ADF President Alan Sears named to 2016 Politico 50

ARLINGTON, Va. – Politico has named Alliance Defending Freedom President, CEO, and General Counsel Alan Sears to its 2016 Politico 50, a list of the top 50 “thinkers, doers, and visionaries transforming American politics in 2016.” Sears occupies the number 31 position.

The editors of Politico choose 50 people for the list each year. Other recipients this year include Paul Ryan, Madeleine Albright, James Comey, Tim Cook, Yuval Levin, Sonia Sotomayor, Bill Kristol, and Ben Sasse. Past recipients have included the Pope, other justices of the U.S. Supreme Court, and additional politicians, activists, journalists, data gurus, financiers, and heads of prominent, influential organizations.

In its bio for Sears, Politico wrote that it chose Sears because of the involvement of ADF in protecting student privacy over the past year in locker rooms, showers, restrooms, and other intimate changing areas and because he “has built the ADF into one of the preeminent organizations of the religious right, with $44 million in funding, some 3,000 lawyers worldwide and a clear mission to defend religious freedom: As he put it in a March interview with Vice, ‘Tolerance is a two-way street.’”

“I consider it an honor to be named among distinguished jurists, political leaders, and others who have had an impact on our nation, but this is only by God’s grace. The last 22 years have been an incredible journey,” said Sears. “Because of what God has done, ADF has become the largest alliance-building, non-profit legal organization that advocates for the right of people to freely live out their faith throughout the world. We are humbled to have been a part of victories at the U.S. Supreme Court nearly every term for last few years and to be the only legal group with a religious freedom case before high court this term.”

Sears leads the efforts of ADF through a comprehensive legal strategy that includes training, funding, and legal advocacy that has resulted in important roles in 49 victories at the U.S. Supreme Court and numerous cases in lower courts.

Since the launch of ADF in 1994, Sears has provided strategic leadership in the training of 1,889 lawyers from 45 nations who have provided more than $198 million in pro-bono or dedicated time. His visionary efforts have also resulted in the graduation of more than 1,800 outstanding law students, representing 227 law schools from 21 nations, through a world-class leadership training program.

Sears earned his law degree from Louis D. Brandeis School of Law. While serving in numerous positions within the Reagan and Bush I administrations, he worked for the Department of Justice under Attorneys General William French Smith and Edwin Meese III, including service as an assistant U.S. attorney and chief of the Criminal Section for the Western District of Kentucky. Sears was appointed as director of the Attorney General’s Commission on Pornography and served as associate solicitor with the Department of Interior under Secretary Donald Hodel. A graduate of the University of Kentucky, Sears has continued his education with professional instruction at Stanford University Graduate School of Business, Harvard Law School, Harvard Business School, and Pepperdine University.

Last year, Newsmax named Sears to its 2015 “Top 100 Christian Leaders in America” list.

Alliance Defending Freedom is an alliance-building, non-profit legal organization that advocates for the right of people to freely live out their faith.