California attorney to be senior adviser to Biden’s energy secretary

California attorney to be senior adviser to Biden’s energy secretary

A California attorney with a long history in state and national politics is joining President Joe Biden’s administration.

Karen E. Skelton will become a senior adviser to Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm. Skelton spent the last decade as founder and CEO of Skelton Strategies, a boutique political consulting firm that works on environmental, economic and women’s health issues.

Skelton was Gov. Jerry Brown’s director of strategic partnerships at the Global Climate Action Summit. She spent years as an adviser to former California first lady Maria Shriver. Skelton was also political director for Vice President Al Gore, deputy political director to President Bill Clinton, and worked in the U.S. Department of Justice. She graduated from UC Berkeley Law School, but is on inactive status with the California State Bar.

In 2018, she worked with Attorney General Xavier Becerra, Stanford Law School and others to create Lawyers for a Sustainable Economy. According to that organization’s most recent annual report, in 2020 it coordinated $23 million in pro bono work by attorneys at 14 major law firms, advising nonprofits and entrepreneurs about legal issues related to sustainability.

Another appointment last week could have implications for California’s technology industry. Biden named Tim Wu an adviser on technology and competition. The Columbia Law School professor is a privacy and antitrust expert who has advocated breaking up Facebook Inc. He is credited with having invented the term “net neutrality” in 2003.

— Malcolm MacLachlan