In a recent interview, Mary Jo White, a former Chair of the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York talked about the SEC\u2019s lawsuit against Ripple Labs.<\/p>\n
Ms. White is currently a litigation partner in the New York office of Debevoise & Plimpton, and \u201cleader of the firm\u2019s Strategic Crisis Response and Solutions Group.\u201d<\/p>\n
According to her bio, before joining Debevoise in 2017, she served for almost four years as Chair of the SEC. She was \u201cnominated by President Obama to lead the SEC and was one of the Commission\u2019s longest-serving Chairs.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ms. White is \u201crecognized by\u00a0The Legal 500 US\u00a0(2020) and by\u00a0Securities Docket\u2019s\u00a02020 \u2018Enforcement 40,\u2019 their list of the 40 best securities enforcement defense lawyers in the business.\u201d Furthermore, Ms. White is a Fellow in the American College of Trial Lawyers and the International College of Trial Lawyers. She has received numerous awards and is \u201cregularly ranked as a leading lawyer by directories that evaluate law firms.\u201d<\/p>\n
As you may remember, on 22 December 2020, the SEC\u00a0announced\u00a0that it had \u201cfiled an action against Ripple Labs\u00a0Inc. and two of its executives, who are also significant security holders, alleging that they raised over $1.3 billion through an unregistered, ongoing digital asset securities offering.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Ripple will be defended by two former SEC officials: White, who is the senior chair, and Andrew J. Ceresney, who served from April 2013 to December 2016 as the Director of Enforcement of the SEC. Ceresney is a partner in the New York office of Debevoise and Co-Chair of the firm\u2019s Litigation Department.<\/p>\n
White\u2019s comments came during an interview earlier this month with Fortune.<\/p>\n
White believes unequivocally that the SEC is wrong to go after Ripple for the sale of XRP tokens becuase in her view XRP is a currency and not a security.<\/p>\n
She told Fortune:<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s no way to sugarcoat it. They\u2019re dead wrong legally and factually<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n She criticizes former SEC Chair Jay Clayton for getting the SEC to file its lawsuit against Ripple on his last day at office:<\/p>\n