Steve Palmer: All right, here we are, Lawyer Talk Q and A. That is Lawyer Talk podcast dot com, where we are taking Q, uh, and A, that is questions and answers. If you've got your own question that you want me to answer, there's a couple different ways we can go about this. Go toLawyer Talk podcast.com where you can just submit a question. We have a little interface or whatever you want to call it, send it to me. And that's how today's question came. But if you've got other questions, check it out, uh, or put them in the comments here or up there, wherever they go, uh, in your favorite social Media platform. And we will get back to you, uh, and answer the questions that way. And if, of course, you want me to comment on a topic or you want me to cover something, same, uh, thing, hit it in the comments or shoot us. Uh, uh, what you want us to talk about. Lawyer Talk podcast.com Without further ado, um, this is relevant. We just had probably one of the most significant elections in our Time. So, uh, I'm going to sort of bump this one up. We get lots of questions that are backlogged, but, uh, this one I'm going to bump up because it is sort of relevant. Uh, and this comes from Melissa, and Melissa asked, how do some lawyers specialize in political election law? Surely there are not enough elections for someone to specialize in this area alone. Have you ever done political election law? Do you have any stories you can share? Love the podcast. Well, we could just stop right there. Love the podcast. Thanks. Um, I do, too. Uh, at any rate, but let me get to your question, because this. I think what I'm going to also do is we have a they don't teach you that in Law School series where, uh, I get some law students, and we're going to do that later this morning as well. And I'm going to cover some of this there. And because I think really what this is, is about how does somebody choose an area of the law to practice in, uh, coming out of Law School. Uh, now, election law, particularly, this is one of those niche, niche, niche areas. You're correct. The question is sort of saying, you know, how could there be enough room for all these lawyers in this area of the law? Well, there may not be. So if you're coming out of Law School, you think, man, I just want to be a political election lawyer. Uh, that's going to be a difficult hill, uh, to climb. So, typically, what I tell people, and this is what I learned coming out of Law School, Is that your area of practice is generally going to be your first job and you become good at some area of law, whether it's being a domestic relations lawyer, a contracts lawyer, corporate lawyer in a big law firm. You sort of get pigeonholed into one of their sections and that's what you become. Or maybe it's because your Uncle Bob uh, owns a big business and that business has a very unique area of law and you bring that, you bring Uncle Bob into the law firm. So now that becomes your specialty. Uh, it really does happen that way. Um, now election law. One of my former law professors and somebody uh, who I have talked to after Law School is an election lawyer, uh, and he has done lots of consulting, um, and commenting, et cetera on election law. But I think what you're getting at is like political election law, these teams of lawyers that go out, um, like in this most recent election. Now this, this question came in on the 4th of November, uh, but on, during a Tuesday election I heard tell of lawyers with boots on the ground in various uh, states and various jurisdictions challenging things that were happening. Whether I think one of them was in Pennsylvania. There was this notion that uh, one of the uh, they were going to stop counting or ballot somewhere. And the team of lawyers swooped in, threatened litigation and said, you're not following the law, so we're going to go to court and get an injunction and do all this stuff. Um, and then you know, there was another group of specialty type group I think out in Arizona, uh, uh, who uh, doing similar stuff. So how do those lawyers get an election law? Well I don't particularly know. It could just be because they work for a law firm, uh, in their, in some department and they had a case one time involving political uh, election law. It could be that it's a five, uh, hundred one type organization or a uh, public nonprofit uh, group and they hire lawyers out of Law School or maybe out of the firms who have an interest in doing that kind of stuff. So they become political election lawyers, um, now. So that's I think how it happens. Now is there enough room for lots of political election lawyers? I'm a believer in the market. The market bears what the market bears. If you want to get into that type of area, then I would start exploring some of those groups and figure out uh, how you get involved. And if that's your first job, if that's your first uh, area of practice out of Law School, you could quickly make that a specialty. And then you're sort of known it doesn't take much to be known, um, in an area of law like that. So I happen to have an area of practice doing, believe it or not, gaming, uh, machines. Not slot machines in the big casinos, but skill gaming machines or maybe, uh, not so legal gaming machines or all sorts of type of gaming machines in the little mom and pop, uh, strip mall game rooms around the state and various other states. Uh, how did that happen? Well, I had a case one Time and I started to learn about it and that's. I'm the guy that people call for that stuff now. That's how it happens. Um, now do I have any stories, have I ever done political election law? Do I have any stories I can share? So by political election law, like I've never had, I've never been the guy with boots on the ground taken on the cause of fighting, uh, improper elections. Uh, I've never done that. Would I? Yeah, I might. If somebody hired me to do it, I might get involved in that. What I have done though is I've represented people who have tried to vote in multiple jurisdictions. I've represented people charged with misdemeanor crimes and, and maybe even a felony crime, uh, because they wanted to vote, uh, in two different counties. And that happened. They claimed sort of, uh, honestly because they got, um, they were registered to vote, then they moved to a different County. So they didn't know if they should vote in one place plus the other. Or maybe, uh, they forgot to do a change of address. Um, and so I've had, I have represented folks charged with those kind of things to the extent that's political election law. Yeah, I've done it, uh, but never really, uh, I don't have any really juicy stories to tell about being a political election lawyer with boots on the ground fighting the cause, uh, during a big, um, controversial, ah, election. Sorry, I wish I did, but I don't. Um, perhaps what I'll do is I'll get my old, uh, law professor in as a guest and he will have some stories. Uh, so, uh, if you've got your own, I hope that answers your question. And what I'm going to do, by the way, is I'm going to sort of take this in a different direction and I'm going to talk to law students about what they intend to do after they graduate from Law School and try to get. I usually share them what they don't teach you in Law School, but today I think I'm going to have them share with me what it's like to be a law student facing the job market and figuring out what they're going to do in the job market and where they want to go. Um, so tune into that. That is the. They don't teach you that in Law School. Part or series or faction of the Lawyer Talk podcast. Um, so back at it. If you've got your own question, if you've got your own topic you want me to cover. LawyerTalkPodcast.com and by the way, please do me a favor. I'm getting lots of feedback on this. Um, just like Melissa, she says she loves the podcast. I got a favor like it. Share it, uh, engage, because it helps me. I don't, I don't do this for money. I do it for fun. And, uh, if you enjoy it, I just appreciate a little bit of help on the back end, like, uh, it. And share it with all your cronies. And, uh, the podcast will spread like wildfire, um, all over the globe. So until that happens, we are right here every week, each and every week, answering, uh, your questions atlawyer talk podcast.com, at least until now.
