Tadd joined the Firm as Of Counsel in July of 2024. An enrolled member of the Bois Forte Band of Chippewa, he is a Professor Emeritus, recently retired from the University of Minnesota as its first Senior Director of American Indian Tribal Nations Relations.

Starting in 1987, Johnson worked in several capacities for the Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe. He served the Band as its Solicitor General (General Counsel) four different times over the next 37 years. He also served as one of the Band’s Corporate Attorneys and he directed the Office of Government Affairs. As a young attorney, Johnson served as a prosecutor in the Bois Forte Tribal Court, and as an older attorney served as the Chief Judge at Bois Forte.

Johnson served various tribes as a tribal court judge and has taught over 7,100 State employees “Tribal State Relations” since 2013. Starting in 1990, Tadd spent five years with the U.S. House of Representatives, becoming staff director and counsel to the Subcommittee on Native American Affairs. In 1997, President Clinton appointed him to Chair the National Indian Gaming Commission.

Johnson served as a faculty member of the National Judicial College, on the Board of the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce as well as on the Board of the Nature Conservancy. He was nominated by Presidents Trump (2017) and Biden (2024) and confirmed by the U.S. Senate as a Trustee of the Udall Foundation and serves as Vice Chair of the Foundation. Johnson is also currently serving on the University of Minnesota Board of Regents where he chairs the Litigation Committee. Tadd is a frequent lecturer on American Indian history and federal Indian law.

University of Minnesota Law School, 1985

Admitted to practice:

Supreme Court of Minnesota

Federal District Court, District of Minnesota

Mille Lacs Court of Central Jurisdiction, Bois Forte Tribal Court