Lt. Col. Allen West, Executive Director
Lt. Col. Allen West (ret.) is the Executive Director of the American Constitutional Rights Union and ACRU Action Fund. He is a constitutional conservative, combat veteran, and former member of the U.S. Congress.
Lt. Col. West is the third of four generations of military servicemen in his family. During his 22-year career in the U.S. Army, Lieutenant Colonel West served in several combat zones and received many honors, including a Bronze Star, three Meritorious Service Medals, three Army Commendation Medals, one with valor device, and a Valorous Unit Award. In 1993, he was named the US Army ROTC Instructor of the Year. He is also a former commissioned officer in the Texas State Guard.
In November 2010, West was elected to the United States Congress, representing Florida’s 22nd District. As a member of the 112th Congress, he sat on the Small Business and Armed Services Committees.
West is the former Executive Director of the National Center for Policy Analysis in Dallas, Texas, and a former Director of the Booker T. Washington Initiative (BTWI) for the Texas Public Policy Foundation. In July of 2020, Mr. West was elected Chairman of the Republican Party of Texas by an overwhelming majority of State delegates.
Lt. Col. West is an avid distance runner, a Master SCUBA diver, and in his spare time, he enjoys cheering his beloved Tennessee Volunteers. He is a legacy life member of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, a life member of the American Legion, a life member of the Association of the United States Army, the Society of the First Infantry Division, the 4th Infantry Division, and 101st Airborne Division. He is Patriot Life Member (Benefactor) of the National Rifle Association and Life Member (Benefactor) of the Texas State Rifle Association. West is an inductee into the University of Tennessee Army ROTC Hall of Fame.
Lt. Col. West is the author of three books: Guardian of the Republic: An American Ronin’s Journey to Family, Faith and Freedom; Hold Texas, Hold the Nation: Victory or Death; and We Can Overcome: An American Black Conservative Manifesto.
He is married to Dr. Angela Graham-West, a financial adviser, and they have two daughters, Aubrey, a Board-certified Physician Assistant, and Austen, a nursing assistant. He is also the proud grandfather of grandson, Jaxton.
Kristina S. Heuser, Esq., Legal Counsel
Kristina S. Heuser, Esq. was born and raised in Queens, New York and holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Government from Georgetown University. While in college, Ms. Heuser interned on Capitol Hill for Representative J.C. Watts (R-OK) and the House Republican Conference and served as the D.C. area student coordinator for the Alan Keyes presidential campaign. Ms. Heuser also worked for The Declaration Foundation, non-profit organization focused on civics education founded by Ambassador Keyes. After college, Ms. Heuser returned home to New York and worked as a paralegal at the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office while pursuing her Juris Doctorate in the evenings at Brooklyn Law School. After law school, Ms. Heuser worked for a small Manhattan firm and practiced in the areas of civil rights litigation and appeals and federal criminal defense. She received training from and serves as an Allied Attorney with Alliance Defending Freedom, an organization dedicated to protecting and defending religious liberties. In addition to this most important work, Ms. Heuser’s practice has been focused in the areas of general civil/constitutional rights litigation, municipal law, and appeals. Ms. Heuser is so excited to partner with the American Constitutional Rights Union to advance the important initiatives of this dedicated and principled organization.
Tom McHale, Director of Public Policy and Digital Media
Tom McHale is the Director of Public Policy and Digital Media for American Constitutional Rights Union and ACRU Action Fund.
Tom McHale is an author and Editor of American Handgunner magazine. He’s published seven books to date, most of which focus on Second Amendment-related topics, concealed carry, personal defense, and guns and shooting. During the past 10 years, Tom has published nearly 2,000 articles across a variety of publications.
His most recent book, The Practical Guide to the United States Constitution, provides an entertaining, factually accurate, “owner’s manual” for citizens of the United States of America. This practical guide covers the underlying concepts of natural rights and consent-based government. The book also clarifies how each of the three primary founding documents, the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights, work together to define the goals, theory, and mechanics of the American system. The heart of this book is a simplified walk through the contents and meaning of the founding documents.
Prior to his writing career, Tom spent 25 years working in the technology industry as a marketing executive and strategic alliances director. Over his tenure in the technology industry, Tom worked for companies including NCR, Verizon, two different internet startups, and spent 11 years with Microsoft. From his time immersed in the tech space, Tom understands not only the opportunities possible from the industry, but the potential dangers, pitfalls, and threats to privacy and freedom.
Tom also understands the challenges faced by the heart of the American economy — small business. He grew up in a family of small business entrepreneurs, taking part in the family business throughout his high school, college, and adult years. Later in life, he invested his life savings, started his own, and became intimately familiar with struggles entrepreneurs face dealing with not only the challenges of growing a business and meeting a payroll but counterproductive and often burdensome government regulations.
Tom is a graduate of Emory University with a major in Economics and a minor in Computer Science. He completed his Master’s Degree in Business Administration at the University of North Florida with a concentration in Finance and Marketing.
Jack Park, Senior Legal Advisor and Counsel
- US Army JAG Corps
- Chair of the Alabama State Bar’s Military Law Section
- Visiting Legal Fellow for the Center for Judicial and Legal Studies at the Heritage Foundation
Jack Park is the General Counsel for the American Constitutional Rights Union and works on ACRU’s Military Votes Project. Since the beginning of 2019, he has been in private practice in Gainesville, GA. There, Jack specializes in appellate and amicus work for ACRU, The Buckeye Institute, the Southeastern Legal Foundation, and others, as well as doing civil and constitutional litigation.
Jack served in the US Army JAG Corps on both active duty and in the Reserves. He represented the Government in appeals from court-martial convictions while on active duty and helped with instruction in criminal trial advocacy and other subjects at the Army’s Judge Advocate General’s Legal Center and School while in the Reserves. Jack also served as Chair of the Alabama State Bar’s Military Law Section for several years and helped organize the Section’s annual Military Law Symposium, which was held for the 30th time in 2019. He is presently a volunteer with the Georgia State Defense Force.
After his release from active duty in 1985, Jack worked for the Birmingham, AL, law firm now known as Bradley. During his time there, concentrated his work on government contract and construction law cases. In 1995, he began working for the Alabama Attorney General’s Office. There, defended the State, its agencies, and officials when they were sued in voting rights, redistricting, and election law cases, institutional reform litigation, employment discrimination, and construction matters. For 22 months from 2007 to 2009, Jack worked as Special Assistant to the Inspector General for the Corporation for National and Community. He worked with the Inspector General and the office’s auditors, investigators, and support personnel to monitor the Corporation’s activities, report to Congress when appropriate, and assist in audits and investigations of the activities of the Corporation’s grantees. Jack then worked as a Visiting Legal Fellow for the Center for Judicial and Legal Studies at the Heritage Foundation. He assisted the other attorneys in the Center, including its Chairman, former Attorney General Edwin Meese, working on the Center’s Supreme Court, overcriminalization, civil rights, and civil justice projects. From May 2011 until the end of December 2018, Jack served as of counsel for the Atlanta law firm of Strickland Brockington Lewis. He served as a deputy attorney general for the State of Alabama to assist it in its work on and litigation involving the 2010 round of redistricting and worked on redistricting matters for the State of Georgia and Gwinnett County.
Jack is also widely published. He graduated from the University of Virginia in 1977 with a B.A. in History and received his J.D. from Yale Law School in 1980.
Tracey Miller, Chief Operating Officer
Tracey Miller is an experienced executive with a proven track record of success in non-profit and for-profit organizations.
Early in her career she served in leadership of the Washington Scholarship Fund, where she played a pivotal role in the organization, implementation, and funding of the privately funded school choice program. This program became the foundation for the DC School Choice Incentive Act of 2003 – an initiative to implement school choice nationwide. Mrs. Miller went on to advocate to protect and preserve life as she helped with the nationwide expansion of Baby Safe Haven Laws, which allow mothers to safely relinquish newborn infants without fear of prosecution for abandonment or neglect. Her work was responsible for the safe relinquishment of over 1,000 infants.
In 2003, Mrs. Miller formed Credo Strategies, a boutique consulting firm focused on providing strategic planning, advocacy, and fundraising assistance to non-profits and startup companies.
Mrs. Miller holds a bachelor’s degree in Political Science from American University. Her military family prides itself on service to country and community.