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Former Solicitor General Donald Verrilli to Join Munger Tolles
Q: Are you thinking about this as more than the addition of an appellate practice or a D.C. office?
Brian: There’s no question that hiring Donald increases our profile in the appellate—and particularly the Supreme Court appellate—arena. I would expect that Don and also Michael and Chad would attract some significant appellate work, so that’s a good thing. But we did not do this to create a small appellate boutique. Don doesn’t want to limit his practice to being an appellate lawyer. He wasn’t just an appellate lawyer before he joined the government. He does trial work, he does regulatory work, he wants to counsel clients. So we would expect this to be a broad-based office.
Q: Kirkland & Ellis just made a big splash by hiring back Paul Clement. Are there particular forces at work in the economy and the government that make SGs especially attractive to clients?
Brian: I don’t know that there are special forces coming on now. I think clients have always looked to hire lawyers who are both very talented and have experience handling the most challenging problems. Paul Clement is a terrific lawyer, Don Verrilli is a terrific lawyer, and they both handled very difficult problems for the one of the most significant clients in the world, the United States government.
Q: What was Munger, Tolles & Olson’s pitch to Verrilli?
Brian: When we met Don, we found that he really fit the culture of the firm. He shares our commitment to the community, our commitment to pro bono, our commitment to public affairs. So our pitch was you can represent some of the best clients in the most challenging cases in the country in an environment that’s really consistent with your values.
Q: A lot of the recent solicitors general like Clement and Neal Katyal appear fairly regularly at the Federal Circuit in patent cases. Is that an area that your firm might expand now?
Brian: I would think so. We don’t have a sense that in five years we have to have X number of lawyers in certain areas. We expect the office to grow much more naturally and to follow the ambitions and the talents of, not just the people in Washington but the talents of the firm as a whole. Having said that, Don has a strong interest in doing both appellate work and in the IP area. He’s done that as solicitor general. So I would expect that he will attract some very interesting cases before the Federal Circuit.
Q: Your firm has also mentioned that Verrilli counseled senior government officials on national security and on the scope of executive authority. Fair to say these are increasingly important issues for the technology industry, and for industry in general?
Brian: I think issues of data security are at the front of the minds of business and legal leaders in major corporations around the world. There’s so much data being stored electronically and the risks of having that hacked or otherwise challenged are so significant. That’s certainly an area where we’d like to grow our practice and we think Don may well help us there.
Q: Can you tell us a little more about Michael DeSanctis and Chad Golder?
Brian: Both Michael and Chad have pre-existing relationships with Don. Michael and Don were together at Jenner & Block. Michael was at one point the managing partner of the D.C. office. They’re very close. Michael is a well-rounded litigator, trial lawyer, regulatory lawyer and does everything from entertainment work to general commercial work, to defense contracting litigation. Chad is one of the most talented and experienced lawyers you’ll find anywhere in the country at that level—someone who’s not that far out of law school, he’s a Supreme Court clerk, terrific lawyer.
Q: Given that one of them has run a government law office and another has been in law firm management, are you anticipating building out this practice further?
Brian: I think the office will grow. There’s no question in my mind that these three people are going to attract terrific lawyers.
Q: How much can we expect to see them in California?
Brian: We’ve been a national firm for a long time out of two offices in California, and we’ve done it by taking a one-firm approach. We fully expect that lawyers from Los Angeles and San Francisco will spend significant chunks of time in Washington, and that Don and Chad and Michael will spend significant chunks of time in California. We don’t see it as a stand-alone office. We see it as one firm. We’ve really thought long and hard about how to integrate this and make it seamless. And we’re pretty confident that given their talent and their commitment to our values, we’re going to do well with that.
Scott Graham can be reached at [email protected]. On Twitter: @ScottKGraham.
