Neal Katyal is a associate within the Washington DC workplace of Milbank LLP and a member of the agency’s Litigation & Arbitration Group. Credit score: LinkedIn/Neal Katyal
On the centre of the landmark U.S. Supreme Court docket verdict putting down President Donald Trump’s sweeping world tariffs is an Indian-origin lawyer who argued earlier than America’s highest court docket concerning the illegality of the levies.
Neal Katyal, the son of Indian immigrants and the previous Appearing Solicitor Basic of the USA below President Barack Obama, argued the consequential tariff case on behalf of small companies and received.
U.S. Supreme Court docket rejects tariffs LIVE
“Victory,” Mr. Katyal posted on X shortly after the Supreme Court docket verdict got here in on Friday (February 20, 2026).
Mr. Katyal, in an interview to MS Now, mentioned “One of many nice issues concerning the American system is what simply occurred as we speak. I used to be capable of go to court docket — the son of immigrants — capable of go to court docket and say on behalf of American small companies, ‘Hey, this President is appearing illegally.'”
“I used to be capable of current my case, have them ask actually arduous questions at me, it was a very intense oral argument and on the finish of it, they voted and we received,” he mentioned.
“That’s one thing so extraordinary about this nation. The concept that now we have a system that self-corrects, that enables us to say ‘You is likely to be probably the most highly effective man on the earth however you continue to can’t break the Structure. That to me is what as we speak is about,” Mr. Katyal added.
Mr. Katyal was born in 1970 in Chicago to a paediatrician mom and engineer father, each of whom immigrated from India.
He’s a associate within the Washington DC workplace of Milbank LLP and a member of the agency’s Litigation & Arbitration Group.
In an announcement following the decision, he mentioned the U.S. Supreme Court docket stood up for the rule of legislation and People in every single place. “Its message was easy: Presidents are highly effective, however our Structure is extra highly effective nonetheless. In America, solely Congress can impose taxes on the American folks. The U.S. Supreme Court docket gave us every thing we requested for in our authorized case. All the things.”
Mr. Katyal expressed gratitude for the management of the Liberty Justice Centre, who “led the combat when others wouldn’t”.
“This case has at all times been concerning the presidency, not anybody president. It has at all times been about separation of powers, and never the politics of the second. I am gratified to see our Supreme Court docket, which has been the bedrock of our authorities for 250 years, shield our most elementary values,” he mentioned.
In line with his profile on the Milbank web site, Mr. Katyal focuses on appellate and complicated litigation and has argued 54 circumstances earlier than the Supreme Court docket of the USA.
He has additionally served as a legislation professor for over 20 years at Georgetown College Legislation Centre, “the place he was one of many youngest professors to have acquired tenure and a chaired professorship within the college’s historical past” and has served as a visiting professor at Harvard and Yale legislation colleges.
A graduate of Yale Legislation College, Mr. Katyal clerked for Guido Calabresi of the U.S. Court docket of Appeals for the Second Circuit in addition to for Justice Stephen G. Breyer of the U.S. Supreme Court docket. He additionally served within the Deputy Lawyer Basic’s Workplace on the Justice Division as Nationwide Safety Advisor and as Particular Assistant to the Deputy Lawyer Basic throughout 1998-1999.
Mr. Katyal is the recipient of the “highest award given to a civilian” by the U.S. Division of Justice, the Edmund Randolph Award, which was introduced to him by the Lawyer Basic in 2011, his profile mentioned.
The Chief Justice of the USA appointed him in 2011 and 2014 to the Advisory Committee on Federal Appellate Guidelines.
In a publish on X dated November 4, 2025, Mr. Katyal posted {a photograph} of a conventional ‘Kada’ (bangle) positioned on a ‘Transient for Personal Respondents’ associated to the Supreme Court docket tariff case towards Trump. “Pondering of my father in the beginning, who got here to this land of freedom….Might the Structure win,” he wrote.
Revealed – February 21, 2026 11:55 am IST