Jenner & Block

From its Windy City roots, Jenner & Block has grown to a firm of more than 500 lawyers with offices in Chicago, London, Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco, and Washington, DC. The client roster is a blend of established corporate institutions and trendy players in the arts, entertainment, consumer brands, and technology. The firm is also known for its values, especially its commitment to pro bono.

A Litigation Star Is Born

Jenner & Block was founded in 1914 as Newman, Poppenhusen & Stern by a trio of lawyers with big-name Chicago firm pedigrees. In its early years, the firm advised the city’s banks, mortgage houses, and blue-collar corporations. Once the 1920s roared around, however, the firm took on a decidedly more high-profile identity as litigator Edward Johnston developed into one of the nation’s foremost antitrust attorneys. With a victory in the landmark 1925 U.S. Supreme Court case of Maple Flooring Manufacturers Association v. United States, in which he dismantled the Justice Department’s argument that the exchange of information by trade association members constituted a violation of antitrust law, Johnston cemented the firm’s reputation as a litigation powerhouse.

Collaboration Is Key

Jenner & Block has leading international litigation, arbitration, and investigations practices. The firm also boasts a top-notch appellate team, which has secured victories in appellate courts of all levels on a variety of issues and has recorded more than 100 arguments before the U.S. Supreme Court, including the landmark win for LGBT rights in Lawrence v. Texas. The firm’s litigation department is “fully integrated,” which means lawyers work across sub-practices and regions with a focus on collaboration.

While the firm is most known for its litigation prowess, Jenner’s corporate department is no slouch. The practice is oriented around M&A but covers an array of complex transactions and counsels for a wide range of clients, from large public companies to middle-market and emerging companies, closely-held family businesses, private equity, and other funds and investors.

Focus on Others

Pro bono is a major part of Jenner’s culture, with 100 percent of its attorneys dedicating more than 20 hours to pro bono work in 2022—more than 71,000 hours in one year. The firm has been ranked the No. 1 pro bono firm by The American Lawyer a whopping 11 times in the last 15 years and is among the top 20 firms for pro bono in Vault’s ranking. The firm credits up to 100 pro bono hours toward associates’ billable target, after which all pro bono hours are credited toward a “super bonus.” And the work is wide ranging, including everything from asylum to criminal matters to domestic violence to FOIA, and much more. The firm shares its pro bono news in an annual report cleverly named “The Heart of the Matter.”

• Represented the RIAA against an ISP for allowing customers to commit massive infringement using BitTorrent. After a month-long trial in the Western District of Texas, a federal jury determined that Grande Communications Networks LLC must pay more than $46.7 million to a group of record labels, after its users pirated over 1,400 copyrighted songs.
• Represented Hetronic International in its March 2023 U.S. Supreme Court argument. Jenner previously secured Hetronic a $113 million jury verdict against two of its former European distributors for selling copycat products, as well as an injunction preventing the distributors from selling infringing products in every country in which Hetronic markets or sells products. The 10th Circuit upheld the verdict and injunction. 
• Conducted a comprehensive investigation and produced a Final Report as the court-appointed Examiner in In re Celsius Network LLC, et al., regarding Celsius’s crypto assets and public representations, Celsius’s bitcoin mining utility obligations, and certain tax procedures.  
• Represent Albertsons in its publicly announced and pending acquisition by Kroger valued at $25 billion. The deal is expected to close in early 2024.

• “Top Firm for Advancement,” 2022—Yale Law Women’s Top Firms Report
• Mansfield Rule Plus Certified, 2022—Diversity Lab
• “Best Places to Work for LGBTQ+ Equality,” 2022—Human Rights Campaign
• #1 Law Firm for Pro Bono, 2022—Law360 Pro Bono Pulse Survey
• Ranked #1 Pro Bono Law Firm for 11 of the last 15 years—The American Lawyer