Liz Cheney
February 23
As Wyoming’s lone representative from 2017 to 2023, former congresswoman Liz Cheney spoke for an entire state. But when she became one of only a handful of House Republicans who raised their voices against former President Donald Trump in the wake of the January 6 insurrection, Cheney paid with her seat.
“She may have lost her position, but she maintained her honor and upheld her oath to the Constitution. It has been the honor of my lifetime to watch her tirelessly fight to defend democracy and uphold the rule of law,” said Cheney’s daughter, Elizabeth Perry, WCL/JD ’25, who introduced her during WCL’s Administrative Law Review Symposium.
“It’s not every day as a 26-year-old that you get to bring your mom to school, so I’m honored to have the opportunity to do so today,” Perry said.
Cheney delivered the keynote address during the daylong conference, which also featured remarks from Representative Jamie Raskin (D-MD), WCL professor emeritus. The two served together on the House Select Committee that investigated the attack on the Capitol and developed a close friendship.
“At one point, Jamie said to me, ‘You know, I really look forward to the days when you and I can disagree again,’” Cheney said with a chuckle.
The theme of WCL’s annual conference was elections and democracy, and Cheney told the roomful of law students that the latter is on the ballot this November. “In 2024, we’ve got to make sure we save the republic,” she said bluntly.
“I have a lot of policy disagreements with the Biden administration, but I know that we can survive bad policy for four years. We cannot survive a president who’s willing to torch the Constitution—and that extends to members of [Congress],” Cheney said.
“Our institutions [of government] are the best that have ever been devised by human beings, but they only work if individuals sustain them. None of us can be bystanders because there’s nobody else coming to save us. It’s up to us.”
Despite her dire warning, Cheney ended her remarks on a hopeful note.
“The vast majority of us—regardless of party—want our kids to grow up in a country that’s characterized by the peaceful transfer of power. I hope that you will [make] a commitment to ensuring that we do what’s right and rise above partisanship,” she said.
“History is going to look back at this moment, and we have to be able to say, ‘We loved this country so much that we were willing to put the nation, our Constitution, and democracy ahead of partisan politics,’” Cheney continued. “If we do that, I’m confident that we will prevail—and Jamie and I can start disagreeing again.”
Surgeon General Vivek Murthy
December 17
“Do one brave thing each day, however small, and you will build the courage to live the life you were destined to lead.”
The nation’s top doctor—and vice admiral of the US Public Health Commissioned Corps—addressed 1,700 graduates during AU’s 146th commencement. Murthy’s remarks to the Class of 2023 came on the heels of the launch of his 5-for-5 Connection Challenge, aimed at combating the loneliness epidemic and helping Americans forge bonds in their daily lives.
Susan Glasser and Peter Baker
April 9
“We felt that it was extremely important to do an after-action report of sorts on the Trump presidency. In the course of doing that work, we understood quite quickly that it was not really a book of history yet, but a book of the present and potentially the future.”
Glasser, staff writer for the New Yorker, shared the impetus for The Divider: Trump in the White House, 2017–2021, her third collaboration with husband Baker, chief White House correspondent for the New York Times.SPA’s Center for Congressional and Presidential Studies and KPU hosted the couple, who met at the Washington Post in the late ’90s as part of the Thurber Dialogues on Democracy. “We like to say we’re the one good thing that came out of the Monica Lewinsky scandal,” joked Baker.
Jim Acosta
February 10
“Our job is to get the truth out there in a fair, accurate, and balanced way. I always tell people, ‘If you want to be liked, go be a veterinarian or something.’”
CNN’s former White House correspondent, whom President Donald Trump called “the enemy of the people” during a testy exchange at a 2018 press conference, fielded questions from SOC’s aspiring reporters about the role of the Fourth Estate.
Stephanie Hsu
February 21
“Really powerful people were telling me, ‘Look, you guys did a really cute thing—but no one’s going to watch it.’”
The Academy Award–nominated actress chatted about Everything Everywhere All at Once—the 2022 sci-fi comedy featuring a nearly all-Asian cast, which went from surprise box office hit to Oscar darling—during AU’s inaugural Spirit of Change Week.
Governor Spencer Cox
February 22
“It’s so much easier to tear down than it is to build up. I worked in construction for a couple summers. Whenever we got to demolish a building, it was so much fun.”
The Utah Republican joined Colorado’s Democratic governor Jared Polis and former Maryland governor Larry Hogan, a 2024 fellow with AU’s Sine Institute of Policy and Politics, for a conversation as part of the National Governors Association’s (NGA) Disagree Better initiative, which advocates for leaning into “healthy conflict.” Cox and Polis are chair and vice chair, respectively, of NGA.
Bakari Sellers
February 15
“You’ve lived through generations of trauma in just two decades—9/11, the financial crisis, Sandy Hook, the election of Donald Trump, Parkland, a pandemic, the invasion of Ukraine, and October 7—and you’re still here. The perseverance you’ve displayed is indicative of the hope that we should have for your generation.”
Once the youngest African American elected official in the US when he joined the South Carolina legislature at age 22, the attorney and author praised Generation Z during a Black History Month lecture sponsored by the Kennedy Political Union (KPU), Caribbean Circle, and the Residence Hall Association.