Holwell Shuster & Goldberg LLP

Partner

Jayme Jonat has achieved groundbreaking settlements on two historic sex discrimination cases in the airline industry and helped lead her firm’s work on one of the largest antitrust disputes in history. Jayme was the first woman to serve as administrative partner of HSG, a position of immense responsibility, where she helped lead operations, recruiting, and professional development.

In two particularly impactful matters, Jayme led an HSG team that partnered with the ACLU in pro bono litigation that established important precedent on how employers must treat expecting and new mothers. Jayme spearheaded two first-of-their-kind discrimination lawsuits against Frontier Airlines, alleging that its policies toward pregnant and breastfeeding pilots and flight attendants violated the Civil Rights Act. The lawsuits challenged, among other things, Frontier’s practice of prohibiting employees from pumping while on duty. Frontier’s policies, which made no accommodations for breastfeeding mothers, forced some female employees to choose between breastfeeding their children and keeping their job.

The litigation Jayme led changed those policies. In 2022, Frontier settled the lawsuit on behalf of flight attendants, agreeing to allow flight attendants to use breast pumps in flight and to identify lactation facilities at its base airport locations. In December 2023, Frontier settled the pilots’ lawsuit, marking a critical step toward gender equity in the airline industry. As a result, Frontier became one of the first airlines to permit pilots to pump in the cockpit during noncritical phases of a flight, allowing lactating pilots to continue working while maintaining the highest safety standards.

Jayme’s commercial litigation work carries similarly high stakes—and, as with her litigation against Frontier, affects entire industries. She plays a prominent role in the defense of Visa in antitrust actions brought by some of the largest retailers in the world—including Target, Macy’s, and many others—over “swipe fees.” Jayme helped Visa reach a historic $6.26 billion settlement with one class of merchants, the largest known settlement of a private antitrust case under the 120-year-old Sherman Act. In March 2023, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit approved the final settlement. In November 2025, Visa, along with Mastercard, announced a more than $200 billion settlement with over 12 million merchants. If approved, the settlement is expected to resolve two decades of antitrust litigation over swipe fees.

Jayme assisted Judge Holwell in his role as an independent monitor appointed by a major financial institution under an agreement between the institution and the SEC. She also represented Sealed Air—the maker of bubble wrap—in a securities fraud class action in the SDNY. The plaintiffs alleged that the company and a former executive had made false and misleading statements to the SEC. In January 2023, the court approved a settlement of $12.5 million.

In January 2024, Jayme helped the online video platform Rumble Inc. win dismissals of two putative class actions alleging Rumble violated the Video Privacy Protection Act by disclosing to Facebook the personal information of subscribers.

Jayme was a key member of the HSG team representing AmTrust North American, Inc. in a breach-of-contract and breach-of-fiduciary duty action in New York Supreme Court against its managing general agent arising out of an insurance program improperly operated by the agent, causing losses of over $200 million. The dispute settled favorably for HSG’s client.

New York

U.S. Court of Appeals, Second Circuit

U.S. District Court, Eastern District of New York

U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York

Fordham University School of Law (J.D., magna cum laude, 2010)

Cornell University (B.S., 2007)