Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr is building out its natural resources and Native American practices with the hire this week of a former deputy secretary of the U.S. Department of the Interior.

Michael Connor joins the firm in Washington, D.C., as a partner after serving in the Interior Department's second highest role.

“It wasn't as easy as I thought it would be to find a firm that had developed a practice in all the areas I have expertise in,” Connor said Tuesday.