Lisa Brown has served as the Department of Education’s General Counsel since her Senate confirmation in October 2021. Prior to joining the Department of Education, she was Vice President and General Counsel of Georgetown University, where she provided legal counsel to the University’s President, Board of Directors, and senior academic and administrative officers; served in the President’s Cabinet; and mentored first generation college students and students interested in law and social justice. Brown also served on the Board of Trustees of the Center for Law and Social Policy, DC Theatre Lab and SMYAL (Supporting and Mentoring Youth Advocates and Leaders).

Brown has spent extensive time in public service. She served in the Administration of President Obama, first as Assistant to the President and Staff Secretary in the White House, and then as Acting Chief Performance Officer at the Office of Management and Budget. She had previously served as Co-Director of Agency Review for the Obama-Biden Transition Project. During the Administration of President Clinton, Brown began as a career lawyer in the Office of Legal Counsel at the Department of Justice and then became Counsel to Vice President Gore, where she also served as a member of the Executive Board of the President’s Committee for Employment of People with Disabilities. Between the two administrations, Brown was Executive Director of the American Constitution Society for Law and Policy. Before entering the government, Brown was a partner at the Washington law firm of Shea and Gardner. Brown clerked for the Honorable John C. Godbold on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit in Montgomery, Alabama.

Brown graduated magna cum laude from Princeton University with a degree in political economy and earned her law degree from the University of Chicago Law School where she graduated with Honors and served as Editor-in-Chief of the University of Chicago Legal Forum.