Ryan Ray
Lobbyist Chris Moya is pulling in his shingle and joining national lobbying firm Jones Walker LLP, a source close to the move confirmed to SaintPetersBlog.
Moya, along with Emily Buckley, is set to finalize the deal and begin lobbying for Jones Walker on Monday.
Moya brings with him a lucrative book of boutique business built on his connections to the Miami and international political communities.
Moya, a former staffer at the Florida Division of Elections, founded his firm in 1999. Since then, he has developed a client list that includes many of the state’s most powerful interests: State Farm Insurance, the Seminole Tribe of Florida, and Dosal Tobacco. Moya has also been a leading advocate for charter schools.
The firm Moya’s joining was founded in 1937 by one-time Harry S. Truman speechwriter Joseph Merrick Jones and is one of the largest law firms in the nation. Jones, Walker, Waechter, Poitevent, Carrère & Denègre L.L.P is a 375-attorney national firm with one of the best gaming practices in the legal community, which is part of the reason why it hired in 2013 leading Florida gaming lobbyist Marc Dunbar.
Jones Walker advocates for such national heavyweights as Chevron, General Electric, and the Port of New Orleans. Jones Walker works with AT&T as well, a mega-client also represented in Florida by Moya last year.
Moya, a former adviser to U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, is a close ally of fellow Miami native Lt. Gov. Carlos López-Cantera and brings a great deal of South Florida savvy and connections with him to Tallahassee.
Under Moya’s leadership, The Moya Group revenues grew to nearly $500,000 per quarter.
Buckley joined the group by way of stops at the Florida House, the Executive Office of the governor, Southern Strategy Group, and the James Madison Institute.
