Daniel R. Adler

Daniel R. Adler is a litigation associate in the Los Angeles office of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher. He specializes in complex commercial and constitutional litigation in trial and appellate courts. Daniel has briefed more than 70 appeals for federal and state courts across the country and has argued before the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and several California Courts of Appeal.

Highlights include:

• Class actions. Daniel regularly defends clients in high-stakes class actions. He has defended, among other clients, a pharmaceutical company against antitrust claims, a technology company against securities claims, a boat and motorcycle manufacturer against manufacturing-defect and mislabeling claims, and insurers against claims for business income lost during the COVID-19 pandemic. Daniel also frequently challenges orders granting motions for class certification. In one case, for example, the Fourth Circuit vacated an order certifying an antitrust class seeking billions. In re Zetia (Ezetimibe) Antitrust Litigation, 7 F.4th 227 (4th Cir. 2021). On remand, Daniel persuaded the district court not to recertify the class. Daniel has also defended significant class-action settlements from appeals brought by objectors. E.g., In re Facebook, Inc. Internet Tracking Litigation, 2024 WL 700985 (9th Cir. 2024).

• Insurance. Daniel has extensive experience representing insurers in trial courts and on appeal. He won affirmance of judgments in cases brought on behalf of putative classes of policyholders in California and Washington seeking business income lost during the COVID-19 pandemic. E.g., Mudpie, Inc. v. Travelers Casualty Insurance Company of America, 15 F.4th 885 (9th Cir. 2021); Hill & Stout, PLLC v. Mutual of Enumclaw Insurance Company, 515 P.3d 525 (Wash. 2022). Daniel also persuaded the Fifth and Ninth Circuits that large classes of auto-insurance policyholders should not be certified because it was impossible to determine whether they were all injured on a classwide basis.  Bourque v. State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company, 89 F.4th 525 (5th Cir. 2023); Lara v. First National Insurance Company of America, 25 F.4th 1134 (9th Cir. 2022). In another of his appeals, the California Court of Appeal decided that the California Insurance Commissioner had impermissibly ordered a retroactive refund of premiums to policyholders. State Farm General Insurance Company v. Lara, 71 Cal. App. 5th 148 (2021).

• Securities and corporate governance. Daniel persuaded the United States Supreme Court to grant certiorari and then unanimously hold that plaintiffs suing under Section 11 of the Securities Act of 1933 must prove that they bought shares under the registration statement they claim is misleading.  Slack Technologies, LLC v. Pirani, 143 S. Ct. 1433 (2022). He also won a decision from the Ninth Circuit holding that liability for short-swing profits under Section 16(b) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 does not turn on whether a board approved transactions with an insider for the express purpose of exempting those transactions from liability. Roth v. Foris Ventures, LLC, 86 F.4th 832 (9th Cir. 2023). Daniel has also litigated cases in the Delaware Supreme Court, securing a reversal in a high-profile appraisal action (DFC Global Corp. v. Muirfield Value Partners, L.P., 172 A.3d 346 (Del. 2017)) and affirmance of a decision declining to second-guess a board’s judgment in approving an acquisition (City of Coral Springs Police Officers’ Pension Plan v. Block, Inc., 308 A.3d 1189 (Del. 2023)).

• Defending cities. Daniel persuaded the Supreme Court to grant certiorari and then hold that the enforcement of laws regulating camping on public property is not “cruel and unusual punishment” under the Eighth Amendment.  City of Grants Pass v. Johnson, 144 S. Ct. 2202 (2024). The decision returned to local governments the right to decide for themselves how best to address homelessness.  Daniel also defended a city, at both trial and on appeal, against claims brought under the California Voting Rights Act and the Equal Protection Clause. He has also counseled other California cities threatened with litigation under the California Voting Rights Act and section 2 of the federal Voting Rights Act.
• General commercial appeals.  Daniel secured reversal of an order granting summary judgment in a dispute over a valuable piece of commercial real estate in Nashville.  Houston Humphreys LLC v. Houston Street Partners, LLC, 2022 WL 3573404 (Tenn. Ct. App. 2022). And in a dispute between former parties to a license agreement to manufacture and sell consumer electronics, he defeated multiple appeals challenging orders granting summary judgment and awarding his client significant attorneys’ fees. Monster, LLC v. Beats Electronics, LLC, 2023 WL 4484055 (Cal. Ct. App. 2023); Monster, LLC v. Beats Electronics, LLC, 2020 WL 5014610 (Cal. Ct. App. 2020).

Daniel also maintains an active pro bono practice. Highlights include:

• First Amendment. Daniel won dismissal of a complaint filed against a nonprofit by a political group for an alleged violation of the First Amendment. Pasadena Republican Club. v. Western Justice Center, 985 F.3d 1161 (9th Cir. 2021). He has also counseled other clients facing potential First Amendment litigation.

• Fourth Amendment. Daniel has represented the Cato Institute in opposing the United States Customs and Border Protection’s policy of searching electronic devices at the border, including at international airports, without even reasonable suspicion.

• Prisoners’ and Detainees’ Rights. Daniel secured an opinion holding that a former prisoner’s claim of indifference to his medical needs was not barred by the Prison Litigation Reform Act’s exhaustion requirement. Jackson v. Fong, 870 F.3d 928 (9th Cir. 2017). In another appeal, he won reversal of the dismissal of a former immigration detainee’s claim that federal immigration officials violated his constitutional right of access to the courts. Garcia v. Johnson, 840 F. App’x 255 (9th Cir. 2021).

• Criminal appeals. Daniel has represented former prosecutors and public defenders serving as amici curiae in support of nonviolent drug offenders seeking to withdraw their guilty pleas on the ground that their counsel did not advise them of the immigration consequences of those pleas. In one case, he helped to persuade the California Court of Appeal to grant the defendant’s habeas petition.  In re Hernandez, 33 Cal. App. 5th 530 (2019). In others, he helped to persuade the California Supreme Court to reverse orders denying defendants’ motions to vacate their convictions. People v. Espinoza, 14 Cal. 5th 311 (2023); People v. Vivar, 11 Cal. 5th 510 (2021). Those decisions will protect other noncitizens from the consequences of their uninformed guilty pleas. Daniel has also represented a client in a direct criminal appeal challenging convictions for attempted murder and first-degree assault.

Daniel has been recognized in Best Lawyers: Ones to Watch® in America  for Appellate Practice since 2024.

Daniel joined Gibson Dunn after serving as a law clerk to Judge Paul J. Watford of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.

He graduated from Columbia Law School in 2014, where he served as an editor of the Columbia Law Review and earned the Ruth Bader Ginsburg Prize for achieving highest academic honors in all three years. Daniel graduated summa cum laude from Princeton University in 2009 with a degree in History and minors in Finance and Latin. Before attending law school, he worked as a strategy consultant at Bain & Company in Chicago.

Daniel is admitted to practice law in the State of California as well as before the Supreme Court of the United States, the United States Courts of Appeals for the First, Second, Fourth, and Ninth Circuits, and the United States District Courts for the Central, Eastern, and Southern Districts of California.

Capabilities

• Appellate and Constitutional Law
• Class Actions
• Insurance and Reinsurance
• Litigation

Credentials

Education:

• Columbia University - 2014 Juris Doctor
• Princeton University - 2009 Bachelor of Arts

Admissions:

• California Bar

Clerkships:

• US Court of Appeals, 9th Circuit, Hon. Paul J. Watford, 2014 - 2015