Samuel F. Wright

Known as one of the “fathers of USERRA,” Samuel is a retired U.S. Navy captain and judge advocate who has dedicated more than three decades of his legal career to advancing service members’ employment rights, particularly those provided under the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act (USERRA). As an Of Counsel attorney at Tully Rinckey PLLC, Samuel concentrates his practice on litigation over violations of USERRA and other military-related laws.

Prior to joining Tully Rinckey PLLC, Samuel served as the director of the Service Members Law Center at the Reserve Officers Association. There he educated service members and their families, reporters and state and federal legislative staffers on USERRA, the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act (SCRA), the Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act (UOCAVA), and other laws affecting National Guard and Reserve members. He is also a former attorney for the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL), U.S. Office of Special Counsel, and U.S. Department of Defense Employer Support for the Guard and Reserve (ESGR).

Samuel’s involvement in military law matters began in in the 1970s. As a judge advocate, he worked in the Office of the Judge Advocate General’s Claims Division, where he defended the Navy against asbestos-related tort claims. After leaving active duty in 1980, he became a judge advocate in the Navy Reserve, in which he served for another 27 years. During his long tenure in the Reserve, Samuel handled matters relating to USERRA and its predecessor, the Veterans’ Reemployment Rights Act (VRRA). Throughout his military career, Samuel was awarded two Navy Commendation Medals, a Joint Service Commendation and the Meritorious Service Medal.

From 1982 to 1992, Samuel served as an attorney for the United States Department of Labor (DOL), where he worked extensively on matters relating to the World War II-era VRRA. In the early 1990s, Samuel, along with another DOL attorney, largely drafted the interagency task force work product that President George H.W. Bush presented to Congress in February 1991. On October 13, 1994, President Bill Clinton signed Public Law 103-353 (USERRA), as a long-overdue rewrite of the VRRA. The new law enacted in 1994 was very similar to the version drafted by Samuel and one other DOL attorney.

In 1997 – three years after the enactment of USERRA – Samuel started writing for ROA’s Web site a “Legal Review,” in which he provided legal analysis on matters relating to service members’ rights under various laws, such as USERRA, the SCRA and the UOCAVA. There are now more than 1,300 articles on that Web site, and Samuel is the author or co-author of more than 1,200 of them.