The New York University School of Law (NYU Law) has invited Ambassador Keith Harper and Special Counsel Lenny Powell to teach a course on federal Indian law as part of their Spring 2024 offerings. The course will provide an introduction to the legal relationship between Native American tribes and the United States.
Both will maintain their current practices while serving as adjunct professors.
Keith focuses his practice on Native American affairs, litigation, and international clients from the private and public sectors. From 2014 until 2017, he served as the US Ambassador and Permanent Representative to the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva, Switzerland. A citizen of the Cherokee Nation, Keith is the first Native American to be named a US Ambassador. He represented the plaintiff class of 500,000 individual Indians and served as class counsel in the landmark Indian trust funds lawsuit, Cobell v. Salazar. Ultimately, the case settled for $3.4 billion, which represents the largest settlement of a lawsuit against the United States in history.
Lenny represents clients before appellate and trial courts throughout the country in high-stakes cases involving statutory interpretation, constitutional law, administrative law, and federal Indian law. As a former elected leader of his federally recognized tribe — the Hopland Band of Pomo Indians — Lenny brings significant experience and a client’s perspective to the firm’s Native American Law Practice. He regularly briefs matters before the United States Supreme Court, where he has helped win five cases on the merits and successfully opposed dozens of petitions for certiorari, including as lead counsel. His notable Indian law wins include Haaland v. Brackeen — the landmark Supreme Court case upholding the constitutionality of the Indian Child Welfare Act — and McGirt v. Oklahoma — the Supreme Court case recognizing the continued existence of the Muscogee (Creek) Reservation, which The New York Times has called “potentially one of the most consequential legal victories for Native Americans in decades.”
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