Meet Treasury GC Robert Hoyt, DC’s ‘Busiest Lawyer’
Legal Times describes the Treasury Department’s general counsel, Robert Hoyt, as “the busiest lawyer in Washington.”
Hoyt has led the department’s legal team in recent bailouts for Bear Stearns, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and American International Group—and he oversees a staff of 2,000 lawyers who work for the agencies that are part of the department.
Through it all, Hoyt has been a calming force, even as he worked round the clock, the Legal Times story says. “He was always calm and reflective, and very cool under pressure,” said Edward Herlihy, a partner at Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, the law firm brought in to help on the bailouts of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
Hoyt said he enjoys management, a trait that has surely helped him since he has had to rely on delegation.
Hoyt is a former partner at Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr, where he was the youngest lawyer ever to serve on the firm’s management and executive committees. He first joined Wilmer as a summer associate while pursuing his J.D. at the University of Pennsylvania, and left in 2005 to become associate counsel in the White House. His wife, Alysia, is a lawyer at the Drug Enforcement Administration.
“It’s something I enjoyed, the business of law,” Hoyt told Legal Times. “I very much like the management. A lot of lawyers don’t. A lot of people will tell you that lawyers are lousy managers.”
