It seems that Activision has a type. After hiring former George W. Bush-era counterterrorism appointee Frances F. Townsend and controversial Trump administration member Brian Bulatao in March, the mega-publisher has now rounded out its ranks with a third ex-member of a Republican Presidential administration: former George W. Bush White House lawyer Grant Dixton.
Activision disclosed the hiring in a securities filing yesterday, noting that previous chief legal officer Chris Walther “will be succeeded by Grant Dixton, who will be joining the Company from The Boeing Company, where he serves as Senior Vice President, General Counsel & Corporate Secretary and a member of the Executive Council.” Activision did not mention Dixton’s previous three-year post as associate counsel to the President of the United States.
Compared to Townsend, who now also works on the legal side of things for Activision, and Bulatao, who is now the company’s chief administrative officer, Dixton seems to have kept a lower public profile. While Townsend gained a reputation as a torture apologist and Bulatao a “bully” in their respective previous positions, Dixton’s most notable headline-grabbing moment occurred in 2005 when he went after The Onion — which you might recognise from this very G/O Media network of sites — for using the Presidential seal in one of its satirical articles.
“I’m surprised the President deems it wise to spend taxpayer money for his lawyer to write letters to The Onion,” then-editor in chief Scott Dikkers wrote to Dixton at the time, according to The New York Times (via some guy).
It remains to be seen if Dixton will go after satirical sites that use the Call of Duty logo with similar rigour.
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