On June 3, 2021, President Joe Biden announced that NASUSA member Neil MacBride is his nominee for General Counsel, Department of Treasury. MacBride is currently a litigation partner in the law firm of Davis Polk & Wardwell, where he serves as head of its Washington, DC office and as co-head of the Firm’s Government Investigations Practice.

Before entering private practice, MacBride spent extensive time as a government official on law enforcement, national security, and financial enforcement matters.  He served in the Obama-Biden Administration, first as an Associate Deputy Attorney General for criminal enforcement in the U.S. Department of Justice and then as the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia. MacBride earlier served as Chief Counsel to then-Senator Joseph R. Biden, Jr. on the Senate Judiciary Committee and as a federal prosecutor in the United States Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia.  He also served on the Biden-Harris and the Obama-Biden Transition Teams.  Earlier in his career, MacBride served as General Counsel to the Business Software Alliance and practiced law at the Washington, DC law firm of Verner, Liipfert, Bernhard, McPherson & Hand.  He began his public service career clerking for the Honorable Henry C. Morgan, Jr. in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia.

MacBride graduated from the University of Virginia School of Law and Houghton College.  He lives in Northern Virginia with his wife Christina Jackson MacBride and their three children.

The Tennessee Attorney General’s Office has created a podcast regarding the removal of Governor Ray Blanton in 1979. It features NAFUSA life member and past president Hal Hardin, Senator Lamar Alexander, and political consultant Tom Ingram. Hardin was the United States Attorney at the time and played a critical role.

You can access Making the Case on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Just search “Making the Case” or “Tennessee Attorney General.”

The United States Senate on July 20, confirmed NAFUSA life member Kenneth Polite to serve as the assistant attorney general for the Justice Department’s Criminal Division. The vote was 56-44. He was nominated by President Biden on April 12, 2021. He served as the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Louisiana from 2013 to 2017, having been appointed by President Obama. Most recently he was a partner at Morgan Lewis in Philadelphia.

Paul Coggins, immediate past president of NAFUSA, has released the second Cash McCahill novel, The Eye of the Tigress. The first, Sting Like A Butterfly, was published in 2020.

Paul Coggins is the co-chair of the White Collar and Government Investigations Section of Locke Lord. He is the former United States Attorney for the Northern District of Texas. A Rhodes Scholar, a graduate of Harvard Law School, and a former host of a popular radio call in show, Paul is also a frequent commentator for the media, and a contributor of articles to newspapers and magazines.   

The book is available to pre-order. Click here for more details

King & Spalding announced on June 17, 2021 that McGregor (Greg) Scott, most recently the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of California, will join the firm as a partner in the firm’s Special Matters and Government Investigations team. He will be based in San Francisco and Sacramento. Scott is a lifetime member of NAFUSA and a former board member.

Scott was twice nominated by the president and unanimously confirmed by the Senate to serve as the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District, from 2001 to 2009 and from 2017 to 2021. As U.S. Attorney, he oversaw federal prosecutions and civil litigation from 34 counties and supervised 100 attorneys. In between those stints, he was a partner at Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe, where he vice chaired its White Collar Defense and Corporate Investigations Practice Group. An experienced trial lawyer, Scott has represented major companies across multiple industries—including health care, retail and construction—that faced government investigations. He also has deep experience on matters involving consumer protection, construction accidents, the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and the False Claims Act.

“Greg is a natural leader with exceptional talent and energy,” said Zach Fardon, who leads King & Spalding’s Government Matters practice, which includes the Special Matters and Government Investigations team. “He will be a force multiplier for King & Spalding in his ability to provide clients with representation on both criminal as well as civil/regulatory governmental investigations.” King & Spalding now has nine former United States Attorneys with Scott joining Zach Fardon, John Richter, Craig Carpenito, Rod Rosenstein, John Horn, Sally Yates, Jim Vines and Paul Murphy.

Prior to his federal government post, Scott was twice elected District Attorney of Shasta County, and prior to that was a deputy district attorney in Contra Costa “With a stellar runway of experience and deep connections in the DOJ and California legal community, Greg is well-positioned to further expand our investigations and litigation work on the West Coast, nationally and globally,” said San Francisco office managing partner Charles Correll. “He also has a reputation for working in a collaborative and pragmatic fashion. He’ll be a formidable asset to the firm.”

Scott retired in 2008 as a lieutenant colonel from the U.S. Army Reserve after 23 years of service as an infantry officer. He earned his JD from the University of California, Hastings College of the Law, and his undergraduate degree from Santa Clara University.

“I had the privilege of working directly with several King & Spalding lawyers in two previous presidential administrations, persons for whom I have the greatest personal and professional respect,” said Scott. “I believe great results will be created for clients when my network across the nation in general and in California in particular is added to King & Spalding’s exemplary client base and legal firepower. I could not be more pleased to be joining this great law firm.”

The University of Virginia School of Law is offering a new course this fall entitled “The Mueller Report and the Role of the Special Counsel.” It will be taught by NAFUSA member Bob Mueller and three members of his team. Mueller led the nearly two-year-long inquiry into President Donald Trump’s dealings with Russia and its potential interference in the 2016 election. Over six in-person sessions, they will take a chronological look at the investigation and the function of a special counsel. The course will focus on the key decisions made during the course of the investigation and the challenges and tradeoffs presented by those decisions.

Mueller was a United States Marine Corps officer, an Assistant United States Attorney in three different offices, the United States Attorney for the Northern District of California, the Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Criminal Division, and the longest-serving Director of the FBI since J. Edgar Hoover. He earned his law degree in 1973 from the University of Virginia School of Law, where he served on the Law Review. He is currently a partner at WilmerHale in Washington.

On January 21, 2021, Robins Kaplan LLP filed an amicus brief in the United States Supreme Court on behalf of ten former United States Attorneys. The case, United States v. Cooley, concerns the scope of tribal law enforcement’s search and seizure authority over non-Natives on the Reservation. The ten amici included Robins Kaplan partners and NAFUSA members Tim Purdon and Brendan Johnson, along with several other NAFUSA members.

On June 1, 2021, the Supreme Court issued its unanimous opinion holding that a tribal police officer has authority to detain temporarily and to search non-Indian persons traveling on public rights-of-way running through a reservation for potential violations of state or federal law. In doing so, the Court twice cited the amicus brief of the ten former United States Attorneys twice on pages 7 and 8: Click here to read the Supreme Court opinion.