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[[Image:Leo.jpg|thumb|right|Leonard Leo]]
'''Leonard Leo''' is an American lawyer and , co-chairman of the executive vice president and a board member of at the [[Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies]], and chairman of [[CRC Advisors]]. The [[Federalist Society]] is funded by right-wing foundations, including Milwaukee's [[Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation]] and the [[Charles G. Koch Foundation]], to move America's legal establishment and jurisprudence to the right. Leo has been a leader in the effort by the [[Judicial Crisis Network]], the Kochs' [[Americans for Prosperity]] group, the [[Tea Party Patriots]], and other libertarian and far right groups and funders (including the secretive [[Wellspring Committee]]) to advance a conservative judiciary at the federal and state level. Read more on these ties below.
For decades, Leo has worked quietly behind the scenes to organize a right-wing take over of the U.S. Supreme Court. In recent years, he has mobilized millions of dollars in secret dark money for massive PR efforts and grassroots mobilization to block President Obama's 2016 pick for the court, Merrick Garland, as well as to advance President Trump's picks of Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh. He was also instrumental in the selections of Justices Samuel Alito and John Roberts to the high court.
While serving as chairman of USCIRF, Leo was active in the opposition to the construction of an Islamic community center near the World Trade Center site in lower Manhattan. The Park51 or Cordoba House project was dubbed the "Ground Zero Mosque" by right-wing critics. Leo was director of Liberty Central, a Tea Party-related group organized by Virginia Thomas, the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. Liberty Central organized a petition campaign against the Cordoba House project.<ref>David Corn and Nick Baumann, [https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2010/08/commission-international-religious-freedom-ground-zero-mosque/ “Ground Zero Mosque” Foes Bankrolled By Feds], ''Mother Jones'', August 23, 2010.</ref>
==Ties to the Council for National Policy==
Leo sits on the Board of Governors at the [[Council for National Policy]] (CNP). Leo spoke to CNP in February 2019 where he told members,
:"“We’re going to have to understand that judicial confirmations these days are more like political campaigns. We’re going to have to be smart as a movement. No one in this room has probably experienced the kind of transformation that I think we are beginning to see."<ref>Robert O'Harrow and Shawn Boburg, [https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2019/investigations/leonard-leo-federalists-society-courts/ A conservative activist’s behind-the-scenes campaign to remake the nation’s courts], ''Washington Post,'' May 21, 2019.</ref>
{{Council for National Policy}}
==Official Positions with Associated Groups==
