They’ve Got Next: State Attorneys General Practice Fresh Face Angelina Whitfield

Attorneys general across the US have been working together to improve regulation of anti-competitive conduct. They’ve been collaborating in multistate litigation and pushing Congress to modernize the federal antitrust laws.

For those reasons, Dentons US partner and former Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum (R)said he was eager to hire Angelina Whitfield in 2021. Whitfield is a senior managing associate with the firm, a position she has earned while overcoming the formidable challenge of profound hearing loss.

Dentons was eager because it knew that it needed to bolster its antitrust resources, an area of active state AG enforcement, McCollum said. Whitfield also came highly recommended.

“She was a star performer at the Illinois attorney general’s office. I knew her boss, and that is a really good office,” McCollum said. Lisa Madigan (D) was the Illinois attorney general at the time.

While an assistant attorney general in Chicago, Whitfield was assigned to the antitrust bureau, where she led investigations and represented the state in enforcement actions and multidistrict litigation. Her matters frequently involved price-fixing, wage-fixing, and other anticompetitive conduct.

She handled litigation against multiple pharmaceutical companies for their alleged conspiracy to fix the prices of more than 300 generic prescription drugs. She also handled litigation for alleged product hopping against Indivior Inc.—a global pharmaceutical company that was spun off from Reckitt Benckiser Inc.—over Suboxone, a prescription drug used to manage symptoms of opioid addiction. Product hopping refers to when a company formulates a new version of a drug for which the patent is expiring and phases out the old one to avoid losing market exclusivity.

Additionally, Whitfield helped to secure a $2.3 million settlement over an alleged reverse-payment scheme between brand and generic manufacturers of Lidoderm, also known as lidocaine patches.

Whitfield said her five years in the AG’s office managing litigation and conducting investigations helped her to develop an understanding of what a regulator is looking for substantively, technically, and procedurally.

“There are different paths that staff have to navigate, and I understand what information they need to make their decisions,” she said.

Whitfield left the attorney general’s office in 2018. Prior to joining Dentons in Chicago, Whitfield was an associate at Axinn, Veltrop & Harkrider in New York.

Her current clients, which include medical device manufacturers and major tech platforms, tend to be on the cutting edge. Many of her matters are confidential, however, involving product counseling and investigations. Discretion is key, Whitfield said.

“Sometimes the client’s best outcome is when the matter goes away quietly and quickly,” she said.

That’s easier said than done when dealing with a sprawling investigation of a global company. The logistics alone are a tremendous undertaking, including assembling extensive information from an large organization operating in multiple jurisdictions. You need a cross-national strategy, she said.

Whitfield “is a rock star,” Dentons partner Thurbert Baker said. Baker was the first Black Attorney General of Georgia when he was appointed in 1997. He served until 2011.

“I’ve watched AG work for a lot of years, and the issues we deal with continue to evolve on a daily basis, and their interests have expanded exponentially,” he said.

It’s not just antitrust of which she has a deep grasp. She knows cannabis, digital assets, employment, and life sciences, too, Baker said.

Whitfield is “a vital part of the think tank for the AG practice,” keeping her colleagues abreast of a rapidly evolving landscape, he said.

Whitfield has bilateral hearing loss. She is profoundly deaf in one ear and severely deaf in the other.

“When I was a child, I was the subject of medical studies. They never figured out the cause,” Whitfield said.

They did tell her she was likely going to lose all of her hearing and might need cochlear implants, so she made the most of her time.

Whitfield taught herself how to lip read and seized on every opportunity to expand her speaking abilities.

“For a long time, I avoided telling people about my hearing loss, because I wanted people to consider me ready to tackle anything,” she said.

“I sang in choir and learned notes even if I couldn’t hear them. I had to function as best as I could with what I had,” she said.

It took perseverance and sometimes working twice has hard to make sure she had the necessary accommodations, but she got through, Whitfield said.

“I’ve adapted so well that most people can’t tell,” she said.

Whitfield said she recently got hearing aids that connect to Bluetooth.

“It’s been magical,” she said.

Her appreciation for scientific innovation is part of why Whitfield said she loves what she does so much.

“Literally every day that I wake up, there is a new and interesting issue I’ve never seen before that needs to be solved efficiently and thoughtfully, and I really enjoy that,” Whitfield said.