# Alan Dershowitz Harvard Law's youngest-ever full professor at 28, the most famous criminal defense attorney in America for four decades, and the single figure who most completely embodies the transformation of "civil libertarian" from a political identity into a permission structure for defending power. Dershowitz's career arc — from defending Claus von Bülow and the free speech rights of pornographers to negotiating Jeffrey Epstein's plea deal, defending Trump in his first impeachment trial, advising [[Jared Kushner]] on pardons, and authoring a book arguing Trump could constitutionally serve a third term — is the story of how liberal credentialism becomes a weapon in the hands of illiberal power. He is the legal establishment's answer to the question: what happens when brilliance operates without a moral center of gravity? ## Background Born September 1, 1938, in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Raised in Borough Park in an Orthodox Jewish family. Father was a founder and president of the Young Israel synagogue. - **Brooklyn College** BA (1959) - **Yale Law School** JD (1962); editor of the *Yale Law Journal* - **Law clerk** to Judge David Bazelon (D.C. Circuit), then to Supreme Court Justice Arthur Goldberg - **Harvard Law School** assistant professor (1964); full professor (1967, age 28 — youngest in the school's history); Felix Frankfurter Professor of Law (1993); retired from teaching 2013 ## The Legal Career: A Pattern Dershowitz's career divides into three overlapping phases, each building on the credibility earned in the previous one. ### Phase 1: The Civil Libertarian (1960s–1990s) The cases that built his reputation were genuinely important: - **Harry Reems** (1976) — Successfully overturned the obscenity conviction of a porn actor, a legitimate [[First Amendment]] case - **Claus von Bülow** (1984) — Overturned the conviction for attempted murder of his wife. The case became the basis for the book *Reversal of Fortune* (1985) and the 1990 film - **O.J. Simpson** (1995) — Served as appellate adviser on the "Dream Team." Won 13 of 15 murder/attempted murder appellate cases over his career - **Mike Tyson** — Represented on appeal after rape conviction (conviction upheld) - **Patty Hearst, Leona Helmsley, Jim Bakker, [[Julian Assange]]** — A roster of high-profile clients that cemented his status as the go-to defense lawyer for the famous and the wealthy This phase established two things: (1) Dershowitz's genuine legal brilliance and (2) the principle that he would defend anyone, which would later provide cover for defending people who were indefensible. ### Phase 2: The Epstein Entanglement (2005–Present) In 2005, when Jeffrey Epstein learned he was under investigation for sexual abuse of underage girls, he turned to Dershowitz as part of his legal team. **Dershowitz's role in the 2008 plea deal:** Dershowitz was one of Epstein's key defense attorneys in negotiating the Non-Prosecution Agreement with [[Alex Acosta]]'s U.S. Attorney's office. The legal "dream team" — which also included Kenneth Starr, Jay Lefkowitz, and Gerald Lefcourt — secured: - Abandonment of the draft 60-count federal indictment - State plea to two charges (reframing child sex trafficking as "solicitation of prostitution") - 13 months county jail with work release (6 days/week, 12 hours/day) - Federal immunity for all co-conspirators, named and unnamed - No victim notification (later found to violate the Crime Victims' Rights Act) Dershowitz has consistently defended his role, stating he was doing his job as a defense attorney: getting the best possible result for his client. This framing — the lawyer-as-amoral-technician — has become his signature defense for everything that followed. **The Giuffre accusations:** In 2014, Virginia Giuffre — one of Epstein's most prominent accusers — alleged that Epstein had sexually trafficked her to Dershowitz between 2000 and 2002, when she was underage. Giuffre detailed alleged encounters in multiple settings including Epstein's planes and residences. Dershowitz has vehemently denied these accusations since they were made. The legal saga: - **2019:** Giuffre sued Dershowitz for defamation; Dershowitz countersued - **January 2024:** Newly unsealed deposition material contained detailed allegations from Giuffre - **November 2022:** Settlement reached. Giuffre agreed to drop her lawsuit and issued a public statement acknowledging she "may have made a mistake" in identifying Dershowitz. No money changed hands. Dershowitz treated this settlement as full vindication. Critics noted that "may have made a mistake" is not a retraction, and that the settlement came under unknown pressures and circumstances. Virginia Giuffre died by suicide in 2025. ### Phase 3: The Trump Defender (2018–Present) Dershowitz's transformation from lifelong Democrat and Clinton supporter to Trump's most prominent legal defender is one of the most consequential political realignments in recent American history — not because of Dershowitz himself, but because of the legitimizing function he serves. **The impeachment defense (January 2020):** Trump was reportedly "fixated" on having Dershowitz on his legal team for the first impeachment trial. White House officials applied significant pressure to secure his participation. Dershowitz presented constitutional arguments that abuse of power does not constitute an impeachable offense, paraphrasing former Justice Benjamin Curtis to argue that impeachment requires "criminal-like conduct." His most controversial argument: that a president who believes his own re-election is in the national interest cannot be impeached for actions taken to further that re-election — a theory that, taken to its logical conclusion, would make virtually any presidential self-dealing non-impeachable. Even the *National Review* called the argument "dangerous." Dershowitz said he accepted no compensation and would donate any payment to charity. **The Kushner connection:** Dershowitz developed a working relationship with Jared Kushner that bridged legal, political, and policy domains: - Advised Trump and Kushner on Middle East peace policy (the Abraham Accords) - Nominated Kushner, Avi Berkowitz, David Friedman, and Ron Dermer for the [[Nobel Peace Prize]] for the Abraham Accords - Collaborated with Kushner on clemency: Dershowitz and Kushner together helped secure approximately **27 pardons** from Trump, operating as an informal pardon pipeline connecting outside groups to the White House The pardon collaboration is structurally significant: Dershowitz provided legal credibility and client connections; Kushner provided White House access. Together they operated a clemency channel that bypassed the normal DOJ pardon review process. **The Martha's Vineyard exile:** Dershowitz's Trump defense cost him his liberal social world. He has publicly complained about being "shunned" on Martha's Vineyard, where he has a home. Director Larry David told him they could no longer be friends. In 2026, he was shouted out of a Martha's Vineyard farmer's market over his Epstein connections. The social ostracism became a recurring theme in his media appearances and a rhetorical tool: proof, in his telling, that the left had abandoned civil liberties. ## The Israel Thread Israel advocacy is the connective tissue that makes Dershowitz's political journey legible. His commitment to Israel has been the one constant across every phase: - **Academic:** Author of *The Case for Israel* (2003), *The Case for Peace* (2005), *Defending Israel* (2019), *Palestinianism* (2025) - **Legal:** Advocated for Israel in international law contexts throughout his career - **Political bridge:** Israel policy is where Dershowitz's liberalism and the Republican right overlap most completely. His Abraham Accords advisory role with Kushner was rooted in decades of Israel advocacy - **The break with Democrats:** Dershowitz formally left the Democratic Party after witnessing pro-Palestinian protests outside the 2024 Democratic National Convention. After 70 years of voting Democratic, he declared himself an independent, citing what he described as growing antisemitism and anti-Israel sentiment in the party Israel is the lens through which Dershowitz's transformation makes sense to Dershowitz himself: he didn't move right, the left moved away from Israel. Whether this framing is accurate or self-serving is debatable. What's clear is that Israel advocacy provided the ideological bridge across which Dershowitz walked from Clinton's world to Trump's. ## Current Activities (2025–2026) - **Third-term book:** Met with Trump in the Oval Office (December 2025) to discuss his upcoming book *Could President Trump Constitutionally Serve a Third Term?* (expected 2026). Argues the [[22nd Amendment]] contains a "hole" that could allow a twice-elected president to return to office through another constitutional mechanism — such as being nominated as VP and ascending via resignation. [[The White House]] said the country would be "lucky" if Trump served "even longer." - **Newsmax contributor:** Regular presence on [[Newsmax]], providing legal commentary and Trump defense - **Clemency advocacy:** Seeking Trump pardons for leaders of OneTaste, an "orgasmic meditation" organization awaiting federal sentencing - **Iran policy:** Advised the Trump administration on blockading the Strait of Hormuz - **CNN defamation suit:** Sued [[CNN]] for $300 million over coverage of his 2020 impeachment-trial argument; lost in the district court and the 11th Circuit. His Supreme Court petition (No. 25-770) asked the Court to discard the actual-malice rule of [[New York Times Co. v. Sullivan]]. Denied **June 29, 2026**, with [[Clarence Thomas]] dissenting, joined by [[Neil Gorsuch]]. - **Epstein files:** Named in documents released under the Epstein Files Transparency Act (2025–2026) ## The Legitimizing Function Dershowitz matters for this KB not as a conservative ideologue — he isn't one — but as a **legitimizer**. His function in the MAGA ecosystem is to provide elite liberal-academic credibility to positions that would otherwise be recognized as authoritarian, corrupt, or self-dealing: 1. **Epstein plea deal:** A Harvard Law professor negotiating the NPA gave it a veneer of legal respectability that a lesser-known attorney could not have provided 2. **Impeachment defense:** A lifelong Democrat arguing that abuse of power isn't impeachable neutralized the most potent Democratic argument — "even Dershowitz agrees..." 3. **Pardon pipeline:** Dershowitz's legal prestige laundered the pardon process, making what was functionally a favor exchange appear like principled clemency advocacy 4. **Third-term argument:** The Harvard imprimatur transforms what would otherwise be dismissed as authoritarian fantasy into a "constitutional question worth exploring" 5. **Israel bridge:** Dershowitz connects the Republican-Israel alliance to the liberal-Zionist establishment, providing bipartisan cover for policies that might otherwise be seen as purely partisan The pattern: Dershowitz lends his credibility to the exercise of power, and in return receives access, relevance, and the ability to continue operating at the highest levels despite the Epstein shadow. It is a transaction, even if neither party would describe it that way. ## The Epstein–Trump–Dershowitz Triangle The three-way connection is worth mapping explicitly: - **Dershowitz defended Epstein** in the 2008 plea deal, helping secure the NPA - **Dershowitz was accused by Giuffre** of being one of the people Epstein trafficked her to (Dershowitz denies; Giuffre said she "may have made a mistake" before her death) - **Trump was a social associate of Epstein** through the 1990s–2000s Palm Beach circuit - **Trump nominated [[Alex Acosta]]** — the prosecutor who signed the plea deal Dershowitz negotiated — as Labor Secretary - **Dershowitz defended Trump** in his first impeachment trial - **Dershowitz advised Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner** on Middle East policy and pardons - **Dershowitz is now arguing Trump can serve a third term** - **Trump signed the Epstein Files Transparency Act** — the documents that name both Dershowitz and Trump Each individual connection has an innocent explanation. Taken together, they describe a network of mutual protection and mutual benefit in which legal services, political loyalty, and access to power circulate among a small group of people, several of whom have direct connections to a convicted sex trafficker. ## See Also - [[Jeffrey Epstein]] — Client, social associate, source of the accusations that shadow Dershowitz's career - [[Alex Acosta]] — Counterpart in the 2008 plea deal: Acosta as prosecutor, Dershowitz as defense - [[Donald Trump]] — Impeachment client, pardon collaborator, third-term subject - [[Newsmax]] — Current media platform - [[Federalist Society]] — Network producing the judicial and legal infrastructure Dershowitz now serves - [[Revolving Door]] — The mechanism connecting legal advocacy, political power, and personal benefit