Barack Obama, Biglaw, Election 2012, Money, Politics, Rankings

Which Biglaw Firms Are Opening Their Wallets to Donate to Obama and Romney?

Lawyers at Biglaw firms are opening their hearts and wallets for our Election 2012 presidential candidates. Who's ahead in terms of donations, Obama or Romney?

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From buying their family’s love to buying luxurious lawyerly lairs, attorneys at the nation’s largest firms do a lot of things with their wallets — and now they’re voting with them, too. Earlier this month, we brought you a story about Obama v. Romney in terms of which presidential candidate was leading in the race to collect campaign contributions from the wonderful world of Biglaw.

At present, Obama has an advantage over Romney, with $1.9 million pouring in from America’s 20 biggest firms, as opposed to just over $1 million for his opponent. When we last wrote about this important issue, lawyers from DLA Piper proved to be Obama’s greatest supporters, while Kirkland & Ellis showed up strong for Romney. But what we really want to know is which other firms are opening their hearts wallets for these political adversaries.

With only a little more than a month until Election 2012, let’s take a look at the firms that are making some of the largest (and smallest) political donations….

Considering Obama and Romney support wildly different platforms, it’s interesting to see how many lawyers from the 20 largest Biglaw firms are financially backing them. We were able to find these figures with help from the National Law Journal and the Center for Responsive Politics. Let’s check out Obama’s numbers:

Barack Obama
DLA Piper: $367,027
Sidley Austin: $312,278
Skadden: $214,766
Jones Day: $167,000
Latham: $133,000
Kirkland & Ellis: $118,000
Hogan Lovells: $87,000
Mayer Brown: $83,188
Cleary Gottlieb: $81,000
Greenberg Traurig: $73,733
Reed Smith: $73,388
Morgan Lewis: $62,000
Baker & McKenzie: $55,000
K&L Gates: $50,774
SNR Denton: $39,450
Gibson Dunn: $29,150
White & Case: $26,000
Squire Sanders: $15,000
Weil Gotshal: $14,345
Orrick: $7,300

As Elie previously noted, with that kind of cash, it looks like DLA Piper is gunning to open up shop in the Lincoln Bedroom (thankfully, there’s already a functioning toilet). Here are Romney’s numbers:

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Mitt Romney
Kirkland & Ellis: $393,667
Sidley Austin: $95,000
Jones Day: $95,000
Gibson Dunn: $84,500
Morgan Lewis: $81,000
Latham: $59,000
Skadden: $52,000
Hogan Lovells: $42,000
Greenberg Traurig: $33,523
Weil Gotshal: $33,350
White & Case: $33,000
DLA Piper: $32,750
Mayer Brown: $31,400
Reed Smith: $28,800
K&L Gates: $21,120
Baker & McKenzie: $14,000
Orrick: $6,963
SNR Denton: $6,500
Cleary Gottlieb: $3,750
Squire Sanders: $3,000

It seems that Kirkland is just as generous with its campaign contributions as it is with its year-end bonuses.

Speaking of bonuses, let’s check out how our market leaders in the bonus department did with donations. Sullivan & Cromwell lawyers donated $197,150 to Romney’s campaign, making the firm one of his top contributors, along with the likes of Bain Capital and Goldman Sachs, a longtime S&C client. Lawyers from SullCrom donated a pittance of that amount to Obama: $48,882. Cravath lawyers, on the other hand, cheaped out and low-balled their donation offerings, with only $51,637 going to Obama’s campaign, and just $12,750 to Romney’s.

Does anything about these numbers surprise you? Are you shocked that lawyers from your firm are skewed toward one candidate over the other? Let us know what you think in the comments.

In campaign donations, DLA Piper skews toward Obama, Kirkland votes for Romney [National Law Journal]

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Earlier: Obama Leads Romney In Terms Of Lawyer Fundraising
Which Biglaw Firm Is a Top Obama Super PAC Contributor?

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