Kellie Meiman Hock

Senior Counselor

McLarty Associates, an Ankura Company

Kellie Meiman Hock, Senior Counselor, founded the firm’s trade and Brazil/Southern Cone practices, helping over one-hundred companies to pursue global opportunities and troubleshoot obstacles to market access since joining McLarty in March 2000.

Prior to joining McLarty, she served for almost a decade as a US Foreign Service Officer at the Department of State, serving in Bogota, Colombia, and throughout Brazil in Porto Alegre, São Paulo, and Recife, as well as at the Office of the US Trade Representative in the Executive Office of the President. For over three decades, Kellie has worked on Latin America and on various aspects of trade, investment, and technology policy, helping companies to manage geopolitical uncertainty and industrial policy, from local content requirements to data localization and trade remedies.

Kellie has been deeply engaged in stakeholder efforts to manage a dynamic global trade agenda and increased economic nationalism. She has also helped many companies to internationalize their public policy operations and to develop global expansion plans. She has lived and studied in Central America and Japan. Kellie is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, the Women’s Foreign Policy Group Leadership Council, and the Bretton Woods Committee. She is also on the Board of Directors for the Inter-American Dialogue.

She often writes and speaks on policy matters related to trade/investment/industrial policy, Brazil, and Latin America. A native of Omaha, Nebraska, Kellie is a graduate of the Georgetown University School of Foreign Service. She fluently speaks Spanish and Portuguese.

Robert A. Shapiro

Partner

Thompson Coburn LLP

Co-Chair, Regulatory Practice Group

Chair, International Trade and Transportation Regulatory Practice Group

Robert Shapiro knows international trade. He counsels clients on all aspects of international import and export transactions with a focus on the highly complex and changing issues surrounding compliance and geopolitics.

As chair of the firm’s international trade practice, Robert’s clients depend on his experience and geopolitical perspective to help them navigate the often confusing, diverse and ever-changing policies, laws and regulations governing international activities. He regularly represents clients before the full range of trade-regulating agencies at the Departments of State, Homeland Security, Treasury, Commerce and independent agencies and committees.

Robert’s extensive experience includes advising clients on the valuation, classification and origin of imported merchandise; the avoidance or recovery of duties; and compliance with export controls, sanctions, and other national security laws and regulations. To ensure compliance, Robert is skilled at “teasing out the details” of a product’s and its components’ origins to identify, for example, if forced labor was used in any stage of a component’s production.

In addition, Robert delights in saving clients’ money. He is adept at pursuing novel arguments that diminish or recover duties and tariffs, in one instance recovering $30 million for a client. He also closely follows the ebb and flow of geopolitical and technological change to advise clients on what may be lurking ahead—issues surrounding AI or the technology controls impacting trade with China, for example. Businesses make global investments and engage in transactions that may require reconsideration in light of such changes, and Robert has the perspective to counsel them with clarity.

Prior to practicing law, Robert served as vice president of a major logistics firm and understands that international trade is about the movement of goods and the continuation of business. He brings these practical insights to counseling his clients on compliance, enforcement and other matters throughout supply chains.

Brian Gordon

Senior Vice President

International Trade Finance

Commerce Bank

MITA Past President

Brian joined Commerce in May 2012 to manage the International Service Department, with a wealth of knowledge in the international banking industry. During his banking career he held various international positions at National Bank of Commerce, the Wells Fargo HSBC Trade Bank, Sovereign Bank (now Banco Santander), and HSBC in New York, primarily focused on trade and trade finance. He has 30+ years experience in trade services operations, trade finance, and structured trade finance areas and has also worked closely with global treasury and foreign exchange. 

Brian currently serves on the advisory council for MITA (Midwest International Trade Association) and the World Trade Center-Kansas City. He is also a board member for BAFT (Bankers Association for Finance & Trade), is an active member of the BAFT Regional Banks Council, and serves on the memberships committee of BAFT globally. Brian is an avid disc golfer and cigar connoisseur.