Georgetown Law Receives Record-Setting Donation From Alumnus

The Georgetown University Law Center announced a $10.5 million donation from Scott K. Ginsburg (LAW ’78) on Mar. 18. The donation from Ginsburg— the single largest commitment in the school’s history— is intended to support the expansion of the Law Center campus in downtown D.C.

Part of the donation will also go towards the creation for four Scott K. Ginsburg Professorships at the Law Center to support justice-focused research and legal education.

This current donation stands in stark contrast to the previously tumtulous relationship between the Law Center and Ginsburg.

In 2013, Ginsburg sued the school for $7.5 million for breach of contract and fraud  following a $5 million donation towards the construction of a fitness center in 2000.

According to complaints filed by Ginsburg in 2013, although the Law Center’s representatives agreed to name the facility the “Scott K. Ginsburg Health and Fitness Center,” the naming rights were not honored after Ginsburg was found civilly liable for insider trading in 2002.

Following the 2002 ruling, the Law Center pressured the Dallas businessman to relinquish the naming rights to the fitness center— which Ginsburg alleged he refused to do. Ginsburg alleged that the Law Center knew of the SEC investigation at the time of the agreement, and did not express any concerns.

The lawsuit also asked for the Law Center to return a $2.5 million donation Ginsburg gave in 2003, which was originally intended as the first installment of a $11 million total commitment.

According to comments made by Ginsburg to the Dallas Business Journal at the time, the return of funds would be “an opportunity to continue [his] family’s largess” in the Dallas area.

In response, the Law Center countersued Ginsburg, alleging that he failed to fulfill his donation commitment and that he had agreed to relinquish naming rights as a result of the SEC investigation.

Both suits were dropped following an undisclosed settlement in 2014.

Ginsburg, a Dallas businessman who amassed his wealth in the broadcasting and luxury car-dealing industries, also served as a former staff director and general counsel of the U.S. Senate’s Labor Subcommittee on Employment, Poverty and Migratory Labor between 1975 and 1981.