Jason A. Levine is a partner in the law firm of McDermott Will & Emery LLP based in the firm’s Washington, D.C. office. A member of the Trial Department, Mr. Levine has practiced in the area of complex corporate litigation since 1995. He has first-chaired substantial trials, briefed and argued federal appeals, and managed bet-the-company lawsuits and class actions involving securities, business torts, contracts, trade secrets, and ERISA, among other areas of law. Mr. Levine also represents national political committees and candidates for federal office in connection with election law and campaign finance litigation.
Mr. Levine was named by Lawdragon magazine as one of the top 500 lawyers in the United States who are “carrying the legal profession to new frontiers" (July 2006 ed.), and he is also listed in several selective global directories including United Who’s Who and Who’s Who in Executives & Professionals (2006-08 eds.).
Mr. Levine has been securities defense counsel for such companies as Microsoft, Bank One, Schering-Plough, and corporate executives including the former CEO of Biopure Corporation; provided class action defense for such clients as New Century Financial Corp., IBM, GlaxoSmithKline, Pepco Holdings, Inc., and the Free File Alliance; and defended and prosecuted contract and business tort cases on behalf of companies including Lockheed Martin Corp., Covance Inc., and Boston Beer Company.
Among other trials he has handled, Mr. Levine successfully tried to a jury a defamation case filed by a former gubernatorial candidate against his Republican political committee clients; tried a breach of contract suit against the U.S. State Department on behalf of his client INVERSA, S.A.; and first-chaired significant portions of the trial in a landmark, multi-billion dollar “natural resource damages” case brought by the U.S. Department of Justice against his client, ASARCO Inc.
Mr. Levine’s most recent and current matters include: trying a billion-dollar class action lawsuit brought by union retirees demanding free lifetime healthcare from his client CNH America; prosecuting a fraud lawsuit on behalf of the same client against the UAW; advising financial industry clients in connection with litigation involving The Primary Fund – the only money-market fund to “break the buck” in 25 years; and representing the Republican National Committee and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in significant political and constitutional litigation.
Over his career, Mr. Levine has also led significant pro bono efforts. He briefed and argued a D.C. Circuit appeal on behalf of a class of Black farmers in the landmark Pigford litigation, persuading the court to permit class members to assert claims for discriminatory lending practices against the U.S. Government. In another high-profile matter, after being specially appointed to represent the District of Columbia as appellant, Mr. Levine successfully defended the constitutionality of its juvenile curfew ordinance before the D.C. Circuit sitting en banc.
Mr. Levine received his B.A., summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa, from Brandeis University in 1991. He received his J.D., cum laude, from Harvard Law School in 1994. During law school, he was Editor-in-Chief of the Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy. Mr. Levine served as a judicial clerk to Judge Randall R. Rader on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit from 1994-95. Mr. Levine has also served as an Adjunct Professor at Georgetown University Law Center, teaching a course on constitutional law. He is a member of the Bars of New York and Washington, D.C., and he is admitted to practice before many federal courts nationwide, including the U.S. Supreme Court, the Fifth, Sixth, and Federal Circuits, and the district courts for the District of Columbia, the Eastern District of Michigan, and the Eastern District of Wisconsin.
Education
- Harvard Law School, J.D. (cum laude), 1994
- Brandeis University, B.A. (summa cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa), 1991
