JG THE LAW OFFICE OF JONATHAN GROSS

Constitutional & Civil Rights Litigation

When the government oversteps, someone has to answer for it.

A formidable federal litigation firm defending fundamental & God-given rights — in the courtroom, on appeal, and through the records the government would rather keep sealed.

Request a consultation Meet the team
The attorneys of The Law Office of Jonathan Gross at the United States Capitol

The team · at the United States Capitol

Federal
Trial & appellate practice
FOIA
Transparency litigation
Case Review
Advisory & strategy

Why we practice

Rights are only as real as the lawyer willing to enforce them.

We take the cases that test the limits of government power — criminal defendants facing the full weight of the federal system, citizens denied the records they are owed, and clients whose constitutional rights were treated as negotiable. We litigate them as if the principle were the client, because it is.

What sets us apart

A team that has seen the system from every side.

Jonathan Gross built this firm on a conviction few can offer: to fight government overreach, you have to understand it from the inside and the outside. Its people have served at the heart of federal law enforcement and the Department of Justice — Jonathan as Senior Counsel in the DOJ Civil Rights Division under Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon; Jared Wise as an FBI Assistant Legal Attaché and Supervisory Special Agent directing teams of agents and task-force officers at home and abroad, and later a Senior Advisor to Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche. Cindy Young and Jared Wise are former January 6 defendants.

That is a rare vantage, and it is the whole point. This team knows how a prosecution is built, where it overreaches, and how the machinery of justice can be turned into a weapon — because they have watched it from the government's side of the table and from the receiving end. Few firms can say they have seen it both ways. This one has.

What we do

Practice areas

Who we are

Our Team

In the media

U.S. Congress Brandon Straka Emerald Robinson · Lindell TV Newsmax One America News The Gateway Pundit Daniel Horowitz NPR
See all coverage

Before the Supreme Court

“In our country, no one needs a permit to pray.”

When nobody else would step in, Jon did.

The firm is counsel for the petitioner in Grand v. City of University Heights, now before the Supreme Court on the merits.

Daniel Grand, an Orthodox Jew, emailed a few friends about hosting a prayer group in his home for the coming Sabbath. The City answered with a cease-and-desist order: no religious gathering in his own home without a special use permit, on pain of severe penalties. The Mayor delivered the message personally. Years later the City conceded Grand had never needed a permit at all — but by then he had canceled that Sabbath’s gathering, and the hundreds of Sabbaths since.

When Grand sued under the First Amendment and RLUIPA, the Court of Appeals dismissed his claims as unripe, holding that the takings-based finality rule of Williamson County barred the courthouse door until the City reached a final decision on a permit it should never have required. The question now before the Court is whether that land-use doctrine displaces the ordinary rules that determine when First Amendment and religious-liberty claims may be heard.

Read the brief for petitioner (PDF) View the Supreme Court docket Talk to the firm

Case pending. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome.

Case Highlights

Religious Liberty · RLUIPA

No One Needs a Permit to Pray

The trial record behind the firm’s Supreme Court case.

Grand v. City of University Heights · No. 1:22-cv-01594 · U.S. District Court, N.D. Ohio · Second Amended Complaint filed January 2, 2024

An Orthodox Jewish homeowner was ordered to stop hosting a prayer group in his own home without a special use permit — then surveilled, investigated for code violations, and put through a three-hour public hearing when he applied for one. Jonathan Gross brought the case in the district court and built the record here; that record is now before the Supreme Court.

Read the evidence (PDF, 69 pp.) Learn more
Weaponization of Justice

J6ers Were Destroyed By Weaponization

Forcing the DOJ to keep its own promise to the January 6 defendants.

v. Blanche · No. 1:26-cv-02082 · U.S. District Court, D.D.C. · Filed June 15, 2026 · Pending

On behalf of more than 100 January 6 defendants, the firm has sued the U.S. Attorney General to compel the investigation the Department of Justice itself pledged — into the abusive and unethical prosecutions these defendants endured. The suit seeks no money damages; it asks only for the accountability the government promised.

Read the petition (PDF, 42 pp.) Learn more
First Amendment · Public Access

J6 Historical Society

Unsealing the January 6 record — for defendants, the press, and history.

v. Pirro · No. 1:26-cv-02811 · U.S. District Court, D.D.C. · Filed August 7, 2026 · Pending

The firm represents the J6 Historical Society in a First Amendment suit to lift the boilerplate protective orders that sealed January 6 discovery — the same order language copied across roughly a thousand prosecutions. It asks the court to give each defendant an unrestricted copy of their own case file and to open the government's global evidence databases to the public for research and history.

Read the complaint (PDF, 9 pp.) Learn more
Civil Rights · Conditions of Confinement

J6ers Were Tortured in the DC Gulag

Compelling the civil rights investigation a federal judge ordered in 2021.

v. Dhillon · No. 1:26-cv-03013 · U.S. District Court, D.D.C. · Filed August 28, 2026 · Pending

For the January 6 defendants held pretrial at the D.C. Jail between 2021 and 2025, the firm petitions to compel the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division to open the investigation Judge Royce Lamberth referred to it in October 2021 — a referral that has gone undischarged through two administrations, despite a U.S. Marshals inspection finding systemic failures and an independent audit reporting a death roughly once a month.

Read the petition (PDF, 10 pp.) Learn more

Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome.

Published works

Books by our people.

Our team writes outside the courtroom as well as in it — on faith and finance, on technology and tradition, and on what it costs to stand up to the federal government and keep standing.

Cover of Values Investing by Jonathan Gross

Jonathan Gross

Values Investing

An Omaha Rabbi Learns Torah from Warren Buffett

Written during his years leading a congregation in Warren Buffett’s hometown — what the world’s most patient investor and the Torah turn out to say to one another about character, stewardship, and the long view.

Find the book →
Cover of Ai Vey! by Jonathan Gross

Jonathan Gross

Ai Vey!

Jewish Thoughts on Thinking Machines

An early look at the questions artificial intelligence puts to an ancient tradition — what a thinking machine is, what it owes us, and what we owe each other once we have built one.

Find the book →
Cover of Unbowed by Cindy Lou Young

Cindy Lou Young

Unbowed

Saved by a Cowboy, a Rabbi and a Carpenter — When the Storm Rose, She Stood

A first-hand account of being prosecuted by the United States government, and of the people who carried her through it — written by the firm’s own FOIA and legal-operations lead, who lived it.

Find the book →

Views expressed in these works are the authors’ own and are not legal advice.

In their words

What others say.

“Sir, you’ve got a good attorney with you.”

Hon. Trevor N. McFaddenU.S. District Judge — from the bench, to a defendant

“Jonathan stood beside me in one of the most challenging battles of my life, and he never wavered. I will always be grateful for his advocacy and recommend him without hesitation.”

Rudolph W. GiulianiFormer Mayor of New York City

“Mr. Gross is a good lawyer.”

Rebekah LedererAssistant U.S. Attorney (J6 Prosecutor) — from the case transcript

Speak with us

Tell us what you're facing.

Consultations are confidential. If we're not the right firm for your matter, we'll tell you — and point you toward someone who is.

Request a consultation

Our Practice Areas

We keep the practice narrow on purpose. These are the areas we know cold — and where a focused firm can outwork a bigger one.

Not sure which of these fits your situation?

That's what a consultation is for. Tell us the facts and we'll tell you honestly where you stand.

Request a consultation

Freedom of Information Act

The law says twenty days.

Ask anyone who has waited.

The Freedom of Information Act gives every person a right to federal records, and gives every agency twenty working days to answer. In practice the answer is often silence, then an acknowledgment letter, then a tracking number, then nothing. We file the requests, we take the appeals, and when the agency still will not produce, we take it to federal court.

Request a consultation How the process works

Where our requests stand

The record, not the brochure.

Not a claim about our results — a list of the cases, with the numbers a reader can look up.

We have filed more than forty federal FOIA and Privacy Act requests on behalf of clients. On three of them, the government’s failure to respond has put us in federal court.

The firm also files under state and District of Columbia public-records statutes and with legislative-branch offices, which run on their own clocks.

Docket record reviewed September 2026

All three seek records from the Justice Department and its components. Each asks the same thing: that the agency be ordered to produce what the statute already requires it to produce.

Young v. U.S. Department of Justice
No. 1:25-cv-03955-TSC (D.D.C.)

Filed pro se by Cindy Lou Young — the firm’s FOIA and legal operations manager — and David Sumrall; the firm has since appeared as counsel. One factual matter, five agencies: the FBI’s visit to Mr. Sumrall, who authorized it, who oversaw it, and what Justice Department staff said about it internally. Requests went out in October 2025 to the Department, the Executive Office for United States Attorneys, the Inspector General, the Office of Information Policy and the Bureau. None issued a determination in twenty business days, and the records identifying who authorized the visit have still not been produced.

As filed November 13, 2025 · Read the complaint

Miller v. Federal Bureau of Investigation
No. 1:26-cv-02282 (D.D.C.)

Brought on behalf of independent journalist Yehuda Miller. Seeks the Bureau’s communications and directives concerning Ray Epps, including the records behind his removal from the FBI’s publicly circulated wanted materials after January 6, 2021. The Bureau acknowledged that responsive records exist and reopened the request after a dispute-resolution challenge, then denied it in full under the two personal-privacy exemptions — without a Vaughn index or any itemized account of what it holds. The suit also challenges the denial of a fee waiver.

As filed June 26, 2026 · Read the complaint

Miller v. Federal Bureau of Investigation
No. 1:26-cv-03067 (D.D.C.)

Brought on behalf of independent journalist Yehuda Miller. Three requests in one suit: emails to and from FBI Director Kash Patel over five days in July 2025; a Bureau intelligence product on domestic extremists’ use of amateur radio; and the warrant, affidavit and application materials behind the November 2021 search directed at James O’Keefe and Project Veritas. Two drew no determination at all. The third drew a Glomar refusal to confirm or deny records the suit contends the government has already officially acknowledged.

As filed September 1, 2026 · Read the complaint

These entries describe each complaint as filed, and do not state the current posture of any matter. The 1:25-cv-03955 complaint is posted with the plaintiffs’ personal contact details redacted; it is otherwise the document as filed. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome.

The law as it stands

What the statute actually requires.

FOIA is 5 U.S.C. § 552. Its core commitments are short enough to state plainly.

  • Disclosure is the default.

    The agency carries the burden of justifying every withholding, and a federal court reviews that justification de novo — it owes the agency no deference.

  • Nine exemptions, and only nine.

    An agency may withhold only what one of them actually covers.

  • Since 2016, foreseeable harm.

    The FOIA Improvement Act bars withholding a record simply because an exemption technically fits. The agency must reasonably foresee harm to the interest the exemption protects.

  • Partial production is required.

    Any reasonably segregable non-exempt portion must be released, even when the rest is properly withheld.

  • Ninety days to appeal, minimum.

    An adverse determination must give the requester at least ninety days to appeal. That is a floor, not a ceiling — read the letter.

The nine exemptions

If your denial letter cites a number in parentheses — (b)(5), (b)(7)(A) — this is what it means. An agency may withhold only what one of these nine covers, and since 2016 it must also foresee actual harm from releasing it.

  • 1

    National security

    Information properly classified to protect national defense or foreign policy.

  • 2

    Internal personnel rules

    Records related solely to an agency’s internal personnel rules and practices.

    In practiceThe Supreme Court narrowed this sharply in 2011. It reaches genuine human-resources matters — not, as agencies once argued, any internal record whose release might help someone evade the rules.

  • 3

    Withheld by another statute

    Information some other federal law forbids the agency to release.

    In practiceThe workhorse. The agency need not defend the withholding on its own merits — only point to the other statute. Always ask which one, by name and citation.

  • 4

    Trade secrets and commercial information

    Trade secrets, and commercial or financial information that is privileged or confidential.

    In practiceBroader since 2019. “Confidential” now means information the submitter customarily keeps private and the government promised to protect — no longer requiring proof of competitive harm.

  • 5

    Deliberative and privileged records Most litigated

    Inter- and intra-agency records covered by the deliberative process, attorney work-product, or attorney-client privilege.

    In practiceThe one agencies stretch furthest, and the one the foreseeable-harm standard bites hardest. The deliberative process privilege also expires: it no longer applies to records created more than twenty-five years before the request.

  • 6

    Personal privacy

    Personnel, medical, and similar files whose release would be a clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy.

    In practiceA balancing test, not a switch. The public interest in what the government was doing weighs against the individual’s privacy — so the answer can change with what the records show. One of our pending suits turns on this balance.

  • 7

    Law enforcement records Most litigated

    Records compiled for law enforcement purposes, withheld on any of six specific grounds — interference with proceedings, fair-trial rights, privacy, confidential sources, techniques, or physical safety.

    In practiceSubsection (A), interference with pending enforcement proceedings, is the most common source of open-ended delay: the agency withholds while the matter is live, and the matter stays live.

  • 8

    Financial institution supervision

    Records concerning the examination and supervision of financial institutions.

  • 9

    Well data

    Geological and geophysical information and data concerning wells.

Two things an exemption does not do. It does not excuse a missed deadline — those are separate obligations. And it does not justify withholding a whole document when part of it is releasable: any reasonably segregable non-exempt portion must still come out.

The excuse we hear most

“A lapse in appropriations.”

The single most common explanation for a blown FOIA deadline is that the government was closed. The letter is close to a form:

Due to the recent lapse in appropriations, FOIA personnel were furloughed and processing was suspended. Your request has been placed in the queue and will be processed as resources permit.

There are two problems with it.

First — the Justice Department disagrees.

DOJ’s Office of Information Policy, which supervises FOIA compliance government-wide, issued guidance on November 18, 2025 telling agencies exactly how to count the days after a shutdown: they must count them. The statute excludes Saturdays, Sundays, and legal public holidays from the twenty-day clock. It does not exclude furlough days. A furlough is a reason a deadline was missed. It is not a legal excuse for missing it, and it does not stop the clock.

Second — the dates rarely fit.

Fiscal year 2026 had two lapses, and neither was general:

  • Jan 31 – Feb 3Four days, partial.
  • Feb 14 – Apr 30Seventy-six days, and limited to the Department of Homeland Security. The longest in American history.

When a DHS component explains a spring 2026 delay by pointing to the shutdown, the calendar supports it. When an agency that was funded and open the whole time sends the same letter, it does not. We check before we accept it, and we say so on the record.

All three of our pending suits seek records from the Justice Department and its components — which were funded and operating throughout all seventy-six days of that lapse.

How a request actually moves

Five stages, and where each one stalls.

01

The request

You describe the records you want with enough specificity that a professional employee could locate them, and you send it to the right component of the right agency. Precision here is not a formality: a vague request invites the clarification letter below, and a misrouted request simply sits.

02

Twenty working days

The agency has twenty days, excluding weekends and federal holidays, to determine whether it will comply and to tell you so. That is a determination, not a production — the records may follow later. But the determination is a deadline, and it is enforceable.

Where the clock restarts

Clarification — once. The agency may make one request for information it needs to process yours, and the clock is tolled until you answer. Once. If a second clarification letter arrives, the clock is running whether the agency thinks so or not.

Fee questions — no limit. The agency may also toll to resolve fee issues, and the statute does not cap how often. This is the provision most often used to slow a request down.

The ten-day extension. In “unusual circumstances” the agency may extend by written notice — capped at ten additional working days. Beyond that it must offer you the chance to narrow the request.

03

The denial, in its several forms

Not every denial says “denied.” Watch for:

  • A full or partial withholding under one of the nine exemptions.
  • A Glomar response — refusing to confirm or deny that records exist at all. One of our three pending suits challenges exactly this.
  • “No records located,” which is a challenge to the adequacy of the search, not to the exemptions.
  • A fee category or fee-waiver denial that prices the request out of reach.
  • Silence past the deadline, which the statute treats as its own kind of answer.
04

Administrative appeal

An adverse determination must tell you of your right to appeal to the head of the agency, and must give you at least ninety days to do it. The agency then has twenty working days to decide.

The appeal is not a formality to be skipped. It is where the record for litigation gets built — your chance to put the inadequate search, the misapplied exemption, and the missing foreseeable-harm analysis in writing before a judge ever sees the file.

05

Federal court

If the agency misses its deadlines you are deemed to have exhausted your administrative remedies and may sue without waiting for the appeal to be decided. If the appeal is decided against you, you may sue then.

A FOIA suit is not a damages case. The court cannot award you money for the delay, the expense, or the harm the withholding caused. What it can do is order the agency to produce — and that is the whole of the remedy. In court:

  • Review is de novo. The agency’s determination gets no deference.
  • The burden is on the agency to justify every withholding, usually through a Vaughn index itemizing each document and the exemption claimed. Two of our pending suits ask a court to order one.
  • The judge may examine the withheld records in camera rather than take the agency’s word.
  • Suit may be brought where you reside, where you have your principal place of business, where the records are, or in the District of Columbia.

$405 — the federal civil filing fee on every FOIA complaint, before a word of briefing is written. Multiply that by the number of agencies stonewalling a single project and the arithmetic becomes its own kind of exemption.

One thing worth knowing: if you substantially prevail, the court may assess reasonable attorney’s fees and litigation costs against the United States. It is discretionary, and it is not damages. But it means a meritorious FOIA case is not necessarily one you fund alone from start to finish.

If your request has gone quiet

The dates are the case.

Bring us the request, the tracking number, and every letter the agency has sent — including the acknowledgment. We will tell you where you stand in the five stages above, whether the clock is actually tolled or only said to be, and whether the matter is worth a complaint.

Request a consultation

This page describes the federal Freedom of Information Act, 5 U.S.C. § 552. Many states have their own public-records statutes with different deadlines and procedures. Nothing here is legal advice, and reading it does not create an attorney-client relationship. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome.

Our Team

Assembled on purpose.

Jonathan built this firm with people who have been through the federal system themselves — one attorney, and a team whose lived experience of government overreach is exactly what makes them formidable. Every client works directly with the people handling their matter.

Media

In the press & on the air.

Interviews, testimony, and national coverage of the firm's work — from broadcast and podcasts to the halls of Congress.

This page is updated as new interviews and coverage air.

Contact

Request a consultation.

Three steps. The fee covers intake review, a conflict check, and a 60-minute consultation, and is credited in full toward your retainer if you engage the firm within 30 days. Paying the fee does not make you a client of the firm.

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    Pay the $300 consultation fee

    Secure online payment through Clio. The fee is earned when your consultation is completed. If our conflict check prevents us from proceeding, it will be refunded in full.

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Step 1 · Confidential client intake

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Questions

info@jonathangross.law

By phone

(603) 630-3195

Mailing address

2833 Smith Ave., Suite 331
Baltimore, MD 21209

Hours

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Individual addresses are on the Our Team page.

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