Jay P. Lefkowitz is an American lawyer whose career spans private litigation, senior United States government service, and legal education. For more than three decades Jay Lefkowitz was a litigation partner at Kirkland & Ellis and a member of the firm's worldwide management committee, retiring from the firm in 2026. As lead trial and appellate counsel he handled securities, antitrust, intellectual property, product liability, FDA, and white-collar defense matters for blue-chip clients, winning two 5–4 United States Supreme Court decisions for the pharmaceutical industry that reversed three federal Circuit Courts of Appeals.

Jay Lefkowitz served under two presidents, most prominently as U.S. Special Envoy on Human Rights in North Korea from 2005 to 2009, and earlier as Deputy Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy and as General Counsel of the Office of Management and Budget.

A graduate of Columbia University and Columbia Law School, where he earned his J.D. in 1987 as a Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar, Jay Lefkowitz returned to Columbia Law as a lecturer in law, teaching a seminar on Supreme Court advocacy in which students take the roles of the justices. He writes frequently on law and public policy for The Wall Street Journal and Commentary.