Preston Byrne, Legal Fellow

Preston Byrne is a dual-qualified U.S. and English lawyer. Preston advises the ASI on the legal aspects of its policy proposals and writes on a range of subjects including housing and planning law, the security state, digital freedom, and freedom of speech.

Preston often contributes to or is quoted by mainstream news media on a range of technology policy topics. In 2013, he was the lead author of Burning Down the House, the ASI’s paper opposing the Conservatives’ Help to Buy mortgage subsidy programme. In 2020, he wrote Sense and Sensitivity: Restoring Free Speech in the United Kingdom, a proposal for the repeal of numerous censorial laws in the United Kingdom.

In 2026, he was lead author of the Adam Smith Institute's Freedom of Speech Bill, model legislation designed to replicate the First Amendment's legal protections under the UK's constitutional system.

As a practising lawyer, Preston actively participates in the fight for free speech online. In 2025, he was counsel to every U.S. target of enforcement proceedings by UK Internet censorship agency Ofcom, lead counsel to popular U.S. imageboard 4chan in its in its federal lawsuit against Ofcom in the Federal District Court of the District of Columbia, the creator of the GRANITE Act foreign censorship shield law concept for the United States, and co-author of HB 70, the Wyoming GRANITE Act, which passed the Wyoming House of Representatives 46-12 in February 2026. He has also represented American targets of government censorship agencies in Australia, Brazil, and multiple European Union member states.

Preston received an MA (Hons) from the University of St Andrews, an LL.B. in English law from the College of Law of England and Wales, and an LL.M. in U.S. law from the University of Connecticut Law School. He is admitted in England and Wales, Connecticut, New York, and the District of Columbia.