AIG’s Top Lawyer Gets Government Affairs Role as Pandemic Rages

American International Group Inc. announced Thursday that General Counsel Luciana “Lucy” Fato will take on the additional role of global head of communications and government affairs.

She will report to outgoing AIG CEO Brian Duperreault and president Peter Zaffino, the latter of whom was tapped last month to take over March 1 as CEO.

Fato’s elevation in AIG’s C-suite comes as major insurers across the U.S. seek federal legislation that could reimburse them for paying out on business interruption claims stemming from the coronavirus pandemic.

Insurance company Chubb Ltd., which has been at the forefront on some of those bailout efforts, appointed a new global head of litigation in October, three months after hiring John Fielding from Steptoe & Johnson to be its general counsel for global government and industry affairs.

Fato confirmed to Bloomberg Law in an email that she now has responsibility for government relations, public affairs, and communications in addition to overseeing legal, compliance, and regulatory functions as general counsel.

“As we strengthen AIG’s long-term strategic positioning, it is increasingly important that our stakeholders have a clear picture of our businesses, strategy, and value proposition,” Fato said in a statement announcing her promotion.

As part of Zaffino’s ascension, AIG said it would focus on property and casualty insurance by splitting off its life insurance business into a separate company. Zaffino and Duperreault previously worked at Marsh & McLennan Cos. Inc., where Fato was deputy general counsel and corporate secretary from 2005 to 2014.

AIG hired Fato in 2017 from Nardello & Co., a private investigations firm where she served as general counsel and oversaw its operations in North and South America. Fato, a former capital markets partner at Davis Polk & Wardwell in New York, had previously been general counsel at McGraw Hill Financial, a financial services information and analytics company now called S&P Global Inc.

Fato was not one of AIG’s top five highest-paid executives in 2019, per a proxy statement filed by the New York-based company for that year. She currently owns roughly $290,000 in AIG stock, according to Bloomberg data.

AIG’s in-house lobbying arm includes lawyers George Shevlin IV, Frank Tillotson, and Darren Trigonoplos. The trio accrued $1.14 million in expenses through the first three quarters of 2020, according to U.S. Senate records, which show they advocated on a range of insurance regulation, liability, coverage, and pandemic-related issues.

In September, Aaron Katzel, AIG’s former head of legal operations, sued the company, Fato, and former general counsel Peter Solmssen for wrongful termination. Katzel claimed he was fired after raising ethics and compliance concerns about an AIG plan to make its legal operations center an independent business. AIG has denied Katzel’s allegations. Dechert and Davis Polk are representing the defendants.

Marc Lipman, a lawyer and executive who spent the past 15 years with AIG’s Canadian arm, left the company’s Toronto office in June to become president of insurer Lloyd’s Canada Inc.