Media savvy
Attorney Amanda Bush sharpens her focus on law – and on Fort Worth
– Anne E. Kornblut,
The Boston Globe, Aug. 8, 2004
For Amanda Bush, dealing with the media comes with the territory.
Soon after she announced her engagement to George Prescott Bush, son of Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and nephew of the president, reporters surrounded her parentsÂ’ home in San Angelo.
The media didnÂ’t miss a public moment from her very private wedding weekend in Kennebunkport, either: Jenna Bush, the presidentÂ’s daughter, caught a 38-inch striped bass, one paper reported, citing a family fishing expedition, and AmandaÂ’s bridesmaids wore orange gowns.
But flash forward almost three years, and one could say Amanda Bush, 29, has the media covered. An attorney at the Fort Worth office of Jackson Walker LLP, Bush, has taken on perhaps the most unlikely area of practice: media law.
“It’s been interesting working with the media, being in a political family,” Bush says. “A lot of times, people are thinking: ‘Wait – that seems contradictory!’”
The irony isnÂ’t lost on Bush. In fact, she revels in her niche at the firm: representing media clients on the defense side. ItÂ’s a specialty that wasnÂ’t taught in law school, she says, yet in just her second year of practicing it, has already yielded lifelong lessons.
“I’ve had to, being an only child and being from a small town, grow up real fast as far as understanding the media,” Bush says.
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“Perhaps looking to shave down the marital handicap, Bush keeps golf balls on hand and a putter leaning against the desk of his office, a spare, lawyerly nook overlooking downtown Dallas. (A job change is in his near future as he finalizes his move to the real estate investment firm Charter Holdings.) Photos of Mandi (blond, Dallas-Cowboy-cheerleader hot) and a Bose iPod stereo (he counts Whitey Ford and A Tribe Called Quest among his guilty pleasures) adorn the shelves.”
– Profile of George P. Bush, by Hudson Morgan, Men’s Vogue, August 2006
In 2000, the summer before she began law school at the University of Texas at Austin, Amanda Williams was kicking back, reading People magazine. The issue featured the magazineÂ’s Top 100 Eligible Bachelors. No. 4 caught her eye: George P. Bush.
“To be honest,” Amanda says, “I just kind of flipped through it, saw that he was going to UT [law school], and thought, ‘Oh, well, that’s neat.”
The two met during that first year in school, but didn’t become an item until their second year. George P. Bush, it seems, spent much of his first semester campaigning for, as Amanda calls him, “Uncle George.”
“He was gone so much of our first year campaigning, I don’t know how he did it,” Bush said. “He was gone, gosh, a lot of the first semester and during the Bush v. Gore legal battle. I was impressed that he was able to keep it all together and do well in everything.”
And it didnÂ’t take long for George to become impressed by Amanda. It was during their second year in law school, during a class called Trial Advocacy, that Bush asked Williams, an accomplished high school golfer, out on a golf date.
“The reality is that Mandi is a very attractive and intelligent woman with many would-be suitors,” George P. Bush recalled recently by e-mail. “Therefore, I knew I had to be patient and learn as much information as I could before asking her out.”
“He sat right behind me and he said, ‘We should go out sometime,” Amanda recalls. “And, you know, I wasn’t in law school to date anybody – no, I was real focused on getting my degree and getting out there. [But] he heard that I played golf in high school.
“I thought it would be fun and relaxed and then I beat him! I gave him nine strokes and I beat him by 10. It came down to the last hole.”
“I never believed in my wildest dreams that she would beat me,” George P. said. “She showed great poise and was unflappable.”
That first date led to a dinner date, and soon, Amanda says, she was taken by GeorgeÂ’s unique personality.
“I wasn’t sure what he’d be like and he’s actually the complete opposite of what I expected,” she says. “He’s the most modest, sweetest, most generous person in the world and he doesn’t have an ego at all.
“You see this handsome guy laying out in a magazine, and you think, ‘Oh, he’s got to have an ego,’ you know, but he doesn’t at all, which is why we’re best friends.”
After about six months of dating, George took Amanda to meet his grandparents, George H.W. and Barbara, at the annual Texas vs. Texas A&M Thanksgiving weekend football game.
“They were all in their maroon,” Amanda recalls, referring to the former president’s Aggie affiliation (A&M is home to his presidential library), “and I was in my orange.”
Oops. At least Amanda had something else going for her.
“As soon as they found out that I’m from West Texas, it was sort of like immediately, they welcomed me into their family,” Bush said. “George’s grandmother [says about me] that I have West Texas morals and values and I’m a good West Texas girl. And she and I have a lot in common. George’s grandmother and I are extremely close and we’re a lot alike, which George says is good – and bad! … I do mother him pretty well.”
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“Bush is vice president of Charter Holdings, a real estate investment company in Dallas. About six months ago, he moved to Fort Worth with his wife, Amanda Williams Bush, who is an attorney at Jackson Walker in Fort Worth.”
– Aman Batheja, Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Dec. 7, 2006
George P. and Amanda Bush arenÂ’t unlike many Metroplex couples, it turns out: Even the well-connected struggle with the commuting conundrum. After living in Dallas for three years, with Amanda commuting to her job at Jackson Walker in the D.R. Horton Tower in downtown Fort Worth, the couple decided recently to move to Fort Worth. Now, itÂ’s GeorgeÂ’s turn to commute. But itÂ’s a good trade-off, the Bushes say.
“[Fort Worth] really is a fascinating city with a bright future ahead of it,” George P. Bush says. “It’s … great to live in a city [that] has a centrally located financial and cultural district that promotes a sense of community, which is rare and unique.”
Amanda agrees, adding that Fort Worth is more laid-back.
“For whatever reason, you know, we have the same schedule that we had in Dallas, but we find that we actually spend more time here together,” Amanda says.
That is, when she isnÂ’t working. Jackson Walker, a firm of 20 attorneys, keeps Bush quite busy. And her colleagues are happy to do so.
“Amanda is a very hard worker and very bright,” says her mentor, Chip Babcock, a partner at Jackson Walker who specializes in media law. “She seems to understand the industry. She appreciates the issues of freedom of speech … not all attorneys do.”
Bush proudly highlights her work on one case that she worked on with Babcock and another Jackson Walker attorney, Bob Latham. In Gamal Abdel-Hafiz v. ABC, et al., the attorneys successfully defended their client, ABC Television. An FBI agent had asserted that a Prime Time Live report had made false statements about his character.
“We filed a motion for summary judgment,” Babcock says, “and the judge granted our motion.”
Increasingly, Fort Worth offers more opportunities in the niche law field.
“A lot of people think, ‘Media law, don’t you have to be in New York to practice media law?’” Bush says. “But you’d be surprised, even New York companies get sued in state court, federal court, all the time. There’s more media law in Fort Worth than you’d think.”
The Bushes are finding that Fort Worth has more to offer, as well.
“I love Fort Worth,” Amanda says. “We’ve gotten very involved here, and you know, Fort Worth has opened up its arms to us.”
Bush is serving her first year on the boards of the Fort Worth Symphony and the Van Cliburn Foundation. Music is one of her passions, she says. In addition, both Amanda and George serve on the Barbara Bush Foundation for Family LiteracyÂ’s Celebration of Reading in Dallas, and Amanda is currently a national spokeswoman for the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation.
With challenging jobs, a warm home and a full social calendar, the Bushes, who live on the cityÂ’s west side, are happy to stay put.
“Everyone’s so cordial in Fort Worth,” Bush says. “We go to the museums and there’s lots and lots to do here. I think in Dallas, we got kind of into a rut. So far, it’s been a good move.
“[It’s] our intent to stay here. We love it here, but you never know where life’s going to take you … I think the more you get involved in the community, the more that you want to stay. You build friendships and workships – we never really did that in Dallas so much, so it wasn’t too hard for us to leave Dallas. But now that we’ve made a lot of friends here, and we’re getting really active, I think it would get hard to leave.”
Contact Caplan at acaplan@bizpress.net
