Mountain States Legal Foundation President & CEO Cristen Wohlgemuth
MSLF’s Center to Keep and Bear Arms is the only in-house, litigation only Second Amendment center in the country. The right to keep and bear arms is a corollary to the right to life—and the right to defend your life with the tools of your choice. This right is not granted by government or the Second Amendment. Rather, it is a natural, pre-existing right that is protected by the Second Amendment. Nevertheless, this right is continually attacked at the federal, state, and local levels by gun control activists who want to disregard our natural rights and take away peaceable Americans’ ability to defend themselves. Luckily, we are fighting back—and we currently have a Supreme Court that is willing to validate our rights and uphold the Constitution.
Cristen is a native Texan. She served as a policy advisor to Governor Rick Perry, focusing on natural resources issues. Later she was chief of staff to the Chairman of Appropriations in the Texas House of Representatives. A graduate of Texas A&M, she received her law degree from St. Mary’s University School of Law. Upon completing her degree, she served as the Executive Director for the Claremont Institute’s Center for Constitutional Jurisprudence, in California, where she worked to expand the Center’s influence and impact on the Supreme Court of the United States and federal appellate courts. Cristen joined Mountain States Legal Foundation as Executive Vice President and COO in July 2017 and was promoted to President and CEO in March 2020.