Quick Facts
Biography
Neomi Rao (born c. 1973) is an American lawyer, academic, and government official who currently serves as the administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs. Prior to assuming her current role, Rao was an associate professor of law and the founding director of the Center for the Study of the Administrative State at George Mason University's Antonin Scalia Law School. Her research and teaching focused on constitutional and administrative law.
Education and legal career
After graduating from Yale University with highest distinction in ethics, politics, economics, and philosophy, Rao attended the University of Chicago Law School, where she was a member of the Order of the Coif. She was the comment editor of the University of Chicago Law Review, and executive editor of the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy for the Symposium edition. Rao clerked for U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson III of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. She practiced public international law and arbitration at British law firm Clifford Chance. During the administration of George W. Bush, Rao worked in the White House counsel's office and as a staffer on the Senate Judiciary Committee. Later, she became a professor at George Mason University School of Law (subsequently renamed the Antonin Scalia Law School, a change for which she advocated), where she received tenure in 2012. In 2015, she founded the Center for the Study of the Administrative State.
She is a member of the Administrative Conference of the United States and the governing council of the American Bar Association's Section of Administrative Law and Regulatory Practice, where she co-chairs the section's regulatory policy committee.
Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs Administrator
Nomination
On April 7, 2017, President Donald Trump nominated Rao to become the administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) within the Office of Management and Budget. Former OIRA Administrator Susan Dudley described Rao as "an excellent choice to lead OIRA...In addition to a sharp legal mind, she brings an openness to different perspectives and an ability to manage the competing demands of regulatory policy." Legal commentator and law professor Jonathan H. Adler wrote that "Trump's selection of Rao suggests the administration is serious about regulatory reform, not merely reducing high-profile regulatory burdens." Rao was confirmed to the position by the U.S. Senate on July 10, 2017.