David Yerushalmi, Esq.
David Yerushalmi is an AV® Preeminent™ rated lawyer specializing in complex litigation and risk assessment, especially as it relates to due diligence requirements for domestic and international concerns, geo-political strategic policy, national security, intellectual property, international business relations, and constitutional law. David Yerushalmi has been involved in international legal and constitutional matters for over 30 years. After completing his undergraduate studies with a B.S. in public policy studies and criminal justice, summa cum laude, David Yerushalmi received his Juris Doctorate from the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at Arizona State University in 1984 as the recipient of the John S. Armstrong Award, the law school’s highest honor for the most outstanding graduate. After graduation, David Yerushalmi worked as a lawyer specializing in complex commercial, securities, banking, and environmental litigation in the Los Angeles office of the law firm of LeBoeuf, Lamb, Leiby & Macrae, at the time one of the largest and oldest law firms in the U.S. David Yerushalmi is licensed to practice law in Washington, D.C., New York, California and Arizona.
Today, Mr. Yerushalmi is co-founder and Senior Counsel to the American Freedom Law Center, a national public interest law firm dedicated to fighting for limited government, federalism, and America’s Judeo-Christian heritage.
Mr. Yerushalmi also serves as outside General Counsel to the Center for Security Policy in Washington, D.C., one of the nation’s leading national security think tanks founded by former Reagan administration official Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.
David Yerushalmi is today considered an expert on national security especially in the context of Islamic law and its intersection with Islamic terrorism. In this capacity, he has published widely on the subject including the principle critical scholarship on sharia-compliant finance published in the Utah Law Review (2008, Issue 3). Mr. Yerushalmi also designed and co-authored a ground-breaking peer-reviewed empirical investigation on sharia-adherence and the promotion of violent, jihadist literature in U.S. mosques published initially in the Middle East Quarterly (Summer 2011) and then republished in a more detailed format in Perspectives on Terrorism, the journal of the prestigious Terrorism Research Initiative. This research and scholarship on sharia was earlier the focus of a 2008 monograph published by the McCormick Foundation and the Center for Security Policy entitled, “Shariah, Law and ‘Financial Jihad’: How Should America Respond?”
In 2010, Mr. Yerushalmi participated as a co-author and member of Team ‘B’ in the seminal work on counter-terrorism entitled, Shariah: The Threat To America, An Exercise in Competitive Analysis, Report of Team ‘B’ II, published by the Center for Security Policy and he has also produced and narrated a one-hour CLE program for legal professionals addressing the requirement of proper disclosure in Shariah-compliant financial products. That same year, Mr. Yerushalmi drafted what has become known as the American Laws for American Courts Act, which was enacted into law by several states and is pending in many others. This legislation, crafted especially for states, is an effort to insulate state courts from the growing tendency to embrace constitutionally offensive foreign laws, including sharia. Mr. Yerushalmi’s work in this area led to a Sunday edition, front page, feature article in The New York Times (7/31/2011).
In 2015, Mr. Yerushalmi was one of the principal authors of a detailed plan to defend the Homeland entitled, The Secure Freedom Strategy: A Plan for Victory over the Global Jihad Movement, published by the Center for Security Policy and co-authored by such prominent military and national security experts as Lt. Gen. William G. Boykin (Ret.), Ambassador Henry E. Cooper, Frank J. Gaffney, Jr., and Admiral James A. “Ace” Lyons (Ret.). As a follow-up to The Secure Freedom Strategy, Messrs. Yerushalmi and Muise co-authored the monograph entitled, Offensive and Defensive Lawfare: Fighting Civilizational Jihad in America’s Courts as part of the Center for Security Policy’s Civilization Jihad Reader Series.
In Mr. Yerushalmi’s role as a staunch defender of the Constitution and federalism, he was co-counsel in one of the most important court challenges to the federal law mandating health insurance commonly referred to as ‘Obamacare’ (Thomas More Law Center et al. v. Pres. Obama et al.), recently decided by the U.S. Supreme Court and he has co-authored a scholarly article published in the Duke University Press’s Journal of Health Politics, Policy, and Law, entitled, “Wearing the Crown of Solomon? Chief Justice Roberts and the Affordable Care Act ‘Tax’.”
Mr. Yerushalmi was also co-lead counsel in a novel challenge to the U.S. government’s takeover of AIG insofar as AIG is the world’s dominant promoter of sharia-compliant insurance (Murray v. Geithner et al., recently decided by the Sixth Circuit).
Mr. Yerushalmi recently won a major copyright case where he successfully defended his clients’ use of the plaintiff’s video based upon the defense of Fair Use. The lawsuit was filed in the United States District Court for the Central District of California (Santa Ana) on behalf of the opposing party by Simpson, Thacher & Bartlett, one of the largest intellectual property law firms in the United States (Northland Family Planning Clinic v. Center for Bio-Ethical Reform, Inc.). Also, when a major D.C. law firm sued the Center for Security Policy and Frank Gaffney on behalf of an organization claiming a registered trademark in the phrase “Peace through Strength,” Mr. Yerushalmi filed a counterclaim against the plaintiff on behalf of CSP and Mr. Gaffney and ultimately forced a settlement whereby the plaintiff not only dropped its claims against Mr. Yerushalmi’s clients, but agreed to terminate its trademark and to make a settlement payment to CSP.
Mr. Yerushalmi has also recently won several major First Amendment cases against the New York, Washington, D.C., and Pennsylvania transit authorities on behalf of clients seeking to run pro-Israel/anti-Jihad ads. In those cases, the transit authorities, acting as government entities, refused advertisements based upon the content and viewpoint. Mr. Yerushalmi obtained federal court injunctions requiring the transit authorities to run the ads. In each of these cases, Mr. Yerushalmi negotiated substantial attorney’s fees settlements.
Also, in Mr. Yerushalmi’s role as an advocate for limited government and free market reforms, and as an expert on the threat posed to our national security from transnationalism and the rise of sharia-adherence in the Muslim world, he has been interviewed and written about in the Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Reason Magazine, and appeared on local, national, and international radio and television programs.
David Yerushalmi continues his active involvement in policy and national security matters by editing and writing contributions to various off-line and on-line publications and has published several op eds and commentaries in the Wall Street Journal, National Review, the American Spectator, First Things, FrontPageMagazine, the American Thinker, The Intellectual Conservative, the Jerusalem Post, and Globes, Israel’s leading business newspaper.
David Yerushalmi may be reached directly at [email protected]