David G. Walsh, a partner with Foley & Lardner and former managing partner, is a member of the firm’s Government & Public Affairs Practice and the Sports Industry Team. He has represented communications entities for over 30 years, developing particular skill in cable television and telecommunications law. He has assisted cable television companies and competitive local exchange carriers in all aspects of their business, including corporate structuring, franchising, and facility siting. Significant firm clients in the telecommunications and cable television areas include Charter Communications, Inc., TDS Telecom, Inc., Bresnan Communications, Inc., and TDS Metrocom, Inc.
Mr. Walsh has served as primary counsel in a number of significant litigations involving telecommunications law, including successful challenges to municipal and state regulation of the cable television industry and telephony issues requiring interpretations of the recently passed federal telecommunications law.
Mr. Walsh also counsels and represents business clients in all phases of business activity including the restructuring of reorganized entities. An experienced litigator, he is admitted to practice in Wisconsin, the U.S. District Courts for the Eastern and Western Districts of Wisconsin, the U.S. Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals, and the U.S. Supreme Court.
Mr. Walsh has an extensive estate planning practice and counsels clients and families on business succession and wealth management and transfer.
Mr. Walsh has served as chairman of the Wisconsin State Elections Board, is a member and former secretary of the Dane County Bar Association, is a member of the Board of Directors of National Guardian Life Insurance Company, Alkar-RapidPak, Inc. and is president of the University of Wisconsin System Board of Regents. He served as a member of the firm’s Management Committee from 1993 – 2002. He is listed among The Best Lawyers in America®.
Mr. Walsh received his bachelor’s degree, with honors, in 1965 from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and in 1997 received the Distinguished Business Alumnus Award from the University’s School of Business. His J.D. degree was conferred in 1970 by Harvard Law School.