Perkins Coie is an American multinational law firm headquartered in Seattle, Washington. Founded in 1912, it is recognized as an Am Law 50 firm. It is the largest law firm headquartered in the Pacific Northwest and has 20 offices across the United States and Asia. The firm provides corporate, commercial litigation, intellectual property, and regulatory legal advice to a broad range of clients, including prominent technology companies like Google, Twitter, Intel, Facebook, and Amazon. In addition to its corporate representation, the firm has represented political clients. The firm is known for its pro bono work.
History
Founded in 1912, the firm has represented the Boeing Company since the founding of the aerospace company in 1916. Perkins Coie has been named one of Fortune's "100 Best Companies to Work For" for 19 consecutive years and recently ranked #23 on the list.
In 2009, Perkins Coie was awarded the Maleng Advocate for Youth Award by the Center for Children and Youth Justice for its outstanding pro bono legal work.
The firm was an early entrant into fintech and blockchain legal work. Perkins Coie also counsels startups and established tech companies. It launched the Perkins Coie Tech Venture index in 2019, which measures the overall health and trajectory of the emerging growth technology and venture capital ecosystem.
In 2018, Perkins Coie joined the American Bar Association's campaign targeting substance-use disorders and mental health issues among lawyers.
In 2019, the firm became a signatory to the Mansfield Rule, which aims to diversify the leadership of large law firms by broadening the candidate pool for senior management positions.
Clientele
Perkins Coie is counsel of record for the Democratic National Committee, Democratic Leadership Council, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. Other political clients include most Democratic members of the United States Congress. It has also represented several presidential campaigns, including those of John Kerry, Barack Obama, and Hillary Clinton. The group's political law practice was founded by Robert Bauer who recruited Marc Elias and made him chair of the group in 2009. Both men have since left the firm.
Notable cases
The firm represented Amazon in its IPO in 1997.
The firm represented Christine Gregoire in the prolonged litigation surrounding her 2004 Washington gubernatorial election.
A team of Perkins lawyers successfully represented Al Franken in his recount and legal battle over the 2008 Senatorial election in Minnesota.
In 2006, Perkins Coie, led by partner Harry Schneider, represented Salim Ahmed Hamdan, the alleged driver and bodyguard of Osama Bin Laden. The case made its way to the U.S. Supreme Court in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, in which the Court ruled that the Bush Administration's use of military commissions to try terrorism suspects was unconstitutional.
Perkins Coie worked in the Doe v. Reed case concerning petition signatures in state ballot initiative campaigns, which was argued successfully before the U.S. Supreme Court on April 28, 2010.
In 2010, Perkins Coie sought advisory opinions from the Federal Election Commission declaring that certain Google and Facebook advertisements were covered by the "small items" and "impracticable" exemptions of the law that otherwise requires a political advertisement to include a disclaimer revealing who paid for it. The commission granted Google's request in a divided vote, and deadlocked on Facebook's request. According to The New York Times, "Facebook nonetheless proceeded as if it was exempt from the disclaimer requirement". In October 2017, Perkins Coie lobbied to defeat a bill called the "Honest Ads Act", which would require internet companies to disclose who paid for political ads.