Federal Government Strategies

Bipartisan relationships and business, political, legal experience

Advisors and advocates for our clients, we leverage strong bipartisan relationships, and business, political, and legal experience to assist clients with

• Congressional Investigations
• Defense/Procurement
• Economic Development
• Education
• Energy and the Environment
• Federal Grants
• Financial Services
• Healthcare
• International Relations and Trade
• Political Law
• Regulatory Policy
• Tax Policy
• Telecommunications
• Trademark and Copyright Policy
• Transportation

Team with business mindset and in-depth experience in public affairs – at the international, federal, state, and local levels

Our team understands the processes of government and real-world and political pressures both as former government officials and from years of experience helping clients advance their government relations objectives.

Our team also includes former government officials who have served in a range of capacities:

• Diplomats
• Cabinet officials
• Elected representatives
• High-level Congressional staff members

Nelson Mullins’ government relations team includes attorneys and policy strategists who served as business executives that bring business and fiscal skills to client’s businesses that are critical to helping clients meet their financial objectives.

Our clients range from local governments to large multinational corporations and sovereign governments

It never pays to be surprised. Nelson Mullins offers proactive and effective advocacy on behalf of corporate, nonprofit, and government clients in transactions where politics, business, regulatory and legal environments intersect. Our clients include

• Emerging growth companies
• Foreign sovereign governments
• Fortune 50 global companies
• Professional associations
• State and local governments
• Universities and research institutions

Relationships help advance business objectives

It’s about relationships — with our clients and with government officials —  to help advance business strategies in today's fast-paced business and legal environments. Working with our team, the people you meet are the people who provide the services. 

Our services help clients

• Advance business development and financing objectives –identifying opportunities with the U.S. government and foreign entities
• Advocate and lobby proactively – including drafting legislation and amendments and representing clients in partnership with Nelson Mullins attorneys before federal agencies and at the international level
• Analyze legal, political, business, and regulatory factors – helping identify and guide clients on factors that may impact policy and business interests
• Craft and implement effective media strategies – including using targeted messaging to press and interest groups, opinion pieces, and crisis management
• Create networks – creating custom business development networks — with government officials, trade groups, academic institutions, investors, and others to validate and market client products and solutions — and facilitating coalition-building
• Develop and nurture relationships – providing introductions to leaders and key decision makers, facilitating discussions with public officials, and assisting clients in navigating the halls of government
• Develop programmatic government relations strategies –developing integrated business, legislative, and regulatory programmatic strategies
• Gain political intelligence and identify emerging risk areas – tracking and reporting on legislative activities, including bill introductions, hearings, committee markups, and floor debates
• Navigate procurement processes – providing intelligence on evolving procurement regulations and advising on procurement opportunities and processes
• Prepare to deliver testimony – guiding witnesses in advance of testimony before government agencies, including responses to congressional inquiries

Following is a selected sampling of matters and is provided for informational purposes only. Past success does not indicate the likelihood of success in any future matter.

Trade

• On behalf of a large American specialty chemical and advanced material firm with worldwide operations, the firm worked with the United States Trade Representative, State Department and Commerce Department to win repeal of an export blockade and billions of dollars in unjustified tax penalties imposed by third country.
• On behalf of a U.S. manufacturing client, the firm successfully obtained a technical correction to the Claims Resolution Act of 2010 that would allow for certain future distributions under the Continued Dumping and Subsidies Offset Act, which provides for distribution of unfair trade duties to U.S. manufacturers, preserving millions of dollars of future distributions for our client.
• Working with a broad industry coalition on behalf of a client, the firm assisted with winning a congressional repeal of mandatory country of origin labeling requirements for beef and pork. The repeal language was included in the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2016 which became Public Law 114-113.
• The firm represented a large Canadian oil and gas producer with global operations in winning multi-agency U.S. regulatory approval in relation to a $15.1 billion acquisition.
• The firm represented a leading Silicon Valley technology company to encourage the State Department and the Commerce Department recognize the importance of the digital economy and establish a new Digital Economy Officer Program in US embassies to advance the interests of the digital economy abroad.

Healthcare

• During congressional consideration of the 21st Century Cures bill, advocated on behalf of a leading health technology organization for the successful inclusion of provisions streamlining electronic health records requirements and procedures in order to spur faster development and dissemination of interoperability standards.
• For close to a decade, Nelson Mullins has assisted a national health professions society in achieving key priorities for its membership and the patients it serves. Specifically, in major health legislation enacted into law, we secured language to promote the creation of new payment models, establish provider payments under Medicare, renew and expand federal investments for health professions programs, and create programs to foster opportunities for new investigators in biomedical research.

 Political Law

• Created and oversaw operations of state and federal political action committees for corporate client.
• On an ongoing basis, provide counsel and compliance services on lobbying disclosure requirements and ethics rules at the state and federal levels. 

Financial Services

• The firm was instrumental in creating and eventually passing by a unanimous vote in both the House and the Senate the American Savings Promotion Act to authorize financial institutions to conduct a contest, known as a "savings promotion raffle," to encourage savings, especially among un-banked and under-banked communities. It was signed into law by President Obama and became Public Law No: 113-251.
• On behalf of a leading manufacturer of gift cards, we successfully lobbied for the ECO-Gift CARD Act to extend the deadline for retailers to implement the gift card disclosure provisions specified in the CARD Act of 2009, allowing retailers to sell gift cards in their inventory through the holiday season, rather than destroying gift cards in their inventory. It became Public Law No: 111-209
• Represented financial service providers to work with Congress to include cost-benefit language in the Dodd-Frank legislation as important consideration for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau when drafting regulations.

Education Policy

• The firm represented a leading national association of 10,000 member companies in the manufacturing and retail sectors in working with Congress and the Administration to pass the Every Student Succeeds Act that focuses on access for all students to a well-rounded education and corrects the unintended consequences of No Child Left Behind.

Infrastructure

• On behalf of a client, the firm was successful in having provisions included in the Water Infrastructure Improvements for the Nation Act, to expand a regional water agency to serve manufacturing industries and their suppliers as well as to serve residential communities.

Intellectual Property

• On behalf of a client in the tech community, the firm was retained to successfully defeat the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and the Protect Intellectual Property Act (PIPA) by encouraging targeted grassroots opposition to the legislation.