2025 NC Rehabilitation and Reentry Conference

Featured Speakers
 

Governor Josh Stein

Governor Josh Stein was called to public service by his faith and his family. His faith teaches him that we are all called to make a difference, and his parents Adam and Jane raised his brother Eric, sister Gerda, and him to try to do what is right. They grounded him in our shared values of freedom and opportunity for everyone.

As Governor, Stein’s focus will be on creating a safer, stronger North Carolina. He will bring people together to help western North Carolina recover from Hurricane Helene, create economic opportunity for all North Carolinians, invest in public schools, and keep people safe.

Stein spent the past eight years serving as North Carolina’s Attorney General. During that time, he and his team worked to clear the nation’s largest backlog of untested rape kits and hold accountable the big drug companies that created and fueled the opioid crisis, securing more than $50 billion in settlement funds, including nearly $1.5 billion for North Carolina to help people struggling with addiction. They held e-cigarette manufacturer Juul accountable for sparking a teen vaping epidemic – the first state in the country to do so – and protected vulnerable North Carolinians from fraudsters and scammers, including going after companies that price-gouged customers in the wake of natural disasters. Stein advocated for fully funding North Carolina’s public schools through the Leandro Plan and defended people’s right to vote and women’s right to choose.

Before his time as Attorney General, Stein served in the state Senate and was a champion for public education, clean energy, and public safety. Between 2001 and 2008, he served as senior deputy attorney general for consumer protection in the North Carolina Department of Justice, where he helped run the payday lenders charging loan shark interest rates out of the state and helped enhance people’s privacy protections.

Stein earned law and public policy degrees from Harvard University and graduated from Dartmouth College and Chapel Hill High School. After college, he taught high school English and economics in Zimbabwe for two years. As a young lawyer, Stein worked with the Self-Help Credit Union to develop affordable single-family homes in Durham and with the North Carolina Minority Support Center to raise capital to invest in small businesses across North Carolina.

Kwame Kilpatrick

Kwame Kilpatrick, the chief administrative officer of Movemental Ministries, is an ordained minister, motivational speaker, consultant, and certified character coach who values dedication, service, and excellence. 

Kilpatrick was born and raised in Detroit, Michigan. A graduate with honors from Florida A&M University, Kilpatrick later went to Michigan State University Law School where he graduated and passed the Michigan Bar Exam the first time he took the test. At the age of 26, he was elected to the Michigan State House of Representatives, then elected by his colleagues to be the leader of that body. At the age of 31, he was elected as the youngest mayor of Detroit.

Kilpatrick resigned from office in September 2008 after he was criminally indicted on charges of perjury, misconduct in office and obstruction of justice, and pleaded no contest to assaulting a deputy. He was also indicted on charges of misusing of campaign funds. In March 2013, he was found guilty of racketeering, extortion and related issues and was sentenced to 28 years in prison.

Then-President Donald Trump, however, commuted Kilpatrick’s sentence after about eight years, in a last-minute reprieve before leaving the presidency in January 2021.

"Chef Jeff" Henderson

Jeff Henderson started his culinary career in the unlikeliest of places: prison. While serving nearly 10 years, he discovered an untapped passion for cooking, which led to executive chef positions at Bellagio and Caesars Palace.

In 2020, Henderson founded The Chef Jeff Project with a mission to change the lives of young disadvantaged, and system-impacted men and women in the Las Vegas community. The program offers professional training in one of Las Vegas' top industries — food service. The youth referred to the program are 15–24 years of age and are system impacted, struggling with addiction, dropped out of high school, or aged out of foster care. The program is seen as the last chance for many of these youth before facing more restrictive sanctions in the juvenile and criminal justice systems.

Participants are trained primarily in the art of cooking and take courses in introduction to cooking and baking, restaurant cleaning and sanitation, and the principles of hospitality and customer service. Upon completion each student will be awarded a certificate of completion and given a pathway to enter the workforce or continue their culinary education.

Adam Clausen

In early 2000, Adam Clausen was a 25-year-old homeless drug addict. His desperate situation propelled him into a robbery spree spanning 20 days – nine robberies, using a firearm in each instance. The use of the firearm plus prior offenses mandated a 213-year sentence. 

Once he settled into prison life decades ago, he threw himself into helping others – as a fitness coach, a certified life coach, and mentoring and teaching wherever and however he could. It was a way, he soon realized, to come to terms with the grim fact that the courts had decided he would never be free again.

After serving almost 20 years, passage of the First Step Act enabled Clausen to apply for compassionate release under broader criteria. His motion was granted, and he walked free in August of 2020.

Clausen is working hard to give others that same hope. He works at Social Purpose Corrections, where he continues the coaching work he worked on in prison and occupies a leadership role. And he hasn’t forgotten those he left behind.

Kendall Taylor

Kendall Taylor travels the country speaking at prisons and schools and mentors small business owners and youth to inspire and positively change lives. He created Salute 1st, LLC  with one mission in mind: to impact men from all walks of life by challenging faulty perspectives and belief systems, building men of good character who possess the necessary critical thinking and emotional mastery skills conducive to a successful lifestyle.

Taylor grew up in a single-mother household with his younger brother Robert, in Gastonia. With no positive male influences present, Taylor found himself deep in the underworld of crime, drugs and violence, as well as becoming a father at age 15. In that same year, Taylor was arrested for the first time.

Taylor was involved in a deadly shootout when he was 16. He survived multiple gunshot wounds that, to this day, left a bullet lodged in his lungs. That pattern of destruction continued until he turned his back on a life of crime when he turned 27 and began to use his abilities to build rather than to destroy. 

After his last criminal charge in 2007, Taylor began the arduous journey of working to overcome three felony charges. He went from working in the warehouse of a logistics company in Charlotte to starting his own company (Courier Logix, LLC). After a few years, Courier Logix merged with Metro Transportation Services, and Taylor secured a 49% ownership stake in the combined company. 

Taylor created Salute 1st, LLC  with one mission in mind: to impact men from all walks of life by challenging faulty perspectives and belief systems, building men of good character who possess the necessary critical thinking and emotional mastery skills conducive to a successful lifestyle. He is also co-owner of Rock Soul Entertainment with his wife.