Insights

Washington – August 15, 2024: The 2025 edition of The Best Lawyers in America® has recognized 42 Crowell & Moring lawyers as "Best Lawyers" and 29 lawyers as “Ones to Watch.”

Washington – August 17, 2023: The 2024 edition of The Best Lawyers in America® has recognized 47 firm lawyers as "Best Lawyers" and 41 lawyers as “Ones to Watch.”

On Monday, September 23, 2024, the Department of Justice (DOJ), released an update to its Evaluation of Corporate Compliance Programs (ECCP) guidance.  The ECCP guidance was last revised in March 2023, which brought a number of significant changes, including a focus on compensation and incentive structures (e.g., clawbacks), and third party messaging applications.  This 2024 update, while not as significant in scope as its predecessor, nonetheless highlights the DOJ’s focus on new and emerging technologies, such as artificial intelligence (AI), as part of its evolving assessment of what makes a corporate compliance program truly effective, and how prosecutors should evaluate risk assessments and other management tools at the time of a corporate resolution.

As the Department of Energy’s (“DOE”) Loan Programs Office (“LPO”) continues to finance clean energy manufacturing and deployment in the United States, the recent announcement by the DOE’s Office of Inspector General’s (“DOE OIG”) that it intends to scrutinize LPO’s due diligence process increases the risk to program applicants. According to a recent notice issued on SAM.gov, the DOE OIG intends to issue a sole source contract for legal support “assessing the policies and procedures” for the due diligence of loan applications, and evaluate specific LPO loans and guarantees to assess their compliance with, consistency in application of, and the effectiveness of LPO policies and procedures, as well as related Governmentwide regulations, policies, procedures, and directives, to identify specific points of weakness in due diligence practices, and to recommend improvements to mitigate risks.

On May 22, 2024, the U.S. Department of Justice’s National Security Division (NSD) announced its first declination to prosecute a company under its Enforcement Policy for Business Organizations (Enforcement Policy).

On February 15, 2022, the National Security, Cybersecurity, and Foreign Relations Law Program, the Government Procurement Law Program, the National Security Law Association, and the Anti-Corruption & Compliance Association, hosted a special event, featuring Michael K. Atkinson, former Inspector General of the United States’ 18 intelligence agencies.

This annual celebration commemorates the 243rd anniversary of America’s first whistleblower law and recognizes the great contributions of whistleblowers to democracy.