Firm’s Appellate Practice Group chair earns leadership role with prestigious invitation-only association
WSHC+B Partner Edward G. Guedes, Chair of the firm’s Appellate Practice Group, was elected President of the American Academy of Appellate Lawyers for the 2027 calendar year. The Academy is an invitation-only national association of respected appellate lawyers.
As President, Ed will help guide the Academy’s strategic direction and policy and preside over an organization that provides a trusted national network of appellate counsel. Ed has been a Fellow of the Academy since 2019.
Founded in 1990, the Academy has grown from Fellows in a handful of states with robust appellate bars to 355 Fellows from all 50 states. Fellows must have at least 15 years of appellate practice and receive unsolicited nominations from two current Fellows. Each nomination then undergoes a rigorous vetting process before the Academy’s Board of Directors votes on it. The Academy’s officers serve one-year terms and are elected by the Board.
“It is a tremendous honor to be chosen to lead the American Academy of Appellate Lawyers, and I am grateful to my fellow Board members for their confidence,” Ed said. “The Academy brings together the finest appellate advocates in the country, and I look forward to working with them to strengthen the appellate bar, promote the highest standards of advocacy, and advance the fair administration of justice.”
Ed is widely known for representing business and government clients in high-stakes appeals. He has litigated more than 150 appeals before the Florida Supreme Court, Florida’s district courts of appeal, and the U.S. Courts of Appeals, in matters ranging from constitutional litigation, including First Amendment claims, election law, land use and zoning, commercial litigation, premises liability, intellectual property, and labor and employment. He is Board Certified in Appellate Practice by The Florida Bar and is ranked in appellate law by Chambers USA.
In 2008, Ed was a finalist nominated to fill a vacancy on the Florida Supreme Court.
Among his notable victories, Ed represented more than 40 Florida cities and counties in defending a $200 million federal class action involving red-light camera programs. That work culminated in a unanimous Florida Supreme Court decision upholding the legality of the programs throughout the State of Florida. On behalf of the City of Homestead, he secured a precedent setting en banc decision from the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals realigning its First Amendment jurisprudence with U.S. Supreme Court precedent. Most recently, he argued the case that secured, on behalf of Publix Super Markets, Inc., a Florida Supreme Court decision modifying decades of Florida precedent and setting a new standard for fraud on the court dismissals.
Ed is a longtime leader in the Florida legal community, including service as President of the Florida Supreme Court Historical Society from 2017 to 2019. In 2025, the Miami-Dade Bar honored him with its Circle of Excellence Award. He earned his J.D. from Harvard Law School and his B.A., magna cum laude, from Amherst College.
