David McAtee is responsible for all legal matters at AT&T as well as for AT&T’s public policy organization. He was appointed General Counsel in October 2015 and Chair of the AT&T Foundation in May 2018. McAtee previously served as Senior Associate General Counsel with legal responsibility for all non-HR litigation matters and all antitrust issues.
Prior to joining AT&T in January of 2012, McAtee was a partner of Haynes and Boone, LLP, where he specialized in complex litigation matters, antitrust, and government investigations, and was the Administrative Partner of the firm’s Dallas office. McAtee also served as Senior Law Clerk to United States District Judge Jerry Buchmeyer, then Chief Judge of the Northern District of Texas.
McAtee is a former Executive Committee Member of the State Bar of Texas, Chair of the Board of Editors of the Texas Bar Journal, and Chair of the Fellows of the Texas Bar Foundation. He has twice received a Presidential Citation by the State Bar of Texas for leadership in the bar and received a Leadership Award from TexasBarCLE for his contributions in support of continuing legal education.
He is a former President of The Dallas Assembly and the Trinity Commons Foundation, the coordinating organization for local, state and federal government initiatives in the Trinity River Corridor Project in Dallas, Texas. He currently serves on the Board of Directors of St. Mark’s School of Texas, Methodist Health System, and the Alcuin School.
Born in Dallas, Texas, McAtee graduated from Duke University with honors and The University of Texas School of Law, where he was an Associate Editor of The Review of Litigation.
A Corporate Pro Bono Challenge® 100 signatory, AT&T has a long-standing tradition of supporting pro bono legal services in the many communities where they live and work. As General Counsel, McAtee has empowered AT&T’s legal staff to build on the legal department’s commitment to pro bono. Under his leadership, the pro bono work of AT&T attorneys has been recognized through awards such as the 2018 Champion Award from the Pro Bono Partnership of Atlanta, the 2017 Beacon of Justice Award from the NJ Volunteer Lawyers for Justice, the 2016 Corporate Partner Award from the Chicago Center for Disability and Elder Law, and the 2015 Corporate Pro Bono Award from the Western Center on Law and Poverty.
Examples of AT&T’s current pro bono projects include:
Veterans and First Responders
As a company, AT&T has made a broad commitment to support veterans and first responders, including hiring 20,000 veterans by 2020. As part of this commitment, AT&T attorneys across the U.S. work with veterans legal clinics to provide pro bono legal support to veterans with respect to their VA federal benefits, social security and other legal needs, such as guardianship, wills and estate planning.
In addition, AT&T’s Legal Department co-sponsors with Akin Gump two-year Equal Justice Works fellowship to support the provision of legal services to veterans. Under this program, the fellow collaborates with the Veterans Resource Commission to help upgrade the discharge status of veterans who wrongly received Other Than Honorable discharges due to PTSD or traumatic brain injury, and therefore are ineligible for VA federal benefits and State benefits. In numerous instances, attorneys from AT&T staff these cases, helping veterans obtain discharge upgrades and access much-needed benefits.
Immigration and Human Rights
AT&T lawyers, paralegals, and assistants are active in immigration-related cases through the National Immigrant Justice Center, the Georgia Asylum Immigration Network and the Human Rights Initiative of North Texas. AT&T lawyers have helped obtain asylum for a transgender woman from Vietnam, a gay man from Lebanon, and a man from Eritrea who fled his country after being beaten, imprisoned, and tortured because he supported the democratic process in that country.
ABA Pro Bono Week Celebration
Since 2016, as part of an effort to continue to expand its pro bono efforts, the AT&T legal team has celebrated ABA Pro Bono Week. Underscoring the theme of “Increasing Access to Justice for All” during the 2017 Pro Bono Week nearly 100 AT&T attorneys and staff participated in over 25 events where they provided pro bono legal services in their respective communities on issues such as housing, consumer affairs and veterans issues.
Volunteering Globally
AT&T also encourages the 20 percent of its attorneys who work outside the U.S. to develop pro bono initiatives in support of their communities. For example, AT&T Mexico’s legal team provided pro bono legal support to earthquake survivors in 2017 and established a pro bono program in Mexico City that teaches underrepresented and low-income women about legal and business concepts. In Argentina, AT&T attorneys have partnered with “Teach for Argentina” to visit local schools to teach civics and other relevant legal topics like labor law to Argentine high school students.
Click here to read about PBI’s other Dinner co-chair, David M. Leitch.