Corporate lobbyists misbehaving? Let the legal boss take the reins.

That's what's happening at AT&T, which has taken criticism this week after it was revealed that the telecom paid President Donald Trump's lawyer and “fixer” Michael Cohen $600,000 in political consulting fees last year.

According to various news reports, AT&T has called on its senior executive vice president and general counsel, David McAtee, to run the company's external and legislative affairs department, as Bob Quinn, its former head of lobbying, leaves the company. 

In a company memo from AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson, he called hiring Cohen “a big mistake” and revealed that McAtee is stepping in for now:

“For the foreseeable future, the external & legislative affairs (E&LA) group will report to our general counsel David McAtee … David's No. 1 priority is to ensure every one of the individuals and firms we use in the political arena are people who share our high standards and who we would be proud to have associated with AT&T,” Stephenson wrote.

“To be clear, everything we did was done according to the law and entirely legitimate,” he added. “But the fact is, our past association with Cohen was a serious misjudgment.”

According to records that were obtained by adult film star Stormy Daniels' attorney Michael Avenatti and published earlier this week, Cohen had used a shell company, Essential Consultants, to offer his consulting services to AT&T and others.

AT&T retained Cohen between October 2017 and January 2018 to provide insights into the new Trump administration and its priorities, but not to do lobbying or set up meetings with the administration, the company has said.

Cohen also obtained work from a subsidiary of pharmaceutical company Novartis, among other business clients.

McAtee is a former partner at Haynes and Boone in Dallas, where he specialized in complex litigation, antitrust and government investigations. He joined AT&T in January 2012 as assistant GC and was named to the top legal job in October 2015.

Corporate Counsel interviewed McAtee back in August 2017 about his philosophy around alternative dispute resolution upon receiving an award for ADR excellence from the International Institute for Conflict Prevention & Resolution Inc.