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Office Overview
The lawyers in the Washington office handle a wide variety of matters involving both the federal government and the private sector. Many of our Washington lawyers have government experience directly relevant to our practice areas, having served at several federal departments and agencies, including the Department of Justice, the Department of the Treasury, the Federal Communications Commission, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, the Federal Trade Commission, the Securities and Exchange Commission, National Association of Securities Dealers and Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board.
The office's practice areas, within broad groupings, are outlined below.
Antitrust
We represent clients on a variety of antitrust matters before the Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice, the Federal Trade Commission, state antitrust authorities and in the federal courts. We regularly counsel clients on complex mergers, acquisitions and other competitor collaborations and represent them through the Hart-Scott-Rodino process. We also represent clients in non-merger agency investigations. In addition, we represent clients in antitrust grand jury and other criminal proceedings, as well as in civil antitrust litigation. We provide on-going antitrust counseling for clients in numerous industries on a wide variety of antitrust issues, such as relations with customers and competitors, joint ventures, the interface of antitrust and intellectual property laws, distribution arrangements, Robinson-Patman Act price discrimination issues and issues arising from the deregulation of various industries.
Business Transactions
Our Business and Transactional Practice includes domestic and international mergers and acquisitions; public and privatization finance; real estate and energy finance transactions; and regulatory and antitrust counseling.
Corporate and Securities Law
We handle matters relating to mergers and acquisitions, recapitalization and assistance transactions, day-to-day regulatory counseling, product development, compliance and enforcement, legislation and other issues. We regularly advise our clients on matters relating to disclosure under the securities laws. We also represent issuers and underwriters in private and public offerings of debt and equity securities.
Energy
Our domestic and international Energy Practice extends through the full range of transactional, regulatory and litigation activities, including acquisitions, financing, enforcement, and import and export matters. We have represented producers, pipelines and shippers in U.S. and non U.S. gas sales, gas transportation, gas storage, LNG storage, LNG sales and related contracts. In addition, we have advised interstate and intrastate pipelines; transportation customers of regulated natural gas pipelines and local distribution companies on compliance with federal and state regulations; prosecution of pipeline rate cases and certificate applications; preparation of comments and filings in regulatory proceedings; prosecution of related appellate litigation; and preparation of proposed legislation. We are also experienced in electric utility, independent power, power marketing, alternative energy projects, coal and other energy issues. Our expertise includes rate work for electric utilities, regulatory approvals for asset acquisitions, access to electric transmission service and all aspects of state and federal regulation for producers, marketers and transmission owners.
Environmental
Our Environmental Practice encompasses matters relating to environmental policy, regulation, litigation, business transactions and legislation. Our experience includes defense of governmental enforcement actions (criminal, civil and administrative), environmental liabilities associated with business and real estate transactions, air quality, asbestos, water quality, solid and hazardous waste, toxic substances, wetlands, endangered species, historic preservation and environmental impact assessment.
Government and International Procurement
We counsel both domestic and foreign clients on commercial, investment, and regulatory matters involving transnational business interests. Our practice encompasses virtually all matters involving import and export trade regulations. Those matters include export controls, antidumping and countervailing duty cases, "Section 301" and "Section 337" proceedings, preferential trade programs, foreign investment restrictions, economic sanctions, customs regulations, and other matters of private and public international law.
Health Care
We represent hospitals, physician groups, health care manufacturers, and other entities involved in health care throughout the country. The practice includes such health issues as Medicare and Medicaid, payment, compliance, transactions, and defending False Claims Act investigations. We also advise on antitrust, tax exemption, nonprofit corporation laws, professional corporation laws, statutory and state constitutional limitations on the activities of governmental hospitals, municipal finance, and more traditional business and commercial matters.
Legislative
The Washington office represents numerous clients before the U.S. Congress. We have been heavily involved in tax, healthcare and telecommunications legislation. We also have experience representing clients in matters of public policy in banking, environmental, financial, international trade and other areas. Vinson & Elkins attorneys have also been actively involved in matters of international public policy. As an international law firm, our attorneys have assisted the governments of foreign countries in establishing policies for their growth and development while also maintaining consistency with worldwide trends.
Litigation - Civil, Criminal, Administrative
We have an extensive litigation practice in Washington and throughout the country. We practice before federal and state courts and administrative agencies. Our litigation includes antitrust, banking, bankruptcy, commercial, energy, environmental, futures, options and other derivatives, government contracts, healthcare, international trade, securities, tax and tort matters. We also handle the defense of white-collar criminal matters and Congressional inquiries, as well as internal corporate investigations. We also represent clients in international litigation, including international arbitrations and supervising litigation occurring in different countries.
Public Finance
Our public finance lawyers are involved in all aspects of public and private offerings of securities by state and local governments and by certain non-profit institutions, such as hospitals and private universities. We represent numerous state agencies, cities, counties, school districts, housing agencies, river authorities and special utility districts in bond financing transactions. We consistently have been at the forefront of many creative, complex and innovative financing techniques and structures in our continuing effort to enable public bodies to take advantage of developing financing possibilities for all types of public infrastructure needs. We also represent entities responsible for the investment of public funds. Among our clients are the investment managers of a $12 billion portfolio of assets for a public university system, a $7 billion portfolio of assets belonging to a public pension system and a $600 million private equity investment trust.
Taxation
We handle a wide range of federal tax matters, including planning, controversy, administrative and legislative. Our tax attorneys regularly deal with structuring transactions in a tax-efficient manner, the interaction of different nations' tax regimes and finding ways to reduce or eliminate multiple-country taxation of income. We handle contested proceedings before the Internal Revenue Service, the Tax Court and the Claims Court.
Telecommunications
We have significant experience in a wide variety of matters involving the telecommunications industry. The firm participates in the full panoply of activities in and growing out of state and federal regulation of telecommunications utilities: rule-making, rate-making, contested cases, administrative appeals, licensing, mergers and corporate restructuring, protection of trade secrets and confidential information, taxation, condemnation, litigation and legislative initiatives. Our lawyers have developed recognized experience in the laws and procedural and substantive rules that govern the actions of state and federal administrative agencies regulating the telecommunications industry.
Did You Know
We are located in the Willard office building adjacent to the historic Willard Inter-Continental Hotel, which has welcomed every American president from Franklin Pierce in 1853 to Dwight Eisenhower in the 1950s. This location puts you in the heart of the city, with easy access to government offices, business and financial centers and many cultural and entertainment venues. We are just two blocks from Metro Center, the hub of the city’s underground transit system. The Mall and its many museums are within walking distance. Travel time to Reagan National Airport is just 15 minutes, and both Baltimore-Washington International Airport and Dulles International Airport are 45 minutes away.
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