Overview
Brett’s practice focuses on employment class actions, wage and hour class and collective actions, complex public accommodations litigation, and state and federal agency pattern or practice actions. For more than thirty years, Michael Brett Burns has represented leading employers and management, particularly in the retail industry, in a wide range of employment and public accommodations-related matters. Brett, a partner in the labor and employment practice at Hunton Andrews Kurth, focuses on complex litigation matters, and regularly defends clients in employment class actions, wage and hour class, collective, and representative actions, public accommodations litigation, and federal agency pattern or practice matters (including lawsuits filed by the U.S. Department of Justice, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, and state attorneys general).
Brett has led the defense teams for more than 180 class, collective, representative, and pattern or practice actions, tried complex collective actions and pattern or practice cases to juries, and secured verdicts for clients in multiple single-plaintiff jury trials, bench trials, and arbitrations.
In addition to his litigation and arbitration practice, Brett counsels clients on litigation avoidance strategies and on creative solutions for complicated employment, wage and hour, and public accommodation law challenges. He has earned national recognition for his work from Chambers USA (2021 to present), Benchmark Litigation (2018 to present), Legal 500 US (2021 to present), the California Daily Journal (2021 “Top Labor & Employment Lawyers”), and others. He is a member of the American Employment Law Council and several other legal organizations.
