Steve Simpson

Steve Simpson is a senior attorney at the Institute for Justice. He litigates primarily free speech cases in the state and federal courts across the country. He is currently lead counsel in SpeechNow.org v. FEC, a challenge to the federal campaign finance laws that prevent individuals from banding together to spend money on speech for or against candidates. Steve is also lead counsel in two challenges to Colorado’s campaign finance laws, and he has been involved in a wide variety of other cases, including IJ’s challenge to New York’s ban on direct shipping of wine, which resulted in a win before the United States Supreme Court in Granholm v. Heald. Steve’s views and writings have been published in a number of print and on-line newspapers and journals, including Legal Times, The Washington Post, the Chicago Tribune, and The Washington Times.

Before coming to the Institute, Steve spent five years as a litigator with the international law firm Shearman & Sterling. Steve has authored and co-authored articles and practice guides on federal securities laws, the non-delegation doctrine, and the First Amendment. He is a graduate of New York Law School, where he was a managing editor and articles editor of the law review. After law school, he spent two years clerking for Judge Lenore C. Nesbitt on the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida. Steve is a member of the bars of New York, New Jersey, and the District of Columbia.