Paul Schmidt is chairman of BakerHostetler, serving as our chief executive officer and as chair of the Policy Committee, BakerHostetler’s governing board. Paul is responsible for directing client service, practice delivery and operations, and he oversees our practice and office leaders as well as the functional department heads. Paul guides BakerHostetler with initiatives grounded in the 2020 Strategic Plan, a firm growth and development roadmap of which he was a primary architect. He is a sought-after speaker and commenter on legal industry trends and law firm leadership and is a trusted advisor to clients on risk management, global expansion and international taxation.
In addition to steering BakerHostetler’s strategic priorities, Paul leads by example, staying true to our mission to partner with clients and provide them with timely, responsive and high-quality solutions. He drives our culture of collegiality and inclusion, and his transformative approach to leadership has enhanced the health and welfare of personnel at all levels.
Prior to becoming firm chair, Paul spent 10 years leading BakerHostetler’s national Tax Practice Group and 16 years leading the International Tax team. He previously served as legislation counsel to the U.S. Congress Joint Committee on Taxation and was a partner at a Big Four accounting firm. This experience allowed him to hone his abilities to advocate for and motivate others and build team consensus to achieve goals.
Paul’s legal experience as a tax practitioner revolves around the needs of domestic and multinational companies for sophisticated tax counsel in two principal areas: tax implications related to transactions and controversies. He has worked with private equity clients, hedge funds and publicly traded partnerships, along with both publicly traded and privately held industrial, technology, energy, agriculture, commodities, hospitality and healthcare businesses, on all facets of taxation. Paul’s primary focus is on international taxation, and he advises clients on technical and policy issues in connection with tax reform, transfer pricing, treaties, permanent establishments, U.S. trade and business, subpart F, foreign tax credits, GILTI, FDII, BEAT, inversions, and global debt and hedging issues. He frequently advocates for clients before the Internal Revenue Service as well as at the Treasury Department and on Capitol Hill.
Most of Paul’s client matters involve confidential counseling; they are rarely publicly reported but include work for clients such as The Carlyle Group, ExxonMobil, Wyndham Hotel Group, Travel & Leisure Co., Archer Daniels Midland, Lincoln Electric, STERIS, Sherwin-Williams, Parker Hannifin and the Las Vegas Sands.
Paul is a member of the Bloomberg Tax U.S. International Advisory Board, the GW/IRS Annual Institute on Taxation Advisory Board, and the Parker Fielder Oil and Gas Tax Conference Planning Committee, and previously served as the U.S. vice chair of the American Bar Association Tax Section Foreign Lawyers Forum and as chair of the AICPA International Technical Resource Panel. For more than a decade, he taught international tax as an adjunct professor of law at the Georgetown University Law Center. Paul is also a member of the Economic Club of Washington.
Paul gives back to the community by serving on the Boys & Girls Club of America’s National Board of Governors since 2019 and as co-chair of its Government Relations Committee since 2022.
Planning and Transactions
- Advising a non-U.S. based company on the substantial acquisition of a U.S. automobile manufacturing business, including debt financing issues, withholding tax and treaty issues, permanent establishment issues and post-acquisition integration.
- Advising a U.S. private equity fund manager in connection with transfer pricing issues relating to certain services and cost reimbursements relating to a Chinese investment advisory structure.
Controversy
- Representing a U.S. agri-business in connection with an IRS Appeal regarding a dispute around research and experimentation credit claims.
- Representing a U.S. farming business in tax litigation surrounding an accounting methods issue.