José Ignacio Hernández

Biography

José Ignacio Hernández is a law professor at the Andrés Bello Catholic University and the Central University of Venezuela, currently a fellow at Harvard University's Kennedy School. Between 2019 and 2020, he served as Special Attorney General of Venezuela under the interim government of Juan Guaidó, where he was responsible for setting up legal frameworks to protect Venezuelan sovereign assets and managing the humanitarian emergency in cooperation with the US government and international allies. Widely considered one of Latin America's foremost experts on public debt and restructurings, he has served as an expert witness in landmark cases including Crystallex, and written over a dozen papers in comparative constitutional and administrative law and economic regulation. His expertise includes public debt and debt restructurings, trade treaties, investment and climate change regulation in oil and gas, and international arbitration and investment claims.