Powerhouse attorney Robert B. Barnett dies

NEW YORK (AP) — Robert B. Barnett, a powerhouse Washington attorney who became a fixture in the political and publishing worlds as the literary representative for Barack and Michelle Obama, Bill and Hillary Clinton and dozens of other leaders, has died at age 79.

One of Barnett’s partners at Williams & Connolly, Michael F. O’Connor, told The Associated Press that he died Thursday night at Sibley Memorial Hospital of an “undisclosed illness.” Additional details were not immediately available.

“He was a dear friend, a trusted advisor, and a wise, faithful, and steadfast guide to the publishing and entertainment worlds,” the Clintons said in a statement Friday.

A stocky, raspy-voiced man with tortoiseshell glasses, antique cuff links and a knack for being both forthright and discrete, Bob Barnett embodied an era when it was possible to work freely with both Democrats and Republicans, when politics could stop at the edge of a good book deal. He was a longtime Democrat, working on Jimmy Carter’s 1976 campaign and helping Bill Clinton and other candidates in debate preparation. But he would broker contracts for such a wide range of political figures that he liked to joke that should his clients all gather in one room the result would be “World War III.”

He was a partner at the high-end Williams & Connolly, and for more than 20 years no one approached his stature as an intermediary between the Washington elite and New York publishers. From the early 1990s through the end of the Obama administration, in 2017, Barnett represented three consecutive presidents and first ladies — the Clintons, George W. and Laura Bush and the Obamas — and much of the remaining A-list political players, from Ted Kennedy and Mitch McConnell to Dick Cheney and Alan Greenspan, from Paul Ryan and Donald Rumsfeld to Al Franken and Elizabeth Warren.

Barnett was called upon so often by politicians leaving office that he became known as “the doorman to Washington’s revolving door.”

He was not an agent, he liked to point out, but an attorney who billed clients by the hour instead of receiving a percentage of royalties. It was a unique business arrangement that priced out the average writer, but well rewarded Obama, the Clintons and others who landed multimillion-dollar deals.

The general public could have made good money betting on Barnett’s authors to prevail in elections. In six consecutive presidential races, from 1992-2012, a current or future Barnett client was elected, often defeating a non-Barnett client.

“He’s one of the sagest advisers I’ve ever been able to call upon,” Republican strategist Karl Rove, a Barnett client and top aide to George W. Bush, told Politico in 2017. “He has counseled me on every professional decision I’ve made.”

Barnett also handled negotiations for media executives and reporters (Roger Ailes, Bob Woodward, Chris Wallace), musical superstars (Elton John, Barbra Streisand), business leaders (Jack Welch, Phil Knight), international leaders (former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, Queen Noor of Jordan) and one of the world’s best-selling novelists, James Patterson. For years, he was not only representing presidents, but Jake Tapper, Brit Hume and other White House reporters who covered them. One of the best-selling political novels in recent years, “The President Is Missing,” was a collaboration conceived by Barnett for Patterson and Bill Clinton.

His political winning streak ended after 2016 when non-client Donald Trump defeated Hillary Clinton. He was disdainful of Trump and eventually overtaken by the Creative Artists Agency and such younger Washington players as the Javelin literary agency. Even some who fell out with Trump, including former FBI Director James Comey and former national security adviser John Bolton, chose others for book deals.

Asked in 2012 by the British law firm Chamber Associates how he wanted to be remembered, Barnett responded: “‘He was loyal, kept confidences, and tried his best. He was a good husband, father, grandfather, counselor, and friend.”