Erik Jaffe has been involved in appeals on a broad range of legal issues, including First Amendment challenges to campaign finance reform, Commerce Clause challenges to Health Care Reform and other federal legislation, Equal Protection Clause challenges to affirmative action in education, First Amendment challenges to school vouchers, Fifth Amendment challenges to takings of property, Second Amendment challenges to restrictions on gun ownership, and a wide variety of cases involving patents, copyrights, ERISA, securities fraud, federal preemption, environmental regulation, and other state and federal constitutional and statutory matters. He has represented businesses and non-profit groups, Judges, Senators, former government officials, Nobel Prize winners, and a broad cross-section of private individuals. Mr. Jaffe has been involved in over 100 Supreme Court matters, including filing 30 cert. petitions, representing half-a-dozen parties on the merits, and filing over 60 amicus briefs at both the cert. and merits stages.

A 1990 graduate of the Columbia University School of Law, Mr. Jaffe was a law clerk to Judge Douglas H. Ginsburg of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit from 1990 to 1991. Following that clerkship he spent five years in litigation practice with the Washington, D.C. law firm of Williams & Connolly. In the summer of 1996 he left Williams & Connolly to clerk for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. At the end of that clerkship he started his own practice, and he was a sole practitioner from 1997 to 2018. He joined the firm in 2018.

Education

  • Columbia University School of Law (J.D.)
  • Dartmouth College (B.A.)

Clerkship

  • U.S. Supreme Court, Justice Clarence Thomas
  • U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia

Admissions

  • District of Columbia
  • New York
  • U.S. Supreme Court
  • U.S. Courts of Appeals for the D.C., Second, Third, Fourth, Fifth, Seventh, Ninth, Eleventh, and Federal Circuits

Schaerr | Jaffe Attorneys Get Fifth Circuit Win for Clients Challenging Bankruptcy Court Contempt Ruling

Schaerr | Jaffe attorneys Erik Jaffe, Brian Field, and Aaron Gordon successfully appealed a bizarre contempt order issued by a Texas bankruptcy court against a creditor and its lawyers for deigning to ask the district court for relief from an improper gatekeeping order. The Fifth Circuit agreed that the excessive […]

Schaerr | Jaffe Attorneys File Amicus Brief in Upcoming Grants Pass Homelessness Case

On March 4, attorneys from Schaerr | Jaffe filed an amicus brief for the Pacific Research Institute in the upcoming Grants Pass homelessness case. A copy of the brief can be found here. This brief got national attention in a Washington Post article which can be found here.

Schaerr | Jaffe Lawyers Represent the State of Georgia at Trial in First Amendment Challenge to Georgia’s Election Law

Coverage can be found here.

Schaerr | Jaffe Files Post-Trial Motions for Mark Steyn

On March 8, 2024, Schaerr | Jaffe partner H. Christopher Bartolomucci and associate Justin A. Miller filed post-trial motions for conservative writer and commentator Mark Steyn in a high-profile defamation case. Mr. Bartolomucci and Mr. Miller assisted Mr. Steyn at a four-week jury trial in January and February 2024. Senior […]