David S. Jonas

David S. Jonas is the General Counsel of the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board. He previously served as Director of Legal Strategy and Analysis in the Office of the General Counsel at the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). He was appointed to the Senior Executive Service as General Counsel of the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) on April 17, 2005. He joined NNSA as the Deputy General Counsel in 2001 and served as Acting General Counsel from 2003-2005. He received the NNSA Silver Medal for his service there.  

Prior to his service with DOE/NNSA, Mr. Jonas was a Marine Corps officer serving at the Pentagon as nuclear nonproliferation planner for the Joint Chiefs of Staff from 1997-2001.  He has negotiated numerous international treaties and agreements, including the U.S. – India Agreement for Peaceful Nuclear Cooperation, and has extensive experience working with the International Atomic Energy Agency, the Conference on Disarmament, and the United Nations. For his service on the Joint Staff, he received the Defense Meritorious Service Medal. In the U.S. Marine Corps he held a wide variety of command and staff billets.  He served as a prosecutor and defense counsel, supervisory defense counsel, legislative counsel, supervisory appellate defense counsel, and served as the Staff Judge Advocate of the 3d Marine Division in Okinawa and the 13th Marine Expeditionary Unit (afloat).  He also commanded Headquarters Company, 5th Marine Regiment and Support Company, Headquarters and Service Battalion, Marine Corps Recruit Depot, San Diego. As counsel of record in the case of Davis v. United States, 512 U.S. 452 (1994), he became the first active duty judge advocate in the history of the Army, Navy, Air Force or Marine Corps to argue a case at the U.S. Supreme Court.  He received the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces Award for Excellence in Legal Writing in 1992 and was chosen as the Outstanding Career Judge Advocate for the Marine Corps in 2000. He concluded his military service as a lieutenant colonel in 2001.

Mr. Jonas has been published in The Washington Post, Proceedings, the Military Law Review, and the North Carolina Central University Law Review on a variety of national security topics. He has been published in the New York University Journal of International Law and Politics, the UCLA Journal of International Law and Foreign Affairs, the Georgetown Journal of International Law, the Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law, the Michigan State Law Review,  the Florida Journal of International Law and the Georgia Journal of International Law on nuclear non-proliferation law and international law topics.  

Mr. Jonas is an adjunct professor at the Georgetown University Law Center,the George Washington (GW) University Law School, and the U.S. Naval War College where he teaches nuclear non-proliferation law and policy, and he is a frequent speaker on this topic. He was recently recognized as Distinguished Adjunct Professor of Law at GW. He is on the Board of Directors of the Marine Executive Association and was a volunteer for 13 years at Doorways for Women and Families, a temporary shelter. His other interests include competitive tennis, racquetball, hiking, travel, and reading.

Mr. Jonas attended Denison University in Granville, OH where he graduated with a B.A. in Political Science in 1978.  He received his J.D. from the Wake Forest University School of Law in Winston-Salem, NC in 1981. He holds an LL.M. in military law from the Judge Advocate General's School, U.S. Army, in Charlottesville, VA (1991) and an LL.M. in International and Comparative Law from Georgetown University Law Center (2005), with Distinction. He received an M.A. in National Security and Strategic Studies from the U.S. Naval War College (2012) With Highest Distinction.

Mr. Jonas was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.  He currently resides in the Mount Vernon area of Alexandria, Virginia, with his wife Tina, and Grey (a schnauzer).