McGuireWoods Adds DC Partners as Election Spurs Government Exits

McGuireWoods added four Washington partners in the past two months, beefing up government practices thanks to turnover ahead of a change in executive branch leadership in January.

The hires include Megan Lewis, assistant chief of the Washington criminal section of the Justice Department antitrust division; Clint Narver, assistant director of Justice’s consumer protection branch; David Hirsch, who led the Securities and Exchange Commission’s crypto assets and cyber unit, and Kevin Madagan, a former health and Food and Drug Administration partner at Reed Smith.

“In an election cycle, you see more people popping out of government so we’re being a little opportunistic,” said Noreen Kelly, deputy managing partner at the firm. “Each of the practices that those folks joined are moving up market.”

The moves fuel the firm’s ability to enhance its DC bona fides, with its largest office located only about 100 miles outside the nation’s capital in Richmond. McGuireWoods, which traces its roots to President James Monroe’s private secretary starting a practice 190 years ago, also touts a wholly-owned affiliate consulting business that works in state and federal government relations.

There are 10% to 20% more government lawyers looking for jobs in private practice over previous years due to the inevitability of a change in presidential administrations with the November election, said DC-based legal recruiter Stuart TenHoor. “With Biden dropping out, it changed the nature of it,” he said.

Another DC-based legal recruiter, Amy Savage, said McGuireWoods has a record of capturing DC talent because of its history of integrating government lawyers into law firm partnerships. “They are known as a platform where former government attorneys are welcomed and valued,” she said.

‘Growing Work’

The hires of Madagan and Narver were part of a focus on life sciences regulatory lawyers underway for a year, said Richard Viola, deputy managing partner of McGuireWoods’ corporate practice. “We sorted through more than 100 names and we really worked that list for a long time, and we’re happy where we are,” he said.

Demand has risen for legal counsel in transactions with a life sciences regulatory component, Viola said. That is due to private equity investors’ rising interest in pharmaceutical services and healthcare providers’ involvement in clinical research activities, he said.

Jason Cowley, chair of the firm’s government investigations and white collar litigation department, said the hiring of Lewis will help shoulder a heavy antitrust workload. “We are well suited to capture some of that growing work in that area,” he said.

Elizabeth Hogan, managing partner of McGuireWoods’ DC office and co-chair of the firm’s securities enforcement and regulatory counseling practice, said Hirsch’s hire continues an effort by the firm that picked up speed when she joined in 2020. “We’ve brought in a lot of people as regulators and compliance-focused recruits,” she said.

At the end of September, the firm also hired former administrative patent judge Amanda Wieker as an intellectual property partner in the firm’s Richmond office. Wieker helped develop a process to allow the US Patent and Trademark Office director to review Patent and Trial and Appeal Board decisions in America Invents Act proceedings.

Antitrust, FDA

Food and drug regulation and antitrust have been particularly competitive hiring areas for large firms seeking to hire departing government lawyers, TenHoor said.

“Antitrust has been hot because the FTC has been active for the last couple years, and food and drug does well because of life sciences,” TenHoor said. “Ask Am Law 50 firms what their strategic plan is for 2025, and 50% will say that we want to bulk up life sciences capabilities.”

In September, Weil Gotshal & Manges hired antitrust enforcer Mark Seidman, a former FTC lawyer who litigated the FTC’s antitrust case against Kroger’s merger with Albertsons. Two weeks later, the firm hired former FTC lawyer Jasmine Rosner, who joined from Amazon’s corporate legal team. Rosner previously led merger investigations at the FTC.

Arun Rao, former deputy attorney general in the DOJ’s consumer protection branch, joined Mayer Brown after ramping up the department’s consumer protection enforcement agenda focused on pharmaceuticals, among other sectors.