Firm News
Mar 29, 2010
Seyfarth Shaw’s Victoria A. Lipnic Appointed as EEOC Commissioner
Washington, D.C. (March 29, 2010)—Seyfarth Shaw LLP, one of America’s leading full-service law firms, today announced that the Honorable Victoria A. (“Vicki”) Lipnic, Of Counsel in the firm’s Labor & Employment Department, has been appointed by President Barack Obama to serve as a Commissioner on the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC). Prior to joining the firm in its Washington, D.C. office, Lipnic served as Assistant Secretary of Labor for Employment Standards from 2002–2009.
“The EEOC will benefit from Vicki’s extraordinary insights drawn from both her private practice and from her roles as a public servant, including having led the largest agency at the Department of Labor,” said J. Stephen Poor, Chair & Managing Partner of Seyfarth Shaw. “We congratulate Vicki on her appointment as a Commissioner of the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.”
Lipnic was one of 15 of President Obama’s nominees to various senior government positions pending confirmation to the U.S. Senate to receive a recess appointment by the President on March 27th. The President had nominated four individuals to serve at the EEOC: three as commissioners and one as general counsel. All four of the President’s nominees to the EEOC were given recess appointments.
Lipnic began working with Seyfarth Shaw in the firm’s Washington, D.C. office in 2009. She brings to the firm decades of experience with labor and employment law and policy. As Assistant Secretary of Labor for Employment Standards, Lipnic oversaw the Department of Labor’s largest agency, which enforces some of the most comprehensive labor and employment laws that impact more than 135 million workers in 7.3 million workplaces.
Lipnic led the teams who successfully revised the Part 541 overtime regulations under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), the Family and Medical Leave Act regulations, the first-ever compensation guidance and regulations from Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP), and the first revisions to the union financial disclosure regulations in 40 years. Also, under her leadership, the Wage and Hour Division made it a priority to systematically respond to wage and hour opinion letter requests, issuing more than 300 opinion letters during her tenure. She worked closely with the Solicitor of Labor’s office on numerous projects including a number of seminal FLSA issues that went before the U.S. Supreme Court and the Wage and Hour Division’s settlement of the largest FLSA case in its history with a private sector employer. In addition to her work with the Department of Labor, Lipnic’s experience in Washington, D.C. includes service as Workforce Policy Counsel to the Committee on Education and Labor in the U.S. House of Representatives.
Seyfarth Shaw’s Labor & Employment Department consists of over 350 employment attorneys nationally at all levels of experience, allowing seamless representation of the firm’s clients across jurisdictions. The firm’s labor and employment lawyers are organized to leverage their knowledge of specific industry experience and key workplace subspecialties, such as: Affirmative Action/Diversity, Business Immigration, California Labor Code Litigation, Complex Discrimination Litigation, ERISA/Employee Benefits Litigation, Employment Law Training, International Labor and Employment, Single-Plaintiff Litigation, Wage and Hour Litigation, and Workplace Counseling and Compliance Solutions.
Seyfarth Shaw has over 750 attorneys located in nine offices throughout the United States including Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles, New York, Sacramento, San Francisco, and Washington, D.C., as well as Brussels, Belgium. Seyfarth Shaw provides a broad range of legal services in the areas of labor and employment, employee benefits, litigation and business services. The firm’s practice reflects virtually every industry and segment of the country’s business and social fabric. Clients include over 300 of the Fortune 500 companies, financial institutions, newspapers and other media, hotels, health care organizations, airlines and railroads. The firm also represents a number of federal, state, and local governmental and educational entities. For more information, please visit www.seyfarth.com.