2018.
Palacio is a visiting professor at the Edmund E. Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University and writes a monthly column at Project Syndicate, a media outlet featuring commentaries by policymakers, practitioners, and activists.
Posted March 7, 2019