SEC NYC v. USAO DC Forum

[Anonymous User]

I'm a 1L with offers currently at the SEC (Enforcement Division) in NY and the USAO in DC (Division TBA).

I am utterly at a loss about which one to take (both seem great), because I don't have a perfectly clear long-term career bath. In the short term, I know I'd like to clerk and just generally create the best legal resume I can. I probably can't go wrong with either, but I'm really curious about people's thoughts.

I don't really see myself going into criminal law, but the only way I'd go into Securities law would be on the enforcement side (no biglaw for me). Thoughts? Help?

[vamedic03]

Wherever you can live the cheapest.

[Anonymous User]

I can only speak about the SEC NYC program, but its an absolutely great office with great people and a relatively small number of interns (around 10 last year). They are also absolutely swamped with work right now and are giving lots of substantive work to their interns. Dodd-Frank is keeping them extremely busy, with a lot of interesting litigation and investigatory work in private funds and structured products. But, honestly, you can't go wrong either way.

Something to consider though is if you are not interested in biglaw, the SEC does not do very much hiring from summer interns (almost all experienced hires these days, particularly in the regional offices), while the DOJ has the honors program. Thus, getting some experience with the DOJ 1L year to transition to 2L SLIP and then the honors program may be something you are interested in, though I don't think that working for the SEC for 1L will in anyway foreclose SLIP. Best of luck.

[leobowski]

I can only speak about the SEC NYC program, but its an absolutely great office with great people and a relatively small number of interns (around 10 last year). They are also absolutely swamped with work right now and are giving lots of substantive work to their interns. Dodd-Frank is keeping them extremely busy, with a lot of interesting litigation and investigatory work in private funds and structured products. But, honestly, you can't go wrong either way.

Something to consider though is if you are not interested in biglaw, the SEC does not do very much hiring from summer interns (almost all experienced hires these days, particularly in the regional offices), while the DOJ has the honors program. Thus, getting some experience with the DOJ 1L year to transition to 2L SLIP and then the honors program may be something you are interested in, though I don't think that working for the SEC for 1L will in anyway foreclose SLIP. Best of luck.

SLIP-> Honors hiring is also very rare though.

[Anonymous User]

USAO-DC is a great place to be for the summer, and if you request the Civil Division you almost certainly will get it (most people want one of the criminal divisions, especially because USAO-DC handles felonies like robbery, murder and rape as well as federal crimes). If you want to do litigation, you'll get a lot of experience writing briefs, motions, researching a wide variety of issues, etc, and since the AUSAs are swamped with work, they really rely on interns to help them out, thereby giving you a lot of responsibility. Plus, you'll get a bunch of great writing samples. HTH.

[Anonymous User]

Thanks for these responses. I know that both programs are great, I'm just trying to think about what longer term impact they'd have.

As someone who wants to go into government, both offer great government experience bona fides. Would USAO, as part of DOJ, be better in that regard, whereas SEC would be better for trying to get a firm job next summer?

[Anonymous User]

Thanks for these responses. I know that both programs are great, I'm just trying to think about what longer term impact they'd have.

As someone who wants to go into government, both offer great government experience bona fides. Would USAO, as part of DOJ, be better in that regard, whereas SEC would be better for trying to get a firm job next summer?

I think that's generally accurate -- SEC is kind of a prestigious niche part of the government, whereas DOJ basically handles cases that are deemed to be more important/political/specialized and therefore it essentially takes them from the USAOs (this past summer main Justice took one of the cases I was working on, about a month into it, because it got "political"), but the actual work done by DOJ attorneys and AUSAs is almost identical. If your goal is DOJ, USAO-DC is probably the best thing you can do for a 1L summer.

[Anonymous User]

great, thanks for that last response.

Any other thoughts? Clerking?

[vamedic03]

great, thanks for that last response.

Any other thoughts? Clerking?

Grades, Law Review, and professor recommendations are the essential ingredients for clerking. Either experience for 1L summer is fine.