Melanie Cohen

2 weeks ago | news.bloomberglaw.com | Jessica Estepa |Melanie Cohen

The legal profession is facing an existential threat to its legitimacy—and it’s not the one grabbing the headlines. Lawyers across the country in recent months have protested, issued bar statements, and signed amicus briefs on the risks posed by the Trump administration to the rule of law. Our sustained, concerted focus on big law firms is working. But it isn’t enough. The dire and accelerating threat to the rule of law in the US isn’t confined to the legal profession’s upper echelons.

2 weeks ago | news.bloomberglaw.com | Jessica Estepa |Melanie Cohen

The legal profession is facing an existential threat to its legitimacy—and it’s not the one grabbing the headlines. Lawyers across the country in recent months have protested, issued bar statements, and signed amicus briefs on the risks posed by the Trump administration to the rule of law. Our sustained, concerted focus on big law firms is working. But it isn’t enough. The dire and accelerating threat to the rule of law in the US isn’t confined to the legal profession’s upper echelons.

2 weeks ago | news.bloomberglaw.com | Melanie Cohen

Line drawing is inherent in the legislative and regulatory processes, especially when administering state and federal tax codes. Taxpayers who are denied exemptions often seek relief in the courts, and the courts then test the text with a constitutional yardstick. That’s exactly what happened when the Wisconsin Supreme Court denied the Diocese of Superior’s Catholic Charities Bureau a state unemployment tax exemption.

2 weeks ago | news.bloombergtax.com | Daniel Xu |Melanie Cohen

Many car owners have gotten a letter from a vehicle manufacturer informing them of a vehicle being recalled and needing to be fixed. Recalls historically have required physical repairs. But in recent years, a new kind of recall has emerged, reflecting the increasingly computerized and connected vehicles on our roads: the over-the-air, or OTA, recall. Instead of being repaired in a shop, vehicles are “recalled” through remote software fixes.

2 weeks ago | news.bloombergtax.com | Melanie Cohen |Jessica Estepa

Private equity sponsors have spent decades perfecting the playbook of financial engineering. But strategy has become more interdisciplinary and risk more multidimensional. Execution has gotten more contingent on complex regulatory, reputational, and legal variables. That is why the general counsel is emerging as essential in the portfolio company C-suite. The right GC doesn’t just protect enterprise value—they create it.