Mrs. Soraya Saénz de Santamaría

Soraya Sáenz de Santamaría has combined a distinguished career as a jurist with a prominent public activity. A State Attorney on leave of absence, she held the vice-presidency of the Government of Spain from 2011 to 2018. Since 2019, she practices as a lawyer specializing in strategic sectors, such us energy, critical technologies and infrastructures and foreign investments and is an elective member of the Council of State.

She holds a degree in Law (with honors) from the University of Valladolid (1994) and joined the State Attorneys Corps by competitive examination in 1998. Since 2019, she is a partner of the law firm Cuatrecasas, leading the area of strategic sectors and foreign investments and member of its Board of Directors. In 2023, according to Merger Market data, she ranked among the top 3 lawyers who advised M&A transactions with the highest value in the energy sector.

She was a member of Parliament for four terms (2004-2018) and also served as Minister of the Presidency (2011 – 2018), Government Spokesperson (2011-2016) and Minister of Territorial Administrations (2016-2018). She signed the ratification of the Paris Agreement on Climate Change at the United Nations headquarters in New York.

After leaving politics in 2018, she was appointed as an elective member of the Council of State and member of its Study Commission. She has been an associate professor of European Policies and Administrative Law at the Carlos III University of Madrid and currently chairs the Cuatrecasas-Universidad Carlos III de Madrid Research Chair of corporate, financial, tax law and international arbitration that deals with sustainability issues.

She is a Board Member of the Council of Americas and participates in numerous forums and conferences on geopolitics, energy transition and crisis management.

Among her latest publications, she has co-authored "Governance, Regulation and Administration of Justice" and "Before the Next Pandemic: Geopolitical Risks".