Ali Kilmartin

Alison (Ali) M. Kilmartin serves as senior counsel and chief of staff to CEO, President, and General Counsel Kristen Waggoner at Alliance Defending Freedom.

Kilmartin also directs the Grants & Funding Program which, to date, has awarded approximately $55 million in grant funds to thousands of legal projects and cases, many of which have set national and multinational precedents.

From 2018 to 2021, Kilmartin was a senior executive service appointee in the Trump Administration, serving the U.S. Department of Labor as deputy chief of staff in the Office of the Secretary, and as chief of staff and then deputy assistant secretary for policy in the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Policy. She also had a detail to the Executive Office of the President at the White House. Prior to joining the executive branch, Kilmartin was a trial and appellate litigator in Big Law for just under a decade, including in the U.S. Supreme Court on several occasions. In 2014, Kilmartin successfully represented a number of Catholic entities challenging the Obamacare contraceptive mandate, which ultimately resulted in a win in Zubik v. Burwell.

Kilmartin earned her J.D. summa cum laude and was first in her class at Penn State Law. She is admitted to practice in Pennsylvania, Virginia, West Virginia, the U.S. Supreme Court, and numerous federal district and appellate courts.