Lockheed Martin Lands New Legal Chief as Musk Criticizes F-35

Lockheed Martin Corp. has hired Kevin O’Connor, a former federal prosecutor who once was a key legal adviser to President-elect Donald Trump’s 2016-17 transition team, to be its new general counsel.

O’Connor’s recruitment was announced late Tuesday by Lockheed, which said he will join the Bethesda, Maryland-based aerospace and defense giant as of Jan. 13, 2025, a week before Trump is inaugurated and returns to the White House. O’Connor succeeds retiring Lockheed legal chief Maryanne Lavan.

Lockheed has recently come under fire from technology titan Elon Musk, who took to X—the social platform he owns once known as Twitter—to mock the company’s costly F-35 fighter jet after the declassification of a Pentagon test report. Musk, a prominent Trump supporter, is also set to lead the so-called Department of Government Efficiency, whose mandate includes cutting “wasteful expenditures.” The F-35 is the world’s costliest weapons program.

Musk owns companies that compete with Lockheed, which in October reached an agreement with the Pentagon on milestones it must hit to win back some $500 million in withheld payments. Trump is also in line to decide whether to lift sanctions on Turkey’s defense industry, thereby allowing the country to proceed with a plan to buy Lockheed’s F-35s, a fifth-generation fighter in competition with new stealth aircraft developed by the Chinese and Russian militaries.

“It is an honor to join Lockheed Martin at such an exciting time in its history, when national security solutions are of paramount importance,” O’Connor said in a Lockheed statement. Lavan, his predecessor, will serve as a strategic adviser to Lockheed through the first quarter of next year.

Lockheed elevated Lavan to general counsel in 2010 after its former legal chief—future FBI director James Comey—left for a new job. Lavan initially joined Lockheed in 1990 and has held a variety of legal, governance, internal controls, and risk management roles at the company.

O’Connor didn’t respond to a request for comment about whether he’s working with Trump’s current transition team. Bloomberg News reported in 2016 that O’Connor—then the top lawyer to hedge fund mogul Steve Cohen—helped identify and vet candidates for the US Justice Department after Trump’s surprise win in 2016. He subsequently left amid a purge of Chris Christie loyalists.

O’Connor previously led global ethics and compliance at United Technologies Corp., an aerospace conglomerate that merged with Raytheon Co. O’Connor had chaired the white-collar practice at what was then Bracewell & Giuliani, a Big Law firm once named for former Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani. During his time at the Justice Department in the George W. Bush administration, O’Connor was Connecticut’s top federal prosecutor and held the department’s No. 3 job in Washington.

He didn’t join Trump’s first Justice Department, instead remaining with Cohen’s Point72 Asset Management, which he left in 2020 to take the top legal job at heating and air conditioning giant Carrier Global Corp. The latter disclosed O’Connor’s pending departure in a securities filing Tuesday that said he will be succeeded as legal chief at month’s end by Francesca Campbell, chief mergers and acquisitions counsel at the Palm Beach Gardens, Florida-based company.

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Lavan didn’t respond to a comment request about her decision to retire and make way for O’Connor. “This leadership transition is part of robust, intentional, and long-term hiring and succession planning,” Lockheed said.

Carrier’s most recent proxy statement shows that O’Connor earned more than $3.5 million in 2023, a slight increase from the $3 million he received the year prior. Lavan wasn’t one of Lockheed’s five highest-paid executives in 2023, but did receive $6.4 million in total compensation during 2022, per securities filings.

During O’Connor’s final two years at Carrier, the company was advised by lawyers from Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison on two major transactions, its $13.2 billion cash-and-stock acquisition of German manufacturer Viessmann and $3 billion sale of its commercial and residential fire business to Lone Star Funds. The Lone Star deal closed this month.

O’Connor’s hire follows Lockheed’s recent disclosure that Paul Weiss partner Jeh Johnson resigned Nov. 13 from its board. Johnson, who received $340,000 in total compensation for his services in 2023, joined Lockheed as a director in 2018. He led the US Department of Homeland Security during the Obama administration and has often been critical of Trump on cable news.

Johnson told MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough after the US presidential election in November—and before he resigned from Lockheed—that Trump’s campaign “played to fear and anger, and that prevailed.”

Lockheed said in a statement to Bloomberg Government last month that Johnson’s departure wasn’t due to any disagreement with the company. “We are grateful for his many contributions to the company over his nearly seven-year tenure as a director and wish Jeh the best,” Lockheed said.

Paul Weiss, which had close ties to the Biden administration, helped raise money for the Harris-Walz campaign. Paul Weiss lawyers also donated to Republican candidates. Johnson didn’t respond to a comment request.

With assistance from Kate Ackley.