Anthropic Names New General Counsel Ahead of Expected IPO (3) - Bloomberg Law News

Leichty succeeds Jeffrey Bleich, a former US ambassador hired by Anthropic a year ago. He is transitioning to the new role of international special envoy, Bleich said in a Monday post to his LinkedIn profile.

Leichty, who had been head of global commercial legal at Anthropic, joined the company in 2023 after almost six years in-house at Alphabet Inc.’s Google. She began her career as an associate at Morgan, Lewis & Bockius.

“I am so honored to step into this role and continue supporting Anthropic’s mission alongside the entire legal dream team,” Leichty said via LinkedIn.

“In her three years leading legal teams at Anthropic, Elena has earned the trust and admiration of our legal organization, and across the company,” said a separate LinkedIn post from Anthropic’s chief legal officer Brian Israel.

Israel, Bleich, and Anthropic didn’t respond to requests for comment.

Anthropic, founded in 2021 by siblings Dario and Daniela Amodei, hired Israel the following year as general counsel. Israel had previously been an associate general counsel for international law at NASA.

Rob Hester, a Toronto-based associate general counsel at Anthropic, has replaced Leichty as the San Francisco-based company’s head of commercial legal, according to his LinkedIn profile. Hester joined Anthropic in 2024 after spending almost five years at Amazon.com Inc.

Anthropic announced earlier this month its hire of Mariano-Florentino “Tino” Cuéllar, a former California Supreme Court justice, as its first chief global affairs officer. Cuéllar will handle policy, government relations, and strategic international engagement. He had most recently been a law professor at Stanford University and president of the Washington-based Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. The latter role paid Cuéllar almost $915,000 in fiscal 2024-25, according to a tax filing by the nonprofit think tank.

Anthropic has been at odds with the Trump administration, having hired Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr for a high-profile lawsuit against the federal government. Anthropic secured a court order pausing its ban by US agencies.

WilmerHale, White & Case, Morrison & Foerster, and Cooley LLP have collectively represented Anthropic in more than 50% of its cases filed in US federal courts within the past five years, according to Bloomberg Law data.

Bleich said he’d “work with governments around the world” in his new policy-focused role at Anthropic. “It is a dream job for me,” he said.

Bleich previously reported to Israel and now reports into Anthropic’s policy team. He noted that the “decisions being made around AI policy right now, in capitals on every continent, will shape the development of this technology for decades.” His new position at the company, Bleich said, will bring “together the two halves of my career, law and diplomacy.”

Bleich, who clerked in 1990 for former US Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist, has been a partner at Dentons and Munger, Tolles & Olson and served as US ambassador to Australia during the Obama administration. Bleich most recently was the top lawyer for Cruise LLC, a now-defunct autonomous vehicle technology company owned by General Motors Co.

Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, a Silicon Valley legal stalwart, is advising Anthropic as it prepares to go public in a listing that could set a record for size.

Anthropic, like rival OpenAI, has been moving into the legal technology sector.

(Adds litigation docket information in 11th paragraph and updates Bleich's reporting relationship in the 13th paragraph.)

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