Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson Returns Home -- To Paul, Weiss

What career advice does he have for law students and young lawyers?

Jeh Johnson (Paul, Weiss)

Jeh Johnson (Paul, Weiss)

The well-worn path between Biglaw and big government is a two-way street. We’ve been closely following the news of attorneys leaving law firms for top spots in the Trump Administration. At the same time, leading lawyers from the Obama Administration are finding new homes in private practice.

Or, in some cases, not-so-new homes. As we noted this morning, today marks the official return of former Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson to his longtime professional home at Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison. This is his fourth return to the firm in three decades.

I had the pleasure of profiling Jeh Johnson back in 2011, when he served as general counsel of the Department of Defense. He left that role at the end of 2012 and returned to Paul, Weiss, but less than a year later he left again to become our nation’s fourth Secretary of Homeland Security. In case you missed it, check out the wonderful and inspiring departure memo that he issued when he left the firm to take the helm of the federal government’s third-largest department.

But don’t expect another departure memo from Jeh Johnson, 59, anytime soon. I chatted with him by phone this afternoon, and he said that he expects his service as DHS secretary to be his last tour of duty in government.

I reminded him that he said something similar about his service as GC of the Defense Department, before going on to become Secretary of Homeland Security. But the opportunity to lead DHS was, he said, a very special situation: “When the president asked me in August 2013 if I would return to government and join his Cabinet, I thought about it a little bit, but I was never really going to say no.”

Of course, with the Trump Administration now in power, it’s less likely that Johnson would be tapped for another position in federal government. He is a veteran of multiple Democratic administrations, having served as general counsel of the Air Force in the Clinton Administration before his time in the Obama Administration, and he strongly supported and campaigned for Barack Obama. I asked Johnson: do you have any thoughts on the incoming president and his administration?

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“Yes,” Johnson replied, diplomatically — like a deponent who has been instructed by his lawyers to just answer the question posed, nothing more — before going on to offer enthusiastic praise for the new DHS Secretary, General John F. Kelly.

“I have a lot of faith in my successor, John Kelly,” Johnson said. “He is a retired four-star general from the Marines. I came to know him when he was the military aide to the secretary of defense and I was the general counsel. He is a man of character and integrity, and I believe he will be received well by the DHS workforce. I have a great deal of confidence in him.”

Johnson shared with me this fun fact (previously noted by Am Law and The Hill): he was expecting to resign on Friday at noon with the rest of the political appointees of the Obama Administration, but at the last minute he was asked to serve as “designated survivor,” the Cabinet member who would take the reins of leadership in the event that some catastrophe resulted in the deaths of the president and other top leaders gathered at the inauguration.

So Johnson had to spend Friday afternoon in a secure, undisclosed location. As a result of serving in this role, Johnson was therefore the first and only member of the Trump Cabinet for a little over seven hours — after the swearing-in of President Trump around noon, but before the swearing-in of General Kelly as Johnson’s successor at 7:32 on Friday evening.

That was Friday, and Jeh Johnson wasted no time in returning to New York and to private practice. As of this Monday morning, he was happily back at Paul, Weiss (although mainly for administrative purposes and saying hello to people; he will go on a well-earned vacation for a few weeks before starting up at the firm full-time in late February).

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I pointed out to Johnson that, given his successful tenure as DHS Secretary — keeping our nation safe from another major terrorist attack, while overseeing an agency with more than 240,000 employees — he could have done any number of things after leaving the administration. Did he consider any other role besides law firm partner, such as heading up a major foundation, becoming a university president, or taking a C-suite role at a top corporation?

Johnson demurred. “I like the law firm environment,” he explained. “This is where I was trained, and this is what I grew up to do. The job of DHS secretary was incredibly exciting, but part of me still enjoys advocacy, representing clients, advising clients, and being around lawyers. That’s fundamentally who I am, and I look forward to being a contributor to Paul, Weiss. I love this firm, and its culture, and its practice.”

I pointed out to Johnson that senior administration officials don’t always go back to their former firms after government. For example, Greg Craig went to Skadden Arps instead of returning to Williams & Connolly, and one of his predecessors as White House counsel, Fred Fielding, joined Morgan Lewis instead of returning to Wiley Rein (formerly Wiley Rein & Fielding). I asked Johnson: did he talk to any other law firms besides Paul, Weiss?

“No, I did not,” he said. “There was not even an internal debate in my mind about that. When you leave a firm and rejoin it four times over 32 years, you have a unique perspective on the firm. And each time I’ve come back, the firm has been even better, bigger, and stronger, to the point where we are one of the top three or firms, if not the top law firm, in the country. I consider this to be my private-practice home.”

“A lot of the partners here have been colleagues of mine for 30 or more years,” he continued. “And after an incredibly demanding experience as DHS secretary, I was not looking to go someplace new, where I’d have to prove myself all over again.”

Jeh Johnson is returning to a familiar place. Some things will be the same, and some will be different.

In terms of the differences, Johnson returns to private practice with a new and unique perspective: “the benefit of my experience as the member of the Cabinet in charge of national security and especially cyber security, a large and growing area. Because security issues and their legal aspects are more and more a part of the daily lives of our business clients, I hope and expect to be very busy.”

What will remain unchanged: Johnson’s commitment to working with and mentoring young lawyers. “I hope to share with them the benefits of my experiences in public service, and to encourage them to think about doing the same.”

As Johnson discussed at length in my last interview with him, a rich tradition of public service exists at Paul, Weiss. The firm’s lawyers move back and forth between the public and private sectors with ease. When he returns next month, Johnson will move into the office formerly occupied by Ted Sorensen, White House counsel under Presidents Kennedy and Johnson.

“Ted was a mentor of mine,” Johnson said, “and his office is in the immediate neighborhood where I used to sit. I stood in that office on 9/11 and watched the towers collapse. When I return, I will be able to see the new World Trade Center, where my DHS office was when I was in New York City.”

I concluded our conversation with this question to Jeh Johnson: what advice would he give to law students and young lawyers who aspire to the kind of legal career that he has enjoyed?

“As you progress, avoid ‘golden handcuffs,’ which make it impossible to radically change careers and to do something involving a huge pay cut,” he said. “You will find that if you go into public service, it is the most exciting thing you can possibly do. I did things — as an AUSA, as GC of the Air Force, as GC of DoD, as a Cabinet officer — that were simply beyond my imagination as a young associate.”

“There are so many interesting opportunities in law and public service — as long as you are prepared to accept them.”

Ex-Homeland Security Chief to Rejoin New York Law Firm [New York Times]
Homeland Security Chief Jeh Johnson Returns (Again) to Paul Weiss
[American Lawyer via Morning Docket]
Former Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson Rejoins Paul, Weiss [Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison (press release)]

Earlier: An Afternoon With Jeh Johnson, General Counsel of the Defense Department
Departure Memo Of The Day: Jeh Johnson Parting With Paul Weiss


DBL square headshotDavid Lat is the founder and managing editor of Above the Law and the author of Supreme Ambitions: A Novel. He previously worked as a federal prosecutor in Newark, New Jersey; a litigation associate at Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz; and a law clerk to Judge Diarmuid F. O’Scannlain of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. You can connect with David on Twitter (@DavidLat), LinkedIn, and Facebook, and you can reach him by email at dlat@abovethelaw.com.