Harmeet K. Dhillon

From an early interest in constitutional litigation to a stint at the Department of Justice, federal appeals court clerkship, decade of practice at prestigious international law firms, and then founding her own law firm in 2006, Harmeet’s legal career has been marked by a passion for justice, a zeal for attacking legal challenges, and an intense sense of satisfaction in helping her clients realize creative and practical solutions to seemingly intractable problems.

Following a clerkship with the Hon. Paul V. Niemeyer of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, Ms. Dhillon’s practice in New York, London, and the San Francisco Bay Area has focused on federal and state commercial litigation and arbitration, with a particular emphasis on unfair competition/trade secret misappropriation, intellectual property (including trademark litigation and internet torts), complex contractual disputes, and First Amendment litigation (including defamation, trade libel, right of publicity, and anti-SLAPP motions).

Harmeet’s broad experience also encompasses securities, entertainment, employment discrimination and civil rights matters. Ms. Dhillon has developed a niche practice in representing clients across California in election and campaign law matters, ranging from general compliance and ethics representation for partisan and non-partisan contenders to ballot description contests and intellectual property matters pertaining to campaign communications. She is regularly retained by candidates and campaigns for advice on complex legal issues.

Harmeet’s profile in the San Francisco Daily Journal.

Harmeet has practiced before numerous state and federal courts and administrative tribunals across the United States, has successfully handled several trials (jury and bench), arbitrations (including international), and mediations, and has resolved many business disputes prior to the initiation of litigation.

Admitted to practice law in New York and California, she has been a Solicitor of the Supreme Court of England and Wales. Harmeet’s clients at Dhillon Law Group have included e-Commerce leaders, private companies, entrepreneurs, celebrities, film and music artists, authors, advertising executives, franchisees, public utilities, educational institutions and nonprofits.

• Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division at the U.S. Department of Justice
• Associate and Counsel at major international law firms in New York, London, Silicon Valley, and San Francisco for a decade before founding Dhillon Law Group in 2006
• Law Clerk, Hon. Paul V. Niemeyer (United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit (Baltimore))
• Law Clerk, United States Department of Justice, Civil Division, Constitutional Torts Section (D.C.)

Title: Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division

Protecting Elections

• Spearheaded effort to collect voter rolls from every state to ascertain illegal and noncitizen registrations and prevent fraudulent votes. Those are now on appeal, which we expect to ultimately win.
• Sent over 1,000 election monitors across all 50 states during the 2026 midterm general election.
• Sent letters to all 50 states and DC regarding criminal liability for knowingly allowing illegal immigrants to vote.
• Led Civil Rights Division’s briefing in Louisiana v. Callais enjoining unconstitutional race-based gerrymandering.
• Pursuing criminal investigations in multiple states for violations of various election-related statutes, including the procurement and casting of fraudulent ballots.
• Charged and obtained guilty plea from a longtime signature-gatherer (Brenda Lee Brown) in Los Angeles for corrupt voter registration efforts, namely, paying another person to register to vote in a federal election.
• Pursuing criminal investigations in multiple states for violations of various election statutes, including the procurement and casting of fraudulent ballots.

Fighting Unlawful DEI

• Secured almost half-a-billion dollars’ worth of settlements and institutional policy changes from Cornell, Columbia, Brown, University of Virginia, and Northwestern to end unlawful DEI and antisemitism.
• Achieved a $30 million settlement with PayPal Inc. to resolve a fair lending investigation into a discriminatory investment program based on DEI.
• Investigating over 100 university admissions programs for the use of race to achieve “diversity” goals, including medical, law and undergraduate admissions.
• Found Yale, UC Davis, UC San Diego, and multiple other undisclosed major medical schools used unlawful affirmative action in admissions practices (currently negotiating resolution agreements to end the illegal practices).
• Led government-wide revision of all Title VI regulations to remove “disparate impact” DEI language.
• Led intervention into xAI’s challenge to Colorado’s Algorithmic DEI law, which the state ultimately repealed.
• Created DOJ’s anti-DEI guidance for compliance with the Civil Rights Act.
• Sued UCLA for discriminating based on race in medical school admissions by intervening in DoNoHarm/SFFA lawsuit.
• Sued Harvard to obtain its applicant level admissions data that it refused to provide to the Departments of Justice or Education as required by Title VI
• Initiated investigation of Office of Fairfax County Commonwealth Attorney for national origin discrimination in its policy offering lesser or no charges for non-citizens than for citizens.

Advancing Religious Liberty

• Prosecuting 38 individuals in Minnesota, including Don Lemon, under the FACE Act and Ku Klux Klan Act for interfering with religious worship inside a church during its Sunday morning worship service.
• Filed lawsuit on behalf of the Dominican Sisters of Hawthorne against the State of New York, challenging a State law that requires housing biological men with women in the Sisters’ residential hospice care program.

Combating Antisemitism

• Filed first-of-its-kind civil FACE Act case against members and organizers of violent mob the attacked worshipers at West Orange, NJ synagogue.
• Indicted individual for antisemitic arson attack against the historic Beth Israel synagogue in Jackson, Mississippi.
• Indicted and secured guilty plea for vehicle attack against Chabad Headquarters in Brooklyn, New York.
• Sued UCLA for antisemitic hostile work environment related to the 2024 encampment.
• Filed lawsuits against UCLA and Harvard for deliberate indifference to race and national origin discrimination against Jewish and Israeli students due to the antisemitic hostile educational environment on campus.
• Indicted Elias Rodriguez in D.C. with hate crimes and other charges for his fatal shooting of two people outside the Capital Jewish Museum: an American citizen employed at the Embassy of Israel and an Israeli citizen who served as an officer at the Embassy.

Protecting U.S. Workers

• Collected over $10 million dollars in fines and backpay for U.S. worker discrimination.

Aggressively Defending the Second Amendment

• Launched the Second Amendment section, which has sued 11 jurisdictions, including California, Virginia, Colorado, LA County, U.S. Virgin Islands, Minnesota, Mongomery County, Washington, DC, and Denver.
• Reached a first-of-its-kind, court-ordered settlement to protect 2A rights (Los Angeles Sheriff’s Office).
• Recently received successful Third Circuit en banc court victory holding AR-15 and accessory and were unconstitutional.
• Personally argued Second Amendment challenge to state firearm and accessory ban in the Seventh Circuit.
• Initiated an investigation of Philadelphia Police Department’s gun-permit-revocation policy.

Keeping Men out of Women’s Sports and Protecting Women

• Co-authored amicus brief in Hecox that led to a Supreme Court victory.
• Sued Minnesota and California for allowing boys in girls’ sports in K-12.
• Initiated investigations of sexual assaults of women in prisons in Maine, California, and Washington where states house dangerous “transgender” inmates in women’s prisons.

Supporting Law Enforcement

• Terminated eight police consent decrees and other investigations of law enforcement agencies.

Protecting Servicemembers

• Successfully led Civil Rights Division effort to remove language from California Bill A.B. 1537 that prohibited state “peace officers” from engaging in any form of secondary employment that “involves” enforcement of federal immigration laws. Coast Guard Reservists would have been fired if they assisted ICE during their deployment.
• Filed a lawsuit against the New Mexico Supreme Court for violating the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act (SCRA) by refusing to recognize the out-of-state law licenses of qualifying servicemembers and spouses.
• Returned $280,000 to servicemembers from Vehicle Management Solutions Inc. (VMS) for illegally towing and scrapping deployed US Servicemember vehicles in violation of SCRA.

Protecting Americans with Disabilities

• Sued Uber for denying rides to Americans with service animals or folding wheelchairs.
• Sued SeaWorld for denying entry to Americans with wheeled walkers with seats.

Protecting Children and Parental Rights in Education

• Sued Anne Arundel Public Schools and Kansas City Public Schools under FERPA to protect parents’ rights to know if their child’s school is ‘transitioning’ the child to a different ‘gender identity.’ Auditing and investigating other K-12 school districts across the country under Title IX and FERPA for engaging in secret in-school student gender transitions.
• Launched Title IX investigations into school districts across the country (35 in Illinois, 4 in Michigan and 4 in California) to identify sexual orientation and gender ideology (SOGI) content in any class for grades pre-K-12.

Background

• Harmeet is a movement conservative who has fought for the American people for over three decades in her work in election law, civil liberties, and Republican Party politics.
• She is the founder of the Dhillon Law Group and the Center for American Liberty and has represented high-profile clients in cases involving free speech, religious freedom, and election integrity.
• She has also been a frequent legal commentator and advocate on issues related to voting laws and constitutional rights.
• Undergraduate Degree from Dartmouth College. JD from UVA Law School.

Dhillon Law Group

• Represented President Trump personally, the Trump campaign, and related PACs, in over 100 cases.
• Early opponent to social media censorship, including taking on Twitter pre-Elon Musk.
• Early opponent to illegal DEI in Damore v. Google, leading to permanent changes in Silicon Valley hiring practices.
• Harmeet’s firm, which she started in 2004, has also represented numerous conservative organizations such as Turning Point USA, the National Assoc. for Gun Rights, Life Action Network, as well as numerous conservative influencers such as Libs of TikTok and Chloe Cole, conservative journalists, student groups, Republican candidates, elected officials, committees, and political parties, including the Republican National Committee and several state parties.
• In 2019, Harmeet founded the Center for American Liberty (nonprofit), to help fulfill her vision of a national network of conservative attorneys who could represent ordinary citizens whose causes were neglected by the legacy civil rights movement.
• Harmeet and her law firm colleagues trained many Republican lawyers on election law matters nationally and aggressively enforced election integrity through litigation.
• Harmeet is well-known in the pro-life movement for her representation of multiple clients such as Life Action Network and several pro-life protesters who faced restraining orders by San Francisco General Hospital to David Daleidin and the Center for American Liberty.

Fighting COVID-19 Lockdowns

• In 2022, Harmeet’s firm successfully represented the Daily Wire in challenging the federal COVID vaccine mandate, taking the case to the U.S. Supreme Court.
• Additionally, Harmeet took three cases to the U.S. Supreme Court–Tandon v. Newsom (via Center for American Liberty), Gish v. Newsom, and South Bay United Pentecostal Church v. Newsom–challenging California’s overreach in religious gatherings during COVID-19 and won all of them.
• Harmeet filed over two dozen lawsuits challenging state regulations regarding COVID-19.

Leading the Fight for the Republican Party

• Harmeet has been involved in the Republican Party since 2004.
• She brought more Republicans into the party, ran for office, held positions within the CAGOP (Vice Chair & CA NCW), and most famously, ran for RNC Chair against Ronna McDaniel in 2022. McDaniel lost three successive election cycles.
• Represented members and RNC personnel in defending January 6 Committee subpoenas and advanced the RNC’s First Amendment rights in court.

• Dartmouth College, A.B. Classical Studies
• University of Virginia, J.D. (Editorial Board, Virginia Law Review)

• General and Complex Commercial Litigation
• Campaign and Election Law
• Intellectual Property (Trademark, Copyright and Trade Secrets)
• Securities Litigation
• Copyright Infringement Law
• Civil Rights Law
• Corporate Governance Issues – Business disputes, Workplace retaliation, Whistleblower
• Employee Discrimination Law
• First Amendment (Right of Publicity, Internet privacy, Defamation, Trade Libel, and anti-SLAPP)
• Entertainment Transactions and Litigation
• Sexual Harassment

• United States Court of Appeals
  • Second Circuit
  • Fourth Circuit
  • Ninth Circuit
  • Eleventh Circuit
• United States District Court
  • Central District of California
  • Northern District of California
  • Eastern District of California
  • Southern District of California
  • Southern District of New York
  • Eastern District of New York
  • District of Massachusetts
  • District of Delaware
  • Western District of Washington
  • Northern District of Texas
  • Southern District of Texas

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• Director, South Asian Bar Association of Northern California (2001-2004: Board Member at Large; 2007-2009: Chair, Civil Rights Committee)
• Director, Support Network for Battered Women (Santa Clara County) 2001-2003
• Trustee, Sikh Foundation (2001-2009)
• Director, California Women’s Leadership Association(2004-2005; 2008-2009)
• Legal Counsel, Sikh Coalition (2007-2011)
• Legal Counsel, Lohgarh Sikh Educational Foundation (1993-2010)

• Top 100 Lawyers in California – Daily Journal, 2018
• “SALDEF Public Service Award” – Sikh American Legal Defense and Education Fund (SALDEF), 2013
• “Woman Leader in Law” – The Recorder, 2012
• “Cornerstone Award” – North American South Asian Bar Association, 2012
• “Northern California Super Lawyer” – Super Lawyers Magazine, 2011-2012
• “Outstanding Attorney Award” – South Asian Bar Association of Northern California, 2010
• “Best Lawyers Under 40” – National Asian Pacific American Bar Association, 2007
• Centennial Foundation of Canada Distinguished Community Service Award, 2003
• Minority Bar Council Outstanding Community Service Award, 2002

★★★★★
Brilliant Attorney

I retained Dhillon Law Group to represent me against my former employer (an attorney), who mistreated me and took advantage of me. He misrepresented me as a contract employee (which is now illegal in California) to avoid paying me benefits and wanted to avoid paying taxes. When I asked him to pay me for my sick leave (in San Francisco an employer is legally obligated to pay to his employee for sick leave), he started screaming at me and fired me. I contacted Attorney Harmeet Dhillon and she replied to me almost right away. Harmeet and his Associate, Attorney Michael Fleming were very professional, experienced, knowledgeable, thorough and resolved my case in a very short time to my satisfaction. Harmeet did not mind replying to my million emails. I HIGHLY recommend Harmeet Dhillon and Dhillon Law Group to everyone. You won’t regret it. Thank you very much Harmeet for your hard work.

– Anonymous

★★★★★
Excellent professional advice that made a huge difference in outcome

I consulted Harmeet for professional advice for legal matters. She promptly suggested that I had a legitimate case and pointed out California status that strengthen my case. Based on her professional advice, I successfully negotiated a large settlement. Without her advice, I would not have negotiated at all. Her advice made a huge difference in final settlement. Her fees were very reasonable for the quality of advice I received.

– Smith

★★★★★
Strong, Savvy, Successful

Harmeet Dhillon is, without a doubt, the most intelligent woman I’ve ever had the pleasure of meeting. I hired her, and it was the best decision I’ve made. My case presented extreme challenges, and she took everything in stride. She gave me strength when I was ready to give up. Her tenaciousness, determination, and ethics produced a fantastic result. I thoroughly enjoyed all communication I had with her, as she is not only insanely knowledgeable, but quick-witted and hilarious, as well. Her professionalism shines through in everything she does, and I have the utmost respect for her. Harmeet is an absolute blessing. I would not have gotten through the agony of my situation without her confidence and loyalty. I will be eternally grateful to her for the rest of my life. I highly recommend her, clearly.

– Michelle