U.S. Capitol building in Washington, D.C. June 13, 2018. Photo: Diego M. Radzinschi/ALM

Members of Congress asked tech's biggest companies to disclose their outside counsel diversity hiring practices in a letter sent Friday.

Tech companies' outside counsel weigh in on “issues deeply affecting this nation's varied populations” and therefore should be as diverse as the populations their decisions impact, wrote five Democrat members of Congress in Friday's letter.

Yet, they added, some tech companies have failed to realize both the “full effect of their products” and importance of “sufficiently diverse advice.”

“With [tech's] level of influence, these companies must ensure that diverse perspectives are present in their decision making at every point in their organizational structures—and that includes the firms they hire for legal counsel,” said Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman, D-New Jersey.

The message comes as firms face increased pressure to diversify their ranks from in-house counsel. In January, more than 170 general counsel, including some tech industry lawyers, penned a letter threatening to pull their business from firms not trying to improve diversity and inclusion efforts.

Friday's letter was sent to the chief executive officers of the tech industry's 10 largest companies by revenue: Apple Inc., Amazon.com Inc., Alphabet Inc., Microsoft Corp., IBM Corp., Dell, Intel Corp., HP, Cisco Systems Inc. and Facebook Inc. HP and Microsoft both have public diversity requirements in place for outside counsel.

Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, D-Missouri, led efforts to draft and send the letter. He said in an interview that the letter was addressed to CEOs rather than general counsel because he wanted to raise awareness at the top and outside of legal departments.

Lawmakers pushed CEOs on whether legal department spend is held accountable to supplier diversity program requirements and what percent of legal spend annually goes to women- and minority-owned firms.

The representatives also asked if and how tech companies are pushing big law firms to diversify. Criteria used to measure diversity in outside counsel selection, the size of diversity as a factor in outside counsel selection and formal promises made by in-house teams to hold firms accountable are all questions raised Friday.

“We're now seeing how the lack of diverse legal teams limit the background and viewpoints needed when dealing with issues that arise,” said Rep. Barbara Lee, D-California. “It is essential that these companies advocate directly for more diverse hiring, including holding firms that do not meet diversity standards financially accountable.”

Reps. Robin Kelly, D-Illinois and G.K. Butterfield, D-North Carolina, also signed Friday's letter.

Cisco chief legal counselor Mark Chandler said in an emailed statement his company's executives “welcome the CBC's inquiry, which draws good attention to the opportunity that all companies have to use vendor hiring practices as a vehicle to promote diversity and opportunity.” Microsoft did not have additional comment, and the other eight companies did not immediately responded to request for comment.

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