So What's Up With MoFo in the OC?

This rumor, about the Orange County office of Morrison & Foerster, has been making the rounds:

“A couple of my classmates are now scrambling for new summer jobs after MoFo OC told them to start looking elsewhere, because the office basically has no work and they’re already moving lawyers to other offices. They just got told this week. MoFo didn’t even offer to accommodate them in other offices.”

Unwelcome to the OC, bitch?
As it turns out, however, much of the rumor is incorrect. We reached out to the firm, and heard back from no less an authority than Keith Wetmore, the firm’s handsome (and openly gay) chairman:

By virtue of some internal redeployments within the firm, our OC office has declined in size and scope of practice over the past six months, to a point where we did not feel we could offer summer associates a full summer experience or appropriate assurances of permanent offers in that office. For example, we are exiting the corporate practice there so can no longer offer corporate experience to summer associates. There is no shortage of work for the lawyers who remain — one the biggest cases in the firm has historically been, and continues to be, staffed from that office.

We offered all the summer associates positions in a number of our other offices across the globe or split summers between Orange County and those other offices. We have also offered them financial support should they want to work in pro bono for the summer. Understandably, some of them have chosen to consider other firms for the summer before they make a final decision.

We thank Mr. Wetmore and MoFo for this information. We especially appreciated the promptness of their response (within an hour of our original inquiry).

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