(Bloomberg) — The man who won the Obama administration's biggest legal battles, including fights over health care and gay marriage, is stepping down.
U.S. Solicitor General Donald Verrilli will leave his post after a five-year tenure as President Barack Obama's voice at the Supreme Court.
The soft-spoken Verrilli, 58, made the Supreme Court arguments that saved the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) — Obamacare — from legal oblivion in both 2012 and 2015. His nuanced position on gay marriage helped frame the debate as the court moved toward full legalization last year.
"For five years, Solicitor General Don Verrilli has fought in our nation's highest court for a better future, winning landmark cases that moved America forward," Obama said in a statement. Verrilli is the longest-serving solicitor general in more than four decades.
Deputy Solicitor General Ian Gershengorn will take over in an acting capacity starting June 25.
Succeeding Kagan
As deputy White House counsel, Verrilli was little known outside Washington legal circles when Obama nominated him for solicitor general in 2011. Verrilli filled a position that became vacant when Obama named Elena Kagan to the Supreme Court.
His tenure was defined by showdowns with the Supreme Court's conservative wing. Verrilli defended the Voting Rights Act, argued for presidential recess-appointment powers, fought to preserve pollution limits and advocated in favor of campaign finance regulations.
Each argument found Verrilli trying to fend off skeptical questions from the court's conservatives while seeking to persuade either Chief Justice John Roberts or Justice Anthony Kennedy to align with the court's liberal wing.
Roberts was often Verrilli's toughest questioner, pressing the solicitor general on any perceived flaw in his reasoning. In arguments this year over the administration's immigration plan, Roberts pointed to what he suggested were contradictory passages in the solicitor general's brief.
"That must have been a hard sentence to write," Roberts told Verrilli.