Sandler, Reiff, Young & Lamb partners Joseph Sandler, Neil Reiff, and Jim Lamb were all recognized as three of Washington’s top lawyers by Washingtonian Magazine. They were recognized for their outstanding work in the field of election law in the magazine’s December 2011 feature on Washington’s Best Lawyers. As Washingtonian Magazine put it, “Candidates, political parties, and corporations call these campaigns-and-elections lawyers for guidance on campaign finance, ethics laws, and other rules of the political game.” This recognition is only the latest is a long string of honors and accomplishments for Sandler, Reiff, Lamb and the entire team at Sandler, Reiff, Young, & Lamb.

Update January 19, 2012: Washingtonian’s Top Lawyers listing is now online. Follow this link to see Mr. Sandler, Reiff, and Lamb’s  recognition.

Neil Reiff was recently quoted in a Roll Call article, rejecting the idea that the Federal Election Commission is broken.  According to the article, campaign finance reform advocates are concerned the FEC is “broken” and therefore, incapable of enforcing campaign finance regulations. Roll Call reports that 8 non-profits recently wrote a letter to President Obama seeking stronger campaign finance laws and claiming that 3 Republican commissioners “have paralyzed the agency by consistently blocking enforcement of the laws and repeatedly misinterpreting the laws”. However, Reiff said that “[t]his has been the least partisan commission in my 18 years of practice,” and that “if you put the rhetoric aside, the FEC’s recent decisions mirror similar ones at the Supreme Court, which has knocked down key provisions of campaign finance laws during the past five years.”

On March 28, Neil Reiff appeared on a panel sponsored by the George Washington University Law School Election Law Society.  The panel included GW Law Professor Spencer Overton, Leslie Rutledge, counsel from the Republican National Committee, as well as prominent campaign finance attorney Craig Engle, from Arent Fox, LLC.  Panelists discussed current and future trends in campaign finance law.

Joe Sandler also spoke recently about the impact of the Citizens United decision and other recent developments on the financing of the 2010 elections, and the prospects for the future. The panel, which also included Charlie Spies of Clark Hill PLC, Martha McKenna, former political director of the DSCC, Gentry Collins, former political director at the RNC and recent candidate for RNC chairman, was sponsored by the Election Law Society of Georgetown University.