Mike Norton is an associate in the Denver office of Gibson Dunn where he practices in the firm’s litigation department with a focus on internal and governmental investigations as well as regulatory compliance.
Mike takes an interdisciplinary approach to client challenges, using pragmatic grit from growing up on a chicken farm down a dirt road in the Ozarks and his background in quantitative social science and policy to find the best solutions to complex problems. He advises clients on investigations, regulatory compliance, and litigation on federal, state, and local issues in a broad array of industries. Mike maintains an active and wide pro bono practice, where he helps indigent clients with criminal expungement, eviction defense, voter protection, asylum, and civil dispute issues.
Mike also serves as a judge advocate general (JAG) officer in the U.S. Army Reserve at the 440th Civil Affairs Battalion out of Fort Carson, Colorado, where he advises on international and domestic law as the battalion’s international law officer. Prior to joining Gibson Dunn, he worked for the ranking member on the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, at the White House Domestic Policy Council, and as the deputy voter protection director running the ballot cure program for a 2020 presidential campaign in a hotly contested battleground state.
He received his J.D. from Stanford Law School on the Harry S. Truman Scholarship (awarded in undergrad), where he served as a member of the Stanford Law & Policy Review and participated in the Election Law Project and the Community Law Clinic, crafting many of the legal skills he uses today. Before law school, Mike received his Ph.D. (passed defense with no corrections) and M.Sc., both in political science, from the University of Oxford on the Marshall Scholarship, worked in Washington, D.C., and was a first-generation college farm kid receiving his B.S., summa cum laude, in agricultural business and poultry science from the University of Arkansas. He is published in the Election Law Journal and the Journal of International Agricultural Trade and Development.
Mike is admitted to practice law in Colorado, Minnesota, and Arkansas.
Capabilities
- White Collar Defense and Investigations
- Administrative Law and Regulatory Practice
- Crisis Management
- Litigation
- Privacy, Cybersecurity, and Data Innovation
- Public Policy
- Sports Law
Credentials
Education:
- Stanford University - 2021 Juris Doctor
- University of Oxford - 2018 Doctor of Philosophy
- University of Oxford - 2015 Master of Science
- University of Arkansas, Fayetteville - 2013 Bachelor of Science
Admissions:
- Arkansas Bar
- Colorado Bar
- Minnesota Bar