Lee Berger

Lee Berger focuses on antitrust law, including civil enforcement, private litigation, criminal investigations, compliance advice, and mergers. Lee has experience working on cases focused on industries such as real estate; telecom; media and entertainment; esports; health care; energy; consumer technology; automotive; finance; travel; and agriculture.

Before joining Steptoe, Lee served as the inaugural Chief of the Civil Conduct Task Force, Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice, where he supervised or advised on the majority of the Division's civil conduct enforcement investigations and litigations, and counseled the Division leadership on issues concerning civil conduct enforcement. As Chief, he created many policies that continue to drive the effectiveness and efficiency of the Division's civil conduct enforcement agenda today.

Lee's extensive government experience included a focus on the telecom, media, and entertainment industries earlier in his career, when he served as a trial attorney in what was at the time called the Media, Entertainment, and Professional Services Section of the DOJ's Antitrust Division. Some of the more notable cases he worked on at the Antitrust Division include leading two investigations into civil conduct violations in the broadcast television industry, as well as investigations of the two largest-ever broadcast television station group mergers. He also was a key attorney on the investigation and litigation of Live Nation and Ticketmaster's compliance with a 2010 consent decree, as well as the investigation of the Disney/Fox merger. He sat on a high-profile panel of television, cable, and digital media executives as the sole Antitrust Division representative at the 2019 Public Workshop on Competition in Television and Digital Advertising. Prior to his government service, Lee was a lawyer at two international law firms, where he specialized in price-fixing and other coordinated-conduct litigations.

Lee is a frequent speaker on antitrust issues and has long been involved in the California Lawyers Association, where he has served in a variety of roles including current advisor and past chair of the Antitrust & Unfair Competition Section, Secretary of the Board of Directors, and Chair of the Governance Committee.