Cooley Launches New Congressional Investigations Practice in DC

Cooley is launching a congressional investigations practice in Washington with former federal prosecutor and Capitol Hill veteran Susanne Grooms.

Grooms led the investigative staff of the House Committee on Oversight and Reform from 2011 to 2021 where she oversaw a team that conducted hundreds of investigations and congressional hearings. She also served as the general counsel for the Select Committee on Benghazi and was a part of the Senate Impeachment Trial Team in both impeachments of President Donald J. Trump.

“The expertise and experience that Susanne brings to the table is going to be invaluable for Cooley clients as they face congressional scrutiny,” said Mike Attanasio, chair of Cooley’s global litigation department, said in an interview.

“Tech companies, social media companies and AI-related companies are going to face increasing investigatory activity from various committees and subcommittees on Capitol Hill,” he said.

Grooms, former chief counsel to Rep. Elijah Cummings, is joining Cooley from Kaplan Hecker & Fink. She joined the boutique firm in 2021 to help launch its congressional investigations team.

“Cooley is just the ideal platform to launch a congressional investigations practice,” Grooms said in an interview with Bloomberg Law. “Its client base really matches up with the topics and areas that Congress is interested in — the innovative, disruptor clients from technology, social media, AI, life sciences, financial services, healthcare,” she said.

Grooms began her legal career as a prosecutor in the Tax Division of the Justice Department before becoming counsel in the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee for then-Chairman Henry Waxman in 2007. Grooms then joined the Internal Revenue Service in several roles, including as advisor to the Deputy Commissioner for Services and Enforcement and as a senior counselor to the Chief of Criminal Investigations.

In her new role at Cooley, Grooms will advise clients as they navigate high stakes investigations launched by Congress and federal and state agencies, with a particular focus on inquiries involving significant reputational issues and media scrutiny.

“Congressional investigations are high-stakes, high-risk endeavors for clients and they’re really seeking to have an expert to help them navigate these unique circumstances with each particular committee and each particular request,” she said.

The firm plans on building out a new team through additions, but also by leveraging Cooley’s existing bench in agency-facing and DOJ-facing practices that have similar demands coming from those entities for its clients, Attanasio said.

Late last year, the firm added Southern District of New York’s public corruption chief Rebekah Donaleski to its white collar defense team.

“We just could not be more excited about this fit and what it means to our continuing strategy to be very deep and very muscular in dealing with regulatory agencies and now in DOJ and now Congress,” he said.