Don Cruse

Legal Experience

I have fought for clients big and small, in disputes about money as well as their fundamental rights. Over my career, I have worked at a well-regarded corporate law firm, for a state attorney general, and as a judicial law clerk.

I was privileged to begin my career with a one-year clerkship at the Texas Supreme Court, which is Texas's highest court for civil cases. Law clerks help the Court evaluate which of the roughly one thousand petitions filed each year should be granted and also help the Justices write their ultimate opinions.

After that, I worked as a litigator for Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, a prominent New York law firm. While at Wachtell, I worked on a variety of high-stakes commercial disputes. The cases involved complex questions of contract law, insurance coverage, business torts, securities fraud, bankruptcy, antitrust law, and federal regulatory investigations. I was a member of the trial team in IBP, Inc. v. Tyson Foods, a landmark merger case in the Delaware Court of Chancery, and I also worked on the property-insurance lawsuit filed to help rebuild the World Trade Center. Because of my background in technology, I enjoyed my cases involving internet domain names, trademark law, and copyright.

In 2003, I returned to Texas to serve in the Office of Solicitor in the Texas Office of the Attorney General, which handles the State’s most significant appellate cases. As an Assistant Solicitor General, I personally argued before the Texas Supreme Court, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, and several Texas state appellate courts, and I also filed written briefs in the United States Supreme Court.

In the Texas Supreme Court, my cases included Reata Construction Co. v. City of Dallas, an important case about sovereign immunity in contract cases; NCAA v. Yeo, a case about the due process rights afforded to student athletes; and Texas A&M University v. Koseoglu, a procedural case about suing state officials for breach of a settlement agreement.

In the Fifth Circuit, I was lead counsel for the State of Texas in Allstate v. Abbott, in which Allstate hired former solicitor general Kenneth Starr to attack a state law that limits its expansion into the auto-repair business. I also served as lead counsel in Equal Access for El Paso v. Hawkins, a broad challenge to the equity of Texas's Medicaid system.

In 2007, I left OSG to represent private clients by establishing an appellate practice in Austin, Texas.

Educational Background

Don was born and raised in Arlington, Texas, where he attended Martin High School. He moved to Austin to attend the University of Texas, where he earned bachelors degrees in economics and in mathematics. He is an honors graduate of UT Law School, where he was an associate editor on the Texas Law Review, received the Order of the Coif, and was elected to the Order of Barristers and the Friar Society.