Pamela Gilbert: The Attorney Fighting for Consumer Safety
Pamela Gilbert spent years pressuring federal agencies from the outside before she was responsible for running one. As Executive Director of the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, she inherited Congress, budgets, industry pressure, litigation risk, and a career staff of about 500. In this episode she explains what changes when you cross that line, and why access to the courthouse remains central to private enforcement.
About the Guest
Pamela Gilbert is a Partner at Cuneo Gilbert Flannery & LaDuca, LLP, a firm focused on government relations, consumer protection, antitrust, and civil justice, where she has been a named partner since 2003. From 1995 to 2001 she served as Executive Director of the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, the agency's senior staff position, supervising roughly 500 staff including 25 attorneys and growing the agency's funding by nearly 40 percent.
Before the CPSC, Gilbert was Consumer Program Director at U.S. PIRG and Legislative Director and later Executive Director of Public Citizen's Congress Watch. Her more than 35 years of consumer advocacy in Washington include over 50 congressional testimonies, leadership of the Obama Presidential Transition Team for the CPSC in 2008, and legislative wins including the Raechel and Jacqueline Houck Safe Rental Car Act of 2015.
She earned her J.D. at New York University School of Law as a Root-Tilden Scholar and her B.A. magna cum laude from Tufts University. She chairs the board of the American Antitrust Institute, which inducted her into its Private Antitrust Enforcement Hall of Fame in 2023, and serves on the board of the National Consumers League.
In This Episode
- Moving from outside consumer advocacy to running a federal agency, and what actually changes
- What the Executive Director of the CPSC does: budgets, Congress, industry pressure, litigation risk, and stewarding career staff
- Independent agencies and why their structure matters now
- The Raechel and Jacqueline Houck Safe Rental Car Act: the legislative strategy behind a consumer-safety win
- Antitrust consolidation and the state of private enforcement
- Why access to the courthouse remains central to public-interest law
- A career across U.S. PIRG, Public Citizen's Congress Watch, the CPSC, and private practice
Timestamps
- 0:00 Cold open: product safety over politics
- 0:14 From Tufts activism to Ralph Nader
- 4:13 Going inside the CPSC
- 7:55 Tiny budget, big bully pulpit
- 10:45 Lessons in regulatory realism
- 12:43 Independent agencies under threat
- 14:47 What agency independence really means
- 17:50 The Safe Rental Car Act fight
- 22:39 Flipping Hertz to pass the bill
- 25:58 Career advice for young lawyers
- 28:23 Antitrust and the anti-monopoly movement
- 32:48 Opening the courthouse doors
Resources & Links
- Pamela Gilbert, Partner, Cuneo Gilbert Flannery & LaDuca
- U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission
- American Antitrust Institute (Gilbert chairs the board)
- National Consumers League (Board Member)
- Raechel and Jacqueline Houck Safe Rental Car Act of 2015
Previously on Cited Authorities
- Christopher J. Monte (Episode 1)
- Lisa D. Sparks (Episode 2)
- Robert C. Bonsib (Episode 3)
- Ellis Duncan (Episode 4)
- Ebony M. Thompson (Episode 5)
- Fred Brown (Episode 6)
- Glen Frost (Episode 7)
Next on Cited Authorities
Coming soon →