KEN GORMLEY

KEN Gormley is the 13th president of Duquesne University in Pittsburgh. He assumed the post in July of 2016. He previously served as the 11th dean of Duquesne University School of Law.

Gormley joined Duquesne’s law faculty in 1994, after teaching at the University of Pittsburgh School of Law and engaging in private practice. Gormley’s work on a myriad of legal/historical topics has earned him a national reputation as a leading constitutional scholar. In 1997, he published Archibald Cox: Conscience of a Nation (Perseus Books), the authorized biography of one of the leading lawyers and public servants of the 20th century.

In 2010, Gormley published The Death of American Virtue: Clinton vs. Starr (Crown), a New York Times bestseller chronicling the scandals that nearly destroyed the Clinton presidency.

Gormley has testified in the U.S. Senate three times. He served as president of the Allegheny County Bar Association, the first academic to hold that position in the organization’s 137-year history. From 1998-2001, Gormley served as mayor of Forest Hills, Pennsylvania.

In 2019, Gormley announced that Duquesne will open a new medical school which will admit its first class in the fall of 2024. In September of 2021, Duquesne’s Board of Directors voted to extend his contract through the 2026-2027 academic year.

In September of 2022, he presided over the announcement that attorney Thomas R. Kline has committed $50 million to Duquesne’s School of Law which will be named in Kline’s honor; the gift is the largest in the university’s history.

Gormley earned a BA, summa cum laude, from the University of Pittsburgh, and was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. He received a JD from Harvard Law School.

Gormley and his wife Laura have four children: Carolyn, Luke, Rebecca, and Madeleine. He traces his Irish roots to counties Donegal and Galway.