John Yoo is the Emanuel Heller professor of law at the University of California at Berkeley and a Visiting Scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. He is also the author of Defender-in-Chief: Donald Trump’s Fight for Presidential Power (St. Martin’s Press, forthcoming July 2020). His other books address presidential power, national security, and international affairs: Taming Globalization (2012), Confronting Terror (2011); Crisis and Command (2010); War by Other Means (2006); and The Powers of War and Peace (2005).

Professor Yoo has published numerous articles in the United States’ leading law journals. He also regularly contributes to the editorial pages of The Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, National Review, and The Weekly Standard, among others. He has also been a columnist for his hometown newspaper, The Philadelphia Inquirer.

Professor Yoo has served in all three branches of government. He was an official in the Office of Legal Counsel of the U.S. Department of Justice, where he worked on national security and terrorism issues after the September 11 attacks. He served as general counsel of the Senate Judiciary Committee under Chairman Orrin Hatch of Utah. He has been a law clerk for Justice Clarence Thomas of the U.S. Supreme Court and Judge Laurence Silberman of the U.S. court of appeals in Washington, DC. He has been a visiting professor at Seoul National University, Trento University, University of Chicago, and the Free University of Amsterdam.

Professor Yoo graduated from Yale Law School, where he was an articles editor of the Yale Law Journal, and summa cum laude from Harvard College with a degree in American history.