David Cole

David Cole (Bluesky – X) is the Honorable George J Mitchell Professor in Law and Public Policy at Georgetown University Law Center. He is the former National Legal Director of the ACLU.

He is the author of seven books, and his books have received multiple awards, including the American Book Award for Enemy Aliens: Double Standards and Constitutional Freedoms in the War on Terrorism.

He has litigated many significant constitutional cases in the Supreme Court, including Texas v. Johnson and United States v. Eichman, which extended First Amendment protection to flagburning; National Endowment for the Arts v. Finley, which challenged political content restriction on NEA funding; and most recently, Holder v. Humanitarian Law Project, which challenged the constitutionality of the statute prohibiting “material support” to terrorist groups, which makes speech advocating peace and human rights a crime.

New York Times columnist Anthony Lewis has called David “one of the country’s great legal voices for civil liberties today,” and Nat Hentoff has called him “a one-man Committee of Correspondence in the tradition of patriot Sam Adams.” David has received numerous awards for his human rights work, including most recently the inaugural Norman Dorsen Prize from the ACLU for lifetime commitment to civil liberties.

Areas of Expertise: Constitutional Law, Courts and Judges, Criminal Law and Procedure, National Security, Military, War and Peace, Surveillance, Civil Liberties

Selected Media Appearances
Television
“Gun Show Loophole” – MSNBC (The Ed Show)

Radio
Debate: Does Spying Keep Us Safe? – NPR (Intelligence Squared U.S.)
Your Digital Trail: Does The Fourth Amendment Protect Us? – NPR (All Things Considered)

Online
Time to End the Spying Game – The Nation
President Obama, did or did you not kill Anwar al-Awlaki? – The Washington Post
Rewarding Impunity – Foreign Policy
Obama At U.N. To Remind World Of His Policy Goals – NPR
The Memos: Torture Redefined – The New York Times (Room for Debate)