Jeffrey Adam Rosen (born April 2, 1958) is an American lawyer who served as the acting United States attorney general from December 2020 to January 2021 and as the United States deputy attorney general from 2019 to 2020. Before joining the Department of Justice, he was a senior partner at the law firm Kirkland & Ellis and was the United States deputy secretary of transportation.
Early life
Rosen was born to a Jewish family in Boston and grew up in Brockton, Massachusetts. Rosen attended Brockton High School, where he was editor of the high school newspaper. His parents were not college graduates, but he has said that they wanted him to become one.
He graduated from Northwestern University with a Bachelor of Arts in economics in 1979 after serving as president of the student council in his third and final year of college. He then graduated magna cum laude from Harvard Law School, receiving his Juris Doctor in 1982. Other notable political figures from his Harvard Law School class included future US Attorney General, Alberto Gonzales (2005-2007), future Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick, and future Rhode Island US Senator Jack Reed.
Career
Rosen joined Kirkland & Ellis in 1982 as an associate in the firm's Washington DC office. Rosen became a partner in 1988, at age 30. He served in several management roles thereafter, and was elected to the firm's global management committee in 1999, at age 41. He handled complex business litigation for major companies like GM, AOL, Netscape, Marriott, and others.
He left the firm in 2003 and began working for the U.S. government.
After his public service, he returned to Kirkland & Ellis in 2009, and in total worked there for nearly 30 years. In 2017, he returned to federal government service, serving as deputy secretary of the Department of Transportation. In May 2019, he moved to the Department of Justice as deputy attorney general, and from December 24, 2020, to January 20, 2021, as acting attorney general. As of July 2021 he is a nonresident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. In May 2022, he was appointed to chair Virginia's Commission to Combat Antisemitism. That Commission issued its report in December 2022, which was both timely and well received.
He was elected to be a member of the American Law Institute in 1996.
Beginning in 1996, through 2003, Rosen was also an adjunct professor at Georgetown University Law Center, where he taught Professional Responsibility (Legal Ethics).
From 2015 to 2016, Rosen served as the elected Chair of the American Bar Association's Section of Administrative Law and Regulatory Practice.
DOT general counsel
From 2003 to 2006, after unanimous confirmation by the US Senate, Rosen was appointed general counsel at the United States Department of Transportation and acted as counsel for then-Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta. Mineta had previously been President Clinton's Secretary of Commerce, and he was the only Democrat in the George W. Bush Cabinet. He was also the first Asian-American member of a President's Cabinet.
During those years, Rosen oversaw the wide-ranging activities of more than 400 lawyers, while also playing a senior management role in a department with a total budget of approximately $60 billion. Among other things, Rosen led DOT regulatory reform efforts, to achieve regulatory objectives in more efficient and less costly ways.
In 2005–2006, Rosen was also designated as the government's representative on the Amtrak Board of Directors. While serving as General Counsel at DOT, Rosen also testified before Congress on numerous occasions on a wide range of subjects, including Amtrak.
OMB general counsel and senior policy advisor
In 2006, Rosen moved to the White House Office of Management and Budget, where he was general counsel and senior policy advisor until 2009. At OMB, he reported to the Budget director, Rob Portman, who later became US Senator from Ohio. At OMB, Rosen had a wide portfolio, assisting Portman with agency budgets and appropriations, and advising Portman and President Bush about regulatory issues and executive orders. He later published a journal article about "Putting Regulators on a Budget".