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 Democrats in the antitrust bar who are hoping to take the reins of the
Justice Department's antitrust division, which reviews mergers, include
more than a few senior antitrust experts with government experience,
and several who are hoping to get a foot in the door.
In fact, two partners at Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale & Dorr LLP
are two of Sen. Barack Obama's most likely picks. Doug Melamed was
acting assistant attorney general after Joel Klein left the Clinton
administration, and he has been a staunch Obama supporter. But more
vocal than Melamed is his partner Bill Kolasky, a former supporter of
Sen. John McCain, who switched to the Obama camp more than a year ago.
Kolasky, who represented General Electric Co. in its effort to buy Honeywell International Inc. -- a deal that was tanked by European regulators after getting U.S. antitrust approval -- was a deputy assistant attorney general under Charles James, George W. Bush's first AAG. Kolasky vigorously defended American antitrust theories and complained that the EU was foundering in the past. But Kolasky has done more than switch party affiliations: He has repudiated the Bush administration's antitrust philosophy, which has resulted in DOJ's decision to approve virtually all the mergers it reviewed over the past three years until last month, when it announced it would stop JBS SA, the No. 3 beef packer in the U.S., from buying its rivals in both the Nos. 4 and 5 slots. Kolasky has also debated two former Republican public servants: Jim Rill, who was AAG under the first President Bush, now a partner at Howrey LLP, and Tad Lipsky, who worked in the Reagan DOJ, and is now a partner at Latham & Watkins LLP. But other Democrats who might be on a short list for the DOJ job include people like Hogan & Hartson LLP partner Jan McDavid and Arnold & Porter LLP partner Bill Baer, who has already held a senior Democratic slot at the Federal Trade Commission If McCain wins, Lipsky is a potential head of the antitrust division, along with current Assistant Attorney General Deb Garza. - Cecile Kohrs Lindell See related story about possible FTC heads from Dealscape Cecile Kohrs Lindell is a senior reporter in The Deal's Washington bureau. Categories Deal Video
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