Panelist Shelley McKinley

Shelley McKinley

GitHub

U.S.

Shelley McKinley is the chief legal officer at GitHub, where she leads teams responsible for trust and safety, social impact, developer policy, product & regulatory legal, commercial legal, and legal operations. McKinley started her career at Microsoft supporting parts of the Developer Division in 2005.

Prior to joining GitHub, McKinley was the head of Microsoft’s Technology and Corporate Responsibility organization, where she oversaw a team that drove the use of technology to benefit society through priorities such as accessibility, environmental sustainability, broadband access, responsible AI, and justice reform. She has also led legal, corporate, and external affairs teams across Europe and worked on products in Microsoft’s gaming division, including developer communities and Xbox Live. Prior to joining Microsoft, McKinley was legal counsel at Wizards of the Coast, where she supported the Dungeons & Dragons and Magic: The Gathering brands.

McKinley is an outspoken proponent of mental health awareness and uses her voice to help address the affiliated bias and stigma, by advocating for a culture of openness and inclusion. Outside of work, you can find her enjoying outdoor concerts, tearing up the slopes on her snowboard, and relaxing with her family and friends.

Voting History

Statement	Response
General-purpose AI producers (e.g., companies like DeepSeek, OpenAI, Anthropic) can be held accountable for how their products are developed. Strongly agree	“AI-producing companies must be held responsible for how their products are developed. While there’s a separate discussion warranted around AI applications developed for specific use cases, the need for regulating general-purpose AI products is no different from the need for regulating other product-producing companies and industries. All that said, policy makers need to ensure that regulation is proportional and places responsibility with producers of commercial products and services, not the developers building open-source componentry across the tech stack that may be integrated into these systems. If we fail to protect developers and end users, we will almost certainly see a decline in overall innovation.”

Statement

Response

General-purpose AI producers (e.g., companies like DeepSeek, OpenAI, Anthropic) can be held accountable for how their products are developed. Strongly agree

“AI-producing companies must be held responsible for how their products are developed. While there’s a separate discussion warranted around AI applications developed for specific use cases, the need for regulating general-purpose AI products is no different from the need for regulating other product-producing companies and industries. All that said, policy makers need to ensure that regulation is proportional and places responsibility with producers of commercial products and services, not the developers building open-source componentry across the tech stack that may be integrated into these systems. If we fail to protect developers and end users, we will almost certainly see a decline in overall innovation.”