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3 lawyers with ‘elite establishment credentials’ have joined Musk’s DOGE effort, report says
Three lawyers who have joined Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency have “elite establishment credentials,” according to a report by ProPublica. (Image from Shutterstock)
Three lawyers who have joined Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency have “elite establishment credentials,” according to a report by ProPublica.
Two of the lawyers have clerked for U.S. Supreme Court justices, while the third has been hired as a Supreme Court clerk for the 2025-2026 term, ProPublica reports here and here. They also have BigLaw ties. The lawyers are:
• James Burnham, who is the DOGE’s general counsel. A former clerk to Justice Neil Gorsuch, Burnham was formerly a Jones Day partner. He worked in the White House counsel’s office and the U.S. Department of Justice in the first Trump administration. More recently, he launched a boutique law firm and a litigation finance fund.
• Keenan Kmiec, a former clerk for Chief Justice John Roberts. He worked at a “corporate law firm” (identified as Sidley Austin on LinkedIn), worked at his own firm handling insider trading litigation, worked at a Swiss foundation promoting blockchain, and was the CEO of a startup.
• Jacob Altik, who has been hired to clerk for Gorsuch beginning this summer. He is a former associate at Weil, Gotshal & Manges and a former intern at the New Civil Liberties Alliance, a nonprofit that aims to “protect constitutional freedoms from violations by the administrative state.”
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