Brandon Silver is an international human rights lawyer, and Director of Policy and Projects at the Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights.
In this capacity, Brandon serves on the legal teams of prisoners of conscience, representing some of the world's leading dissidents and statespeople. He also provides strategic counsel to governments, parliaments, and international organizations on rule of law and public policy reforms.
He formerly served in the office of then Liberal Party of Canada Leader and now Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, and currently acts as Chief Advisor to former Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada and longtime Parliamentarian Irwin Cotler.
Brandon’s work has been featured in major publications, including TIME magazine, Canada's national news-magazine Maclean's, the Globe and Mail, Foreign Policy, and the Washington Post, and is a past nominee of the Quebec Literary Awards and winner of the CBC Reader’s Choice Prize. In 2016, the World Economic Forum named him a “Global Shaper.”
He is a graduate of the University of Ottawa Faculty of Law, and received his Masters of Law from UC Berkeley on a scholarship for excellence in Public Law.
Brandon has had a transformative impact not only on the law, but on lives; not only in the courthouse, but in the court of global opinion; in each and all of his endeavours, he has represented the very best of what the Canadian legal profession stands for, securing liberty and dignity for the most vulnerable.
As international counsel to dissidents, he led the global advocacy that achieved freedom for political prisoners, including the release of our pro bono client Raif Badawi, the celebrated Saudi blogger whose wife and children are Canadian citizens.
As head of our Global Human Rights Sanctions Program, Brandon has become a trusted interlocutor and confidante to civil society and decisionmakers in Canada and internationally, making major contributions to the adoption, implementation, and refinement of sanctions frameworks for global justice and accountability. In the last 18 months, this has included among others, providing counsel to government and Parliament on recalibrating Canada’s sanctions frameworks - including Asset repurposing, legislation that is currently under consideration in the Senate - and successfully submitting sanctions proposals; advising and guiding the Australian Parliamentary Inquiry that led to the successful adoption of targeted sanctions legislation in that jurisdiction; and Canadian Chair of the Global Magnitsky Civil Society Coalition, representing over 275 organizations around the world engaged in human rights sanctions multilateralization and implementation.
At a time of resurgent intolerance, where Antisemitism remains the most frequent motivation of hate crime in Canada, and Holocaust distortion and denial runs rampant internationally, the creation of the role of Special Envoy on Preserving Holocaust Remembrance and Combatting Antisemitism is as timely as it is necessary. After leading advocacy for the creation of the Office, and subsequently negotiating and drafting its mandate with Government, Brandon was also instrumental in the recent announcement that it will be a permanent Office with a dedicated staff.
When the International Bar Association and International Association of Women Judges reached out to highlight the plight and pain of Afghan legal leaders under threat, Brandon spearheaded our Centre’s response, working with committed and compassionate lawyers across Canada to successfully secure their safe resettlement. With hundreds of Afghans already being resettled thanks to his leadership, our efforts continue with partners in Canada and internationally to secure life-saving support for the many more who remain at risk.
Brandon has also served as trusted advisor to the High-Level Panel of Legal Experts on Media Freedom, established jointly by the governments of Canada and the UK to provide independent and substantive advice to governments on matters of law reform and public policy initiatives to protect and promote press freedom. In this capacity, Brandon has worked closely with Panel Vice-Chair Barrister Amal Clooney and her successor Barrister Can Yeginsu to publish important reports - and pursue advocacy - on myriad pressing matters ranging from consular protection to sanctions, and from hate speech to immigration and refugee measures, the latter of which led to Canada’s recent announcement of a dedicated visa stream for human rights defenders and journalists at risk.
I have known Brandon for years, having first met him in Oslo at the Human Rights Foundation's forums, I have been wonderfully impressed by his decency and initiative, and I am very honored to be his friend and "accomplice" in supporting dissidents and people at risk. I know from our common close friend, Irwin Cotler, just how valuable he is to the Wallenberg Foundation.