Oscar Persons (from left), Frank Strickland and Bryan Tyson of Taylor English (Photo: John Disney/ALM)

High-profile political law and litigation boutique Strickland Brockington Lewis is shutting its doors after 18 years as the principals make a transition to Taylor English Duma.

Frank Strickland, Anne Lewis and Bryan Tyson joined Taylor English as partners earlier this month, while Oscar Persons joined as senior counsel. All four are Republican stalwarts who've worked on election campaigns, in party positions and on a variety of political law issues.

“Throughout their expansive careers, Frank, Anne, Oscar and Bryan have established outstanding reputations in the Atlanta community,” said Taylor English founding partner Marc Taylor. “We are thrilled to have them join our team.”

Strickland and Tyson also joined Taylor English Decisions, the firm's government affairs and business consulting arm that it started it last year by recruiting as CEO Earl Ehrhart, a Marietta Republican who retired from the Georgia House of Representatives after 30 years.

Strickland and Tyson will advise and advocate for companies such as charter schools, other educational entities, utilities and health care providers that are regulated by the state, Tyson said in an interview.

Tyson had started his own consultancy, Tyson Strategies, on his return to Strickland Brockington Lewis last August after his appointment by then-Gov. Nathan Deal as executive director of the Georgia Public Defender Council. The Daily Report made Tyson a finalist for Attorney of the Year in 2016 for his successful advocacy with the state Legislature and governor to boost the beleaguered agency's budget. His consultancy will get folded into Taylor English Decisions, he said.

Their additions give Taylor English 170 lawyers and expand Taylor English Decisions to 12 members.

30-Year Partnership

Strickland, Peggy Brockington and Lewis practiced together for almost 30 years, starting in the late 1980s when Brockington and Lewis joined Strickland's then-firm, Wilson Strickland & Benson, after earning JDs from Georgia State University' newly established law school. The three launched Strickland Brockington Lewis in 2001.

Tyson joined in 2007 after a stint in Washington, D.C., working for Republican Congressman Lynn Westmoreland. Persons, a seasoned litigator and mediator, joined as senior counsel in 2012 after retiring from Alston & Bird. A recipient of the Daily Report's Lifetime Achievement Award, Persons handles mediation, arbitration and consults on litigation.

Strickland said several developments precipitated their move to Taylor English, starting with Brockington's retirement a couple of years ago. Then, last March, Jonathan Poole, a young partner who'd worked with her on education and employment law matters, joined a client, Emory University, as an associate general counsel.

Anne Lewis (Photo: John Disney/ALM)

Meanwhile, Lewis, who was in remission from cancer, has had a recurrence, Strickland said. She is on medical leave. “She has an office at Taylor English. We hope she will make a complete recovery and join us,” he said.

Lewis specializes in redistricting, Voting Rights Act issues and election contests. She has served as special counsel on redistricting matters for the Georgia General Assembly and as a special attorney general on voting rights cases and litigation related to the defense of Georgia's photo ID law.

Lewis has been the general counsel of the Georgia Republican Party since 2009. She is also the board chair for the Georgia Resource Center, which provides habeas representation for prisoners sentenced to death.

“These organic changes started us thinking about what might be a next step for us,” Strickland said.

“We've done a lot of different things over the years, including higher education and charter schools work and some employment work,” he added, “and we were thinking about sharpening our focus in the area broadly called political law.”

That includes, Tyson said, voting rights cases, campaign finance and election law, and redistricting matters. He is handling numerous high-profile cases representing the Georgia Secretary of State's Office and the Gwinnett County Board of Elections in response to the plethora of suits alleging problems with Georgia's November elections.

A few months ago, Strickland was at Taylor English talking to Taylor about a pro bono matter. “I ran into my old friend Earl Ehrhart, and we had a nice conversation,” he said. Ehrhart sent him a follow-up message, Strickland said, “saying, 'If you guys ever think about doing anything different, give us a call.'”

That planted the seed, Strickland said, and soon afterward the firm invited them to join.

Strickland, who serves as a court-appointed special master, mediator and receiver, said he's not ready to retire. “The short version is, if you don't have Plan B, you need to keep working on Plan A,” he said.

“I enjoy what I'm doing and the people I work with,” he added. “I think to stop doing anything remotely productive would not be a good step for me. I like to be where the action is and participate in it to the greatest extent possible.”

He's keeping busy extracurricularly as well. A former chairman of the federal Legal Services Corp. and president of the Atlanta Bar Association, Strickland serves on two of the LSC's board committees, and he's running for secretary of the State Bar of Georgia. He also is chairman with Lewis serving as president of the Atlanta chapter of the Federalist Society—which, he noted, has 500 members.

Tyson's Election Cases

Tyson is representing the Georgia Secretary of State's Office in four election cases—including a wide-ranging federal lawsuit brought by Fair Fight Action alleging numerous voting problems in Georgia's midterm elections.

Stacey Abrams formed the voting rights group last November after her defeat in the governor's race, vowing in a press release to “address the gross mismanagement of this election and to protect future elections from unconstitutional actions.”

The U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Reform opened an investigation into how Georgia's 2018 midterm elections were conducted earlier in March.

Tyson with Josh Belinfante of The Robbins Firm represents the secretary of state and the State Election Board in the suit brought by Fair Fight Action.

He's also representing Georgia's secretary of state in two suits brought by Common Cause Georgia alleging, respectively, problems with provisional ballots and using electronic voting machines with paper ballots. He represents the agency in a third suit brought by the National Democratic Redistricting Committee, alleging that Georgia's 12th Congressional District seat, created after the 2010 census and held by Republican Rick Allen, was gerrymandered in violation of the Voting Rights Act.

Tyson is representing the Gwinnett Board of Elections in two federal cases over absentee ballots and a third suit contesting the validity of the election of Georgia Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan that is now before the Georgia Supreme Court.

In a more hyperlocal case, he's representing Republican challenger Chris Erwin in an ongoing challenge to the primary results for the state House seat in Homer.

Erwin won the Republican primary for House District 28 by just 67 votes last May against Republican Rep. Dan Gasaway. There was no Democrat in the race, so whoever wins the primary wins the seat.

Gasaway, represented by Jake Evans of Holland & Knight, sued over mapping mistakes in Habersham County that assigned some voters to the wrong districts and won a redo election for December. Erwin won by two votes that time. Gasaway sued again. Judge David Sweat threw out the Dec. 4 primary results in February after finding that four votes were cast illegally. The judge has ordered a second redo election for April 9, after removing Erwin from office on Feb. 8.

Erwin was sworn in as a state House member in January—and showed up at the Capitol, cast votes and met with constituents for a week following the January trial. He is appealing.

“My client won both elections, but he lost both election contests,” Tyson said.