Jay Lefkowitz '87 Receives Award from Columbia/Barnard Hillel

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Jay Lefkowitz ’87, a senior litigation partner at Kirkland & Ellis, was honored with the Seixas Award from Columbia/Barnard Hillel at the Jewish student organization’s annual dinner on Tuesday.
 
Lefkowitz, who graduated from Columbia College in 1984, is also a Lecturer-in-Law at the Law School, where he teaches a class on presidential decision-making and administrative law.
 
Lefkowitz served from 2005-2009 as the U.S. Special Envoy on Human Rights in North Korea.  From 2001-2003, he served as Deputy Assistant to President Bush for Domestic Policy and as General Counsel in the Office of Management and Budget.  Earlier, he served as Director of Cabinet Affairs to the Domestic Policy Council for President George H. W. Bush. He has also represented the U.S. at the U.N. Human Rights Commission in Geneva, and the International Conference on Anti-Semitism in Berlin.
 
Also honored at the dinner was Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski, a 1985 Columbia College graduate.
 
The award is named after Gershom Mendes Seixas, the first American-born rabbi who also served as a Columbia University trustee.
 
Columbia Law School, founded in 1858, stands at the forefront of legal education and of the law in a global society. Columbia Law School joins its traditional strengths in international and comparative law, constitutional law, administrative law, business law and human rights law with pioneering work in the areas of intellectual property, digital technology, sexuality and gender, criminal, national security, and environmental law.