Luke Liss
Liss led teams of volunteering attorneys who took on impact litigation, lawsuits intended to bring about societal change. One of his most remarkable pro bono trial wins came in 2020 on behalf of the largest class of Medicare beneficiaries in history. The verdict was upheld on appeal, the firm said in a statement.
More recently, working alongside the Center for Justice and Accountability, an international human rights nonprofit, Liss and colleagues won a federal court verdict against a Colombian paramilitary leader accused of ordering extrajudicial killings. The ruling marked the first time that a United States court had acknowledged that the Colombian government was turning a blind eye to human rights violations carried out by paramilitary groups in the country.
After serving in his dual role for four years, both Liss and Wilson Sonsini came to the conclusion that the firm needed a full-time pro bono attorney, and that he would be the right person for the job.
On Feb. 15, after a unanimous vote by its partners, Wilson Sonsini announced that it had elevated Liss to pro bono partner, the first position of its kind at the firm. Based in Palo Alto, California, Liss will manage Wilson Sonsini's global pro bono efforts while leading the pro bono litigation and immigration teams, the firm said.
"We can't think of anyone better suited for the role than Luke," Doug Clark, Wilson Sonsini's managing partner, said in a statement at the time. "We are confident that the firm's pro bono program will continue to be in good hands under his leadership in the years ahead."
Tonia O. Klausner, a longtime partner in the firm's New York office who was recently appointed senior pro bono counsel, will work alongside Liss to shape Wilson Sonsini's pro bono activity, the firm said.
Liss talked to Law360 Pulse this week and last year about the business value of pro bono for firms, including serving as a powerful recruiting tool. Here, Liss talks about his new position, Wilson Sonsini's pro bono ambitions and Harry B. Bremond, a retired member of the firm and his main source of inspiration.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
How did you become the firm's first entirely dedicated pro bono lawyer?
I was appointed to be the first pro bono counsel of the firm in 2018. In that role, I kind of split my time between overseeing pro bono as well as still doing client-billable work. That was by choice, just because I love working with all our clients so much. Once I was in that role, I kind of saw the possibilities even more, and just kind of dove in. So, it worked out really well.
What does pro bono mean to Wilson Sonsini?
The firm has always had such a strong commitment to pro bono. Pro bono and community service are so important, whether it's for recruiting, whether it's because our clients all expect us to do pro bono, and they're doing it as well. And just because of the moral imperative. People you're recruiting from law schools or lateral attorneys are all expecting to have great pro bono projects in areas that they care about.
It's also where I think the industry is going. There are some firms that have pro bono partners. Most of them, I don't think are full equity partners like I am. We wanted to be just like we are in so many areas, kind of out front, and really build on what we've been doing. There's just a lot of positive momentum.
How did the decision of creating a full-time pro bono position come about? Have you looked at other firms as examples?
I did some research just to see how many firms do have pro bono partners. I saw that there were some, but I was surprised there weren't more. I think there will be more soon.
One thing that I've always kind of done is I'll take ideas about pro bono here and there from what other firms are doing — you need to know what's going on — but I feel like our pro bono program is very unique.
One really different area of my practice, compared to a lot of pro bono partners, is that I actually litigate as well. I don't just oversee the program, I actually litigate cases. That's a big part of my mindset and my top mentality, and I love it.
Who or what inspired you to do pro bono?
Harry Bremond is really the person who I try to be. I could never be him, but I tried to kind of pattern myself after him. He was one of the very first Black attorneys in the Bay Area — we're talking like two or three Black attorneys back in the '60s.
He was one of the first partners at this firm. Before he came to Wilson Sonsini, he couldn't really get a job at law firms, because people just wouldn't hire Black lawyers. So he had to work at warehouses. He had to take whatever kind of cases he could get. But he did it, he made it work. He was a partner here at Wilson Sonsini for over 40 years.
When I was a summer associate and a junior associate, he really mentored me. It's something that goes beyond just a work thing. Me being Black, I didn't grow up in a situation where I had strong Black male role models. I just didn't.
He kind of stepped into that role for me. He really instilled in me the importance of pro bono, and how important it is to give back and pay forward, and mentor people. And then I saw his leadership, how he would litigate cases, how he would be somebody people would go to for advice, how he just had so much wisdom and energy all the time.
He founded our pro bono program, and he was so central to it. When I told him that I was elected partner a couple of weeks ago, I cried because I knew he was proud of me. He told me he was proud of me, which might have been one of the first times, because he was usually tough love with me. It was really an amazing moment.
How do you envision your firm's pro bono program?
Our pro bono program has always been very strong in terms of energy and in terms of volunteers. My biggest immediate goals are to continue that. We're continuing to file new big cases.
We filed another [Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act] case last week involving the [1985] Palace of Justice siege in Colombia. We've continued to do cases with the ACLU of Louisiana involving racial justice.
But my real kind of goals for the program in the immediate term are to continue to streamline it. I want to use technology, in particular, to make sure I'm always getting the newest, freshest opportunities for as many of our people as possible, and deploying our resources as efficiently as I can, for two reasons: one, to just give people more and better opportunities in our various offices, and two, to increase our impact. The faster you can get people working, the more different projects you can get them, and the greater impact you can have.
One way I really see envisioning building all that out is we work with our pro bono platform, Paladin. It's a company we've been using for a few years to distribute opportunities, but we also want to use it for more tracking of what we're already doing, to help make sure that we're meeting our goals.
How do you connect Wilson Sonsini attorneys with pro bono opportunities?
It's something that takes a lot of work and always something we're trying to improve. The biggest way is just letting people know what's available, and then tracking what their interests are. We maintain a pro bono listserv that has like 500 people signed up or so.
I'll give the ACLU Justice Lab project as an example: For that, we would send out an email to that pro bono listserv and say, "Hey, here's this project we have with the ACLU Justice Lab to combat discriminatory policing in Louisiana. This is a great opportunity for you if you want to learn litigation skills. There'll be opportunities to write briefs, do arguments, take depositions," all those things the commercial litigator needs to learn anyway.
We'll get a list of 30, 40 people [who expressed interest], and then, when those opportunities arise, we know who to go to staff up a case.
Another thing too, is oftentimes people will just know of people. Partners will come to me and say, "Hey, can you find a corporate associate to work on this?" Then, another way is the database, Paladin. It's a repository of pro bono projects that people can look at, and if they're interested in one we go through our process of approving it.
For the big cases, we never have a problem finding people to do them because they're so interesting.
What do attorneys get out of taking cases pro bono?
Pro bono is just deeply personal to me. I'm Black. I was adopted as a kid, raised by a single mother, she had three other kids. I really struggled when I was growing up. I wasn't somebody who you would have thought was going to go to Stanford and was going to be a corporate lawyer. A lot of times I struggled, I experienced some racism, I just had some setbacks.
There were always people, at different points in my life, who went out of their way to help me when I really needed it. That really stuck with me. So, I see pro bono as a way that I can kind of give back and show that it was worth those people helping me.
I want to give attorneys those types of opportunities; one, so they can experience that; two, because I really think it helps people grow as a person and as attorneys to be doing that type of work. You're giving them work that they're very interested in, you're broadening their horizons. It's just a win-win all around, especially if you end up winning the cases you're doing — which is very important to me too.
I really think people get a lot out of it for that reason.
Now that you are the firm's pro bono chief, do you still plan on getting your hands dirty?
Yes, absolutely. That's in my DNA, I love to litigate. So I'll continue to be on teams and appear in cases and litigate as well. Hopefully, I'm more like a point guard in basketball, facilitating for other people. But it's just so much a part of me. I love to litigate, I'm a happy warrior. So that will always be part of it.
All Access is a series of discussions with leaders in the access to justice field. Questions and answers have been edited for length and clarity.
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