A supervising trial attorney in the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission's Phoenix, Ariz., office has been chosen to be the agency's next general counsel.
P. David Lopez has been with the EEOC for 13 years, beginning in Washington as a special assistant to Gilbert Casellas, then the commission’s chairman. Lopez (Arizona State, Harvard Law) previously worked in the employment section of the U.S. Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division and as an associate at the D.C. firm Spiegel & McDiarmid.
The White House said late Friday that President Barack Obama intends to nominate Lopez as the commission’s top in-house lawyer. Lopez did not immediately return a call today requesting comment.
While in Phoenix, Lopez tried a case against GoDaddy.com, leading to a $242,000 jury verdict against the software company for discriminating against a Muslim employee. He also worked on a 2003 consent decree with the NBA’s Phoenix Suns, which paid $104,000 to three women who claimed that they were unfairly denied spots on an entertainment troupe.
If confirmed by the Senate, Lopez would succeed Ronald Cooper, who this year returned as a partner to the D.C. office of Steptoe & Johnson.
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