North America Tax News and Developments – March 2020

Christopher H. Hanna joined Baker McKenzie as Counsel in January 2019. He is the Alan D. Feld Endowed Professor of Law and the Altshuler Distinguished Teaching Professor at Southern Methodist University. Professor Hanna has been a visiting professor at the University of Texas School of Law, the University of Florida College of Law, the University of Tokyo School of Law and a visiting scholar at the Harvard Law School and the Japanese Ministry of Finance. In 1998, Professor Hanna served as a consultant in residence to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) in Paris. From June 2000 until April 2001, he assisted the US Joint Committee on Taxation in its complexity study of the US tax system and, from May 2002 until February 2003, he assisted the Joint Committee in its study of Enron, and upon completion of the study, continued to serve as a consultant to the Joint Committee on tax legislation. From May 2011 until December 31, 2018, he served as Senior Policy Advisor for Tax Reform (Republican staff) to the United States Senate Committee on Finance, working extensively on the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017.

Joshua D. Odintz is a partner in and on the management committee of Baker McKenzie’s North American Tax Practice Group. Joshua held high-level government positions with both the US Department of the Treasury and the Senate Finance Committee. He previously served as a Senior Advisor for Tax Reform to the Assistant Secretary at the US Department of the Treasury, where he advised Senior Treasury officials on tax reform options and issues. Joshua also served as the Chief Tax Counsel to the President’s National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, and was instrumental in formulating the tax proposals that were contained in the Commission’s report, entitled the Moment of Truth. Additionally, Joshua served as the Acting Tax Legislative Counsel at the Treasury. Joshua is a frequent speaker at IFA, TEI, ABA Tax Section, NY State Bar Tax Section, Practicing Law Institute and Federal Bar Association tax meetings and conferences.

Steven R. Schneider is a partner in Baker McKenzie's Washington, DC office, and leads the Firm's passthroughs tax group. He started his career as a lawyer in the IRS' national office and has had many years of national-level law firm and Big-4 accounting firm experience. Mr. Schneider also previously chaired the ABA Partnership Tax Committee. He has been teaching an advanced tax course on drafting partnership and LLC agreements at Georgetown University Law Center since 2005, is a regular speaker at national tax venues, and has published numerous articles on tax for Taxes: The Tax Magazine, Tax Notes, Bloomberg BNA and Journal of Taxation, among many others.

Dinh Tran is an associate in the Firm's Tax group in Washington, DC. She advises clients on domestic & international transactional tax matters within the context of mergers and acquisitions, divisions, restructurings, formations, joint ventures, refinancing, and syndications. Dinh represents business clients before the IRS, particularly those seeking private letter rulings and those who are under examination or before IRS Appeals. Prior to joining the Firm, Dinh worked at the Washington National office of a public accounting firm and served as an attorney-advisor at the IRS Office of Chief Counsel, Passthroughs and Special Industries, where she focused on partnership taxation. Also, Dinh previously served as an attorney-advisor to the Honorable Elizabeth Crewson Paris of the United States Tax Court. In addition to practicing tax law, Dinh is currently teaching an ethics course in the taxation program at Georgetown University Law Center.

Patricia W. McDonald advises on tax issues for corporations, partnerships, limited liability companies and other pass-through entities, with an emphasis on private equity and other investment fund transactions, energy credit transactions, partnership transactions, real estate/REIT transactions and M&A transactions. She lectures on international and partnership tax issues for various organizations, including Tax Executives Institute and Council for International Tax Education. Her native language is Cantonese and she is conversant in Mandarin.

Maher Haddad is a partner in Baker McKenzie’s Global Tax Practice Group in Chicago. He has been advising various US and multinational clients on tax planning matters since 2007. Mr. Haddad provides tax structuring advice to corporations, partnerships, limited liability companies, and other pass-through entities.

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Paul DePasquale is a partner in Baker McKenzie's Tax and Global Wealth Management practice groups in New York. He advises individuals and multinational entities on international and domestic tax planning, cross-border transactions and investments, and wealth management. He also advises financial institutions on regulatory, compliance and strategy matters. Paul previously worked in the Firm's Zurich and Hong Kong offices. He is a frequent speaker and writer on international tax compliance and information reporting.

Brandon King is an associate in Baker McKenzie’s Tax Practice Group in Washington, DC. He focuses on tax controversy and tax planning. Prior to joining the Firm, Brandon was a law clerk for the Honorable Albert G. Lauber at the United States Tax Court. He also served as a Presidential Personnel Associate in the Obama administration, where he was the tax advisor on the vetting team for presidential nominations.

Jacque Titus is an associate in the North America Tax Practice Group and resides in the Firm's Dallas Office. She advises US and multinational companies on domestic and international tax planning and transactions.

Michelle Ng is an associate in Baker McKenzie's Palo Alto office, where she advises multinational corporations on domestic and international tax planning.

Trevor Mauck is a member of the Firm’s North America Tax Practice Group in the New York office and practices in the area of tax planning and tax controversy.

Maria P. Eberle is a member of the Firm’s Tax Group in New York and she also serves as chair of the SALT subpractice group. She advises multinational companies on a full range of state and local tax matters, including tax controversy and litigation. Before joining Baker McKenzie, Ms. Eberle was a partner at an international law firm, where she concentrated on state and local tax matters. In addition, she was previously a manager of multistate tax services at a Big Four accounting firm where she advised individual and corporate clients on a variety of state and local tax issues. Ms. Eberle has also served as an adjunct professor of law at Quinnipiac University School of Law, where she taught a course on state and local tax. In 2019 Maria was recognized by Law360 as a Rising Star in the field of Tax. Chambers USA has also named Maria as a Leading Lawyer (State and Local Tax: New York, 2019) and International Tax Review recognizes Maria in their annual Women in Tax Leaders Guide (2016-2019).

Claudine Fox is a senior tax advisor in Baker McKenzie's Washington office. Claudine is a chartered accountant and before joining the firm in 2017, Claudine worked in the international tax services and transaction tax groups of Big 4 accounting firms for 9 years.