Steve Patton is Of Counsel at Kirkland & Ellis, where he focuses on pro bono “impact” litigation, including challenges to the Trump Administration’s adult detention of immigrant children and ban on transgender individuals in the military.

From 2011-2017, Patton was Chicago’s Corporation Counsel and Mayor Emanuel’s senior legal advisor.  In that role, he supervised the City’s 270-lawyer Law Department and instituted initiatives to improve legal representation and reduce costs.  Patton also quarterbacked numerous mayoral initiatives, including achieving “substantial compliance” with a decades-old consent decree barring patronage and negotiating a landmark reparations agreement resolving claims of torture by 70 African American men.

Prior to serving as Corporation Counsel, Patton was a senior litigation partner with Kirkland, where he tried cases and argued appeals throughout the country, and served as chair of the firm’s Litigation Management and Client Development committees. 

Patton is a Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers, and has been voted one of Illinois’ “Top 100 Super Lawyers” and The Best Lawyers of America, and named one of the U.S.’s leading litigators by Chambers USA, Global Counsel’s Dispute Resolution Handbook, and Corporate Board Member magazine.