Dirk Phillips

Dirk Phillips serves as Senior Counsel and Director of Strategy and Integration for Alliance Defending Freedom’s Counter Censorship Task Force. In this role, he works to combat corporate and state-sponsored censorship worldwide and manages ADF’s legal, legislative, coalition, research, and communications efforts in this area.

Prior to joining ADF in 2026, Phillips spent more than fifteen years as a member of the Appellate and Supreme Court Practice at Arnold & Porter. While there, he represented a broad range of clients in high-stakes appeals before state and federal appellate courts across the country, including the U.S. Supreme Court. During these years, Legal 500 noted his “excellent reputation” and he was described in the National Law Journal as a member of the firm’s appellate “dream team.” Outside of his work at the firm, Phillips was named a Master of the Bench in the Edward Coke Appellate Inn of Court. He also assisted attorneys preparing to argue before the U.S. Supreme Court by serving as a judge for moot courts hosted by Georgetown Law’s Supreme Court Institute and the Heritage Foundation.

Before joining Arnold & Porter, Phillips served as an appellate lawyer for the U.S. Department of Justice, where he represented the United States in civil and criminal appeals pending in federal circuit courts across the country. He also worked with attorneys from the Office of the Solicitor General on cases pending before the U.S. Supreme Court. During his tenure at DOJ, Phillips received four awards for superior performance.

Earlier in his career, Phillips was a member of the Supreme Court and Appellate Practice at Hogan & Hartson (now Hogan Lovells Cadwalader). He also served as a law clerk to the Hon. Jane R. Roth of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, and to the Hon. James C. Cacheris of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia.

Phillips is a graduate of the University of Virginia School of Law and is admitted to practice before the U.S. Supreme Court and all thirteen federal circuit courts of appeals. Prior to law school, he graduated summa cum laude from James Madison University, where he was a member of the varsity football team and was named JMU’s Male Scholar-Athlete of the Year as a senior.