Wake Up Call: Former Trump Lawyer to Leave Justice Department

Welcome to Bloomberg Law’s Wake Up Call, a daily rundown of the top news for lawyers, law firms, and in-house counsel.

• Kendra Wharton, a former defense attorney for President Donald Trump who serves as the Justice Department’s senior ethics official, plans to leave the department. Wharton replaced Bradley Weinsheimer, the department’s career designated ethics official who resigned in February after DOJ leaders reassigned him along with about a dozen other senior lawyers to a newly created Sanctuary Cities Working Group. (Reuters)
  
• Mergers among UK law firms have dropped 25% over the past year, with 91 mergers in 2024 compared to 122 in 2023, as senior partners increasingly hold out for deals with private equity-backed buyers. The decline comes from growing private equity interest in law firms, especially those with strong client retention, though most investments are still in their early stages. (City AM)
  
• US Attorney for the Northern District of New York John Sarcone III was confronted and chased by a man armed with a knife outside of an Albany hotel. The man, Saul Morales-Garcia, told police that he didn’t know Sarcone was a US attorney, and was charged with attempted murder, felony weapons possession, and a misdemeanor count of menacing. (Times-Union)

Laterals, Moves, In-House

• Drew Valentine joined White & Case as a partner in its global capital markets practice in New York.
• Jeff Korenblatt joined Norton Rose Fulbright as a partner in its tax practice in Washington. He joins from Holland & Knight.
• Jenny Lambert joined Eversheds Sutherland as a partner in its corporate practice group in Atlanta. She joins from PRGX Global.
• Jodi Goldberg joined Pillsbury as a partner in its communications practice in Washington. She joins from Sheppard Mullin Richter & Hampton.