Private equity firm lawyer with Chicago ties will be new White House counsel
Lawyer Ed Siskel speaks during a news conference at the Dirksen Federal Courthouse in August 2017 in Chicago. President Joe Biden announced Aug. 22 that Siskel will be the new White House counsel. Photo by G-Jun Yam/The Associated Press.
Ed Siskel, a former Obama administration lawyer who also worked as the corporation counsel under then-Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, has been tapped to be the new White House counsel.
During the Obama administration, Siskel’s titles included deputy counsel, and he was involved in introducing the Affordable Care Act, according to an Aug. 22 White House news release.
Additionally, the graduate of the University of Chicago Law School clerked for then-U.S. Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens, worked as an assistant U.S. attorney in the Northern District of Illinois and was an associate deputy attorney general at the Department of Justice.
Siskel’s Chicago connections run deep—he’s the nephew of the famous Chicago Tribune film critic Gene Siskel, who died in 1999. The Gene Siskel Film Center was created in his honor.
According to its website, Siskel has also worked as chief legal officer for Grosvenor Holdings, a Chicago-based investment firm, and the 1998 comedy movie Rushmore is one of his favorite films.
Also a former partner at Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr, he’s scheduled to start the White House position in September.
