George R. Salem

George R. Salem is a member of the board of directors of the Arab Gulf States Institute. He established the Law Offices of George R. Salem, PLLC in January 2005. In November 2005 he entered into a relationship as strategic advisor with DLA Piper, where he is focused on assisting in the development of DLA Piper’s Middle East and U.S. Department of Labor practices. From 1990-2004, Salem was a partner at Akin, Gump, Strauss, Hauer & Feld, LLP, where he headed the law firm’s Middle East and U.S. Department of Labor practices. During the course of his career, Salem has negotiated some of the most significant settlements in the field of labor law, among them the resolution of all pending Employee Retirement Income Security Act cases against the Teamsters’ Central States Pension Fund, the E.O. 11246 discrimination case against Harris Trust and Savings Bank, and several major Occupational Safety and Health Act and Fair Labor Standards Act settlements, including the major FLSA settlement involving Food Lion. 

On behalf of various Middle East clients, Salem headed the legal teams that handled the acquisitions of major assets, including refineries in the Middle East. In addition, he headed the legal team that successfully brought suit against the Department of the Treasury on behalf of the owners of the Al-Shifa pharmaceutical plant in Sudan that was destroyed by the U.S. Navy. From 1985-89, Salem served as the solicitor of labor. As the U.S. Department of Labor’s chief legal officer, he was responsible for enforcing more than 130 laws that regulate the country’s workplace, including those guaranteeing minimum wage through the Fair Labor Standards Act, ensuring occupational safety and health pursuant to the Occupational Safety and Health Act, and maintaining pension security under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act. Salem headed a staff of 850 lawyers and support staff in 13 national offices and 16 regional and subregional offices around the country. He played key roles in the Reagan-Bush ’84, Bush-Quayle ’88, and Bush-Cheney ’00 campaigns. In addition, he served as a member of the board of directors of the Overseas Private Investment Corporation and as chairman of the Tripartite Advisory Panel on International Labor Standards, the legal arm of the President’s Committee on the International Labor Organization. In 2022, Salem was appointed by the Joseph R. Biden administration’s USAID administrator as the inaugural board chair of the Partnership Fund for Peace Advisory Board, a bipartisan board established by Congress pursuant to the Middle East Partnership for Peace Act.  

Salem has written and spoken extensively on labor law and related topics and has lectured in Moscow, Beijing, Cairo, and Geneva. He is also active in several professional associations and is listed in Who’s Who in America, Who’s Who in American Law, Who’s Who in American Politics, Who’s Who in Finance and Industry, The International Who’s Who of Business Lawyers, The International Who’s Who of Management Labour and Employment Lawyers, Chambers USA: America’s Leading Lawyers for Business, Washington, DC Super Lawyers, Super Lawyers Corporate Counsel and The Best Lawyers in America. In addition, he was named by The National Law Journal as one of the top 26 labor lawyers in the United States. He is a fellow of the College of Labor and Employment Lawyers and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. 

Salem co-founded the Arab American Institute in 1985, and currently serves as its chairman, and has served as treasurer of United Palestinian Appeal, Inc. since 1982. He is a past president of the National Association of Arab Americans and has served on the board of directors of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee. In 2003 he was named to the U.S. Advisory Commission on Public Diplomacy’s Advisory Group on Public Diplomacy in the Arab and Muslim World, which was assembled at the request of Congress to study the State Department’s public diplomacy efforts in these regions. On behalf of the George W. Bush administration, Salem served as an official observer to the Palestinian elections held in February 2005 and also as Bush’s representative to the funeral of Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat. 

In 1992 Salem received the Ellis Island Medal of Honor. The award is presented annually to Americans of diverse origins for their outstanding contributions to their own ethnic groups and to American society.