is a Japanese prosecutor and politician who has served in the House of Representatives since 2012. He was Minister of Justice from 2018 to 2019.yamashita-takashi.jp
retrieved 22 November 2018.

Early life and prosecutorial career

Yamashita was born in Takamatsu and grew up in

Okayama is the capital city of Okayama Prefecture in the Chūgoku region of Japan. The city was founded on June 1, 1889. , the city has an estimated population of 720,841 and a population density of 910 persons per km2. The total area is . The city is ...

. After graduating from the University of Tokyo, he became a prosecutor, and served in several assignments, including as Legal Attache to the Embassy of Japan in the United States of America. He attended Columbia Law School on a Fulbright scholarship in 1997. Yamashita left government service in 2010 after serving in an international director role in the Ministry of Justice.

Political career

Yamashita was elected in the

2012 Japanese general election General elections were held in Japan on 16 December 2012. Voters gave the Liberal Democratic Party a landslide victory, ejecting the Democratic Party from power after three years. It was the fourth worst defeat suffered by a ruling party in Jap ...

to represent the Okayama 2nd district, defeating DPJ incumbent

Keisuke Tsumura is a Japanese politician serving in the House of Representatives in the Diet (national legislature) as a member of the Democratic Party for the People (DPP). A native of Tsuyama, Okayama, he attended the University of Tokyo and received an MBA f ...

. He held his seat against Tsumura in the 2014 election and the 2017 election. Yamashita served as Parliamentary Vice Minister of Justice before being appointed Minister of Justice on October 2, 2018. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe chose Yamashita as a conciliatory gesture to intra-party rival

Shigeru Ishiba is a Japanese politician. Ishiba is a member of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), and is the leader of the ''Suigetsukai'' party faction, and a member of the ''Heisei Kenkyūkai'' faction, which was then led by Fukushiro Nukaga, until 2011 ...

, who Yamashita supported. Opposition parties submitted a

no confidence motion A motion of no confidence, also variously called a vote of no confidence, no-confidence motion, motion of confidence, or vote of confidence, is a statement or vote about whether a person in a position of responsibility like in government or mana ...

against Yamashita in November 2018, alleging that he did not properly explain an immigration bill that would admit more foreign workers to Japan.

Nissan , trade name, trading as Nissan Motor Corporation and often shortened to Nissan, is a Japanese multinational corporation, multinational Automotive industry, automobile manufacturer headquartered in Nishi-ku, Yokohama, Japan. The company sells ...

chairman Carlos Ghosn was arrested and jailed during Yamashita's tenure as Justice Minister. During the affair, Yamashita defended the Japanese criminal justice system against international criticism. After Yamashita stepped down as Minister of Justice in September 2019, he was appointed as chief secretary of the LDP's internal body on revising the constitution, led by Hiroyuki Hosoda.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Yamashita, Takashi 1965 births Living people 21st-century Japanese politicians Liberal Democratic Party (Japan) politicians Members of the House of Representatives (Japan) Ministers of Justice of Japan People from Okayama Columbia Law School alumni University of Tokyo alumni