Jonathan Hafetz

Jonathan Hafetz

Justice, Director of Litigation, Liberty and National Security Project

Jonathan Hafetz directs litigation for the Liberty and National Security Project of the Brennan Center.  Mr. Hafetz is counsel in several leading post-9/11 detention cases, including AlMarri v. Pucciarrelli, challenging the indefinite military detention of a lawful resident alien arrested in the United States, and Munaf v. Geren and Omar v. Geren, two cases involving U.S. citizens unlawfully detained in Iraq. Mr. Hafetz has also helped coordinate the Guantánamo detainee litigation since its earliest stages, and currently represents a detainee at Guantánamo. Last year, Mr. Hafetz successfully secured the release of Amir Mohamed Meshal, a U.S. citizen who was subject to extraordinary rendition and illegal detention in East Africa. 

Mr. Hafetz writes and lectures widely about national security issues. His articles have appeared in the American Prospect, The Nation, Findlaw, Jurist, the National Law Journal, Balkinization, Huffington Post, and the New York Law Journal, as well as numerous academic journals.  Mr. Hafetz has also testified before Congress on detainee issues and habeas corpus. Mr. Hafetz's book Habeas Corpus and the Rise of Global Detention System is scheduled for publication by NYU Press in 2009.  Mr. Hafetz also serves as frequent commentator on national security issues, and has appeared on ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, CNN, and NPR.

Before joining the Brennan Center, Mr. Hafetz was a Gibbons Fellow in Public Interest and Constitutional Law at Gibbons, P.C., and an attorney at the ACLU's Immigrants' Rights Project. He also previously clerked for the Honorable Jed S. Rakoff, U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, and Sandra L. Lunch, U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit.

Radio Appearances

Legal Debate on Guantánamo Detainees, Insider Topic with Ray Suarez, PBS, 2/20/2008

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