Jerry E. Holmes

Senior Counsel

Jerry E. Holmes is senior counsel in Morgan Lewis's Employee Benefits and Executive Compensation Practice. He concentrates his practice in the fringe benefits and payroll tax area, and has specific experience in issues that directly impact every employer and employee in the United States, such as information reporting, wage withholding, working condition fringe benefits, employee discounts, wage minimization techniques, and worker classification issues.

Mr. Holmes previously worked in the Washington, D.C. office of an international law firm, where he was a member of its Tax Department. Prior to that, Mr. Holmes was Chief of Branch 2, Office of the Associate Chief Counsel—Tax Exempt and Government Entities (TEGE) at the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). In this capacity he worked on or oversaw every major initiative involving employment tax, fringe benefits, and worker classification issues for the past 15 years. Similarly, he was involved in all major litigation initiatives involving these practice areas for the past decade. During his tenure with the IRS, he was recognized within the IRS, the Treasury Department, the Social Security Administration, and the Tax Division of the Department of Justice, and among state social security administrators, as the IRS’s foremost authority on these issues.

The TEGE division, of which Mr. Holmes was Branch Chief, provides the full array of IRS National Office legal services on matters involving qualified and nonqualified deferred compensation, cafeteria plans, independent contractor arrangements, employee leasing, welfare benefits, fringe benefits, exempt organizations, and employment taxes. Under Mr. Holmes leadership, this branch was the first in the IRS to become fully integrated, with both the technical and field service functions aggregated.

Mr. Holmes frequently speaks on and is involved with educational efforts in both the private and public sectors. Along with IRS staff attorneys, he conducted seminars and continuing education courses for IRS agents and appeals officers in every region of the United States. Mr. Holmes and members of his branch were the primary National Office fringe benefits and employment tax liaisons to the Information Reporting Program Advisory Committee (IRPAC), the Office of Employment Tax Administration and Compliance (OETAC), the Social Security Administration, and the state social security administration offices. His technical and IRS training experience, and his reputation within both the IRS and the Tax Division of the Department of Justice, are important assets to tax controversy matters, especially the litigation of fringe benefits, payroll tax, and independent contractor issues.

Mr. Holmes is admitted to practice in the District of Columbia and Maryland.