Trump officials turn to white-collar lawyer, law school enrollments decline, Kirkland's new Miami office and the brutal law firm collections in 2022
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Longtime D.C. lawyer?Emmet Flood?of?Williams & Connolly?has been in high demand, as the?Justice Department?continues to investigate attempts by then-U.S.?President?Donald Trump?to undermine the 2020 election results.
Flood, who has earned a reputation as an aggressive defender of the executive privilege doctrine, is representing former?Vice President Mike Pence in connection with the DOJ and the Jan. 6 committee probes. He is also advising Pence’s former chief of staff?Marc Short.
The application of executive privilege to a federal grand jury investigation is likely to be a significant issue as the Justice Department attempts to question witnesses about activities in the White House following the 2020 election. “There’s no one more qualified to navigate it and more astute at these issues than he (Flood) is,” said William Burck of law firm Quinn Emanuel, who worked with Flood in the George W. Bush White House.
Meanwhile, Pence?has said?he would not sit for an interview with the congressional Jan. 6 committee, and the panel has not subpoenaed him.
The committee held its final public hearing on Monday,?referring?Trump to the Justice Department for criminal charges.
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New student enrollment in U.S. law schools plummeted 11% this fall, a stark reversal from the nearly 12% spike witnessed in 2021, according to new data from the American Bar Association.
"This is the pendulum swinging back," said law school admissions consultant Mike Spivey. Experts had predicted enrollment would return to normal following law schools’ blockbuster 2021, when the COVID pandemic, a weak entry-level job market, and the 2020 presidential election combined to spur interest in legal careers.
The ABA reported that there are currently 38,020 first-year law students at the law schools it accredits, down from 42,718 in 2021 but close to 2020 levels. Among the 196 accredited schools, 150 saw a decreased first-year class size, the organization said.
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Though it is still early in the 2023 application process, figures from the Law School Admission Council suggest that enrollment for the upcoming fall will be flat or down slightly. "It's a very good year to be an applicant, compared to the previous two years," according to Spivey.
Kirkland & Ellis has cemented its launch into the Miami legal market by inking a lease in a new 55-story tower that has also attracted other major law firms, including Winston & Strawn, Sidley Austin and Baker McKenzie.
Chicago-founded Kirkland signed a 115,000-square-foot lease taking up six floors in the development at 830 Brickell Plaza, while the other three law firms will take up more than 100,000 square feet combined, according to a statement from the building's developers. The building is set to be completed in early 2023 according to the developers.
Miami has been a?hot spot for law firm growth?in 2022, with Sidley, King & Spalding and Venable among the firms newly planting flags there. Other firms, including Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan, have set up shop in recent years.
Welcome to law firm collections season, the least wonderful time of the year.
It’s a perennial December ritual: Firm managers harangue their partners to press clients into paying up before year-end. It’s never fun, but with a potential recession looming, this year appears more fraught than usual.
While firms saw blockbuster revenue and profits in 2021,?columnist Jenna Greene?writes that the buzz around the bar is that collections for 2022 are lagging. As one managing partner put it, “Clients this year, more than ever, have been slow to pay.” It’s an observation backed by a recent report from?Citi Private Bank Law Firm Group?and?Hildebrandt Consulting.
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