Kyle Velte
- Associate Dean, Faculty
- Karelitz Chair in Evidence Law
- Professor of Law
Contact Info
Personal Links
Biography —
Kyle Velte joined the KU Law faculty as an Associate Professor of Law in 2018 and was promoted to Professor of Law in 2022. Velte assumed the role of Associate Dean for Faculty in August 2022. She became the Karelitz Chair in Evidence Law in 2022. At the University of Kansas School of Law, she teaches Evidence, Torts, Employment Discrimination, and Sexual Orientation & the Law. Her scholarship, which examines the intersection of sexuality, gender and the law, has appeared in law journals, including the Yale Law & Policy Review, Cardozo Law Review and Connecticut Law Review. Her recent scholarship focuses on the perceived tensions between religious freedom and LGBT civil rights along three axes — law, policy and theory. She filed or coauthored amicus briefs in the United States Supreme Court cases of Fulton v. City of Philadelphia, R.G. & G.R. Harris Funeral Homes, Inc. v. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, United States v. Windsor, Obergefell v. Hodges and Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission and has appeared in the media discussing issues of religious liberty and its connection to antidiscrimination law, Title IX and marriage equality.
Prior to joining the faculty at KU Law, Velte was a Visiting Assistant Professor at Texas Tech University School of Law, where she taught Evidence, Torts, Professional Responsibility, Conflict of Laws, and Gender, Sexuality & the Law, and an Assistant Professor of the Practice in the Legal Externship Program at the University of Denver Sturm College of Law, focusing on private firm and judicial placements. She also taught Civil Procedure, Conflict of Laws, and Sexual Orientation & the Law.
Velte holds an LL.M. from Harvard Law School and a J.D., summa cum laude, from American University Washington College of Law. While at American University, she was on the editorial board of the American University Journal of Gender, Social Policy & the Law, and received several significant awards, especially for her work in the area of civil rights and public interest law. Her undergraduate degree is from Hamilton College.
Before entering the legal academy, Velte practiced complex commercial litigation at the Denver law firm of Reilly Pozner LLP. Prior to entering private practice, she completed two judicial clerkships with Justice Alex Martinez of the Colorado Supreme Court and for the Honorable Roxanne Bailin of the 20th Judicial District in Boulder, Colorado.
Velte is a member and past President of the Colorado LGBT Bar Association and is a member of the Colorado Women’s Bar Association. She served as a member of the Colorado Chief Justice’s Commission on Professional Development, as a member of the Judicial Performance Commission for the Second Judicial District (Denver), and as a board member for the Colorado Judicial Institute.
Education —
summa cum laude
cum laude
Teaching —
Torts; Evidence; Employment Discrimination; Special Topics: Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity, and the Law
Admitted
New York 2010, Colorado 1999
Career History
University of Kansas School of Law, Professor, Associate Dean for Faculty and Karelitz Chair in Evidence Law, 2022-present; University of Kansas School of Law, Associate Professor, 2018-2022; Texas Tech University School of Law, Visiting Assistant Professor, 2015-2018; Texas Tech University School of Law, Acting Director of Bar Preparation Resources, 2017; University of Denver Sturm College of Law, Lecturer, 2011-2015; University of Denver Sturm College of Law, Assistant Professor of the Practice, 2011-2015; Reilly Pozner, LLP, partner, 2002-2011; Supreme Court of Colorado, Law Clerk, 2001-2002; 20th Judicial District of Colorado, Law Clerk, 1999-2000; United States Attorney's Office, Student Attorney, 1998; Homeless Persons Representation Project, Law Clerk, 1998; National Center for Lesbian Rights, Law Clerk, 1997.
Selected Publications —
- Recovering the Race Analogy in LGBT Religious Exemption Cases, 42 CARDOZO L. REV. 67 (April 2020).
- Postponement as Precedent, 29 S. CAL. REV. L. & SOC. JUST. 1 (Winter 2019).
- From the Mattachine Society to Megan Rapinoe: Tracing the Conformist/Visionary Divide in the LGBTQ-Rights Movement to Anticipate Future Gains, 54 U. RICH. L. REV. 799 (2020) (invited symposium piece).
- Straightwashing the Census, 61 B.C. L. REV. 69 (2020).
- Mitigating the “LGBT Disconnect”: Title IX’s Protection of Transgender Students, Birth Certificate Correction Statutes, and the Transformative Potential of Connecting the Two, 27 Am. U. J. Gender Soc. Pol’y & L. 29 (2019).
- Why the Religious Right Can’t Have Its (Straight Wedding) Cake and Eat It Too: Breaking the Preservation-Through-Transformation Dynamic in Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, 36 Law & Inequality: A Journal of Theory and Practice 67 (Winter 2018).
- Indigenizing Equality, 35 Yale L. & Pol’y Rev. 101 (2017) (co-authored with Professor M. Alexander Pearl).
- Fueling the Terrorist Fires with the First Amendment: Religious Freedom, the Anti-LGBT Right, and Interest Convergence Theory, 82 Brooklyn L. Rev. 1109 (Spring 2017).
- All Fall Down: A Comprehensive Approach to Defeating the Religious Right’s Challenge to Anti-Discrimination Statutes, 49 Conn. L. Rev. 1 (Fall 2016).
- A Tale of Two Outcomes: Justice Found and Lost for Colorado’s Schoolchildren, 12 Legal Comm. & Rhetoric: JALWD 115 (2015).
- Obergefell’s Expressive Promise, 6 HLRe 157 (2015).
- So You Want to Have a Second Child? Second Child Bias and the Justification Suppression Model of Prejudice in Family Responsibilities Discrimination, 61 Buff. L. Rev. 909 (2013).
- Toward Constitutional Recognition of the Lesbian-Headed Family, 26 N.Y.U. Rev. L. & Soc. Change 245 (2001).
- Paths to Protection: A Comparison of Federal Protection Based on Disability and Sexual Orientation, 6 Wm. & Mary J. Women & L. 323 (2000).
- Egging On Lesbian Maternity: The Legal Implications of Tri-Gametic In Vitro Fertilization, 7 Am. U. J. of Gender, Soc. Pol’y & L. 431 (1999).