Breaking the Ice: Feeding Our Future prosecutor joins Ballard Spahr

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Matthew Ebert, who helped lead the federal government’s prosecution in the Feeding Our Future fraud case, is now a litigator in Ballard Spahr‘s Minneapolis office.

Ebert, a former assistant U.S. attorney in the District of Minnesota, had more than a decade of experience in trying high-profile cases before he joined Ballard Spahr in October. That included the Feeding Our Future case, involving 75 defendants and the theft of $250 million intended to feed low-income children in the country’s largest pandemic-related fraud.

That effort “reinforced how much I value being part of a thoughtful, high-performing team,” Ebert said. “Trying the lead defendants to verdict was a shared achievement and the culmination of our collective efforts to bring justice and accountability to those responsible for the Feeding Our Future fraud.”

Ebert sought a federal prosecutor’s role because he “wanted to do legal public service work at the highest level, where the goal is justice, not just winning.”

His trial and prosecution experience, Ebert said, “enable me to strengthen Ballard Spahr’s trial, enforcement and investigations teams and to offer clients practical judgment shaped by having been a decision-maker on the other side.”

Ebert last year received the Attorney General’s Award for Distinguished Service, the U.S. Justice Department’s second-highest award.

Name: Matthew Ebert

Title: Of counsel, Ballard Spahr, Minneapolis

Education: B.A., government, Georgetown University; J.D., University of Minnesota Law School

Q: Best way to start a conversation with you?

A: That’s easy: family. It’s always great to converse with others about the most important people in our lives.

Q: Why law school?

A: I wanted to be an advocate and a problem-solver.

Q: What are you reading?

A: “Autocracy, Inc.” by Anne Applebaum, which offers a sobering assessment of how anti-democratic regimes throughout the world are gaining traction though disinformation, violence and efforts to erode institutional checks. Her book is a timely reminder that now, more than ever, it’s so important for all of us to meet these challenges by embracing our country’s foundational commitment to democratic principles like due process, equal protection, free expression, and checks and balances.

Q: Pet peeve?

A: People who are late. Even worse? People who make me late!

Q: Best part of your work?

A: Constantly learning new things and meeting new people, both of which I love getting to do.

Q: Most challenging?

A: It can be hard to strike the right balance of your time and attention when you have competing short-term and long-term tasks and responsibilities.

Q: Favorite activity away from work?

A: Traveling with my wife and our three kids. We try to focus on family trips that emphasize history and hiking. We try to hit at least one new National Park each year.

Q: Where would you take someone visiting your hometown?

A: My hometown, Hills, Minnesota, has about 600 people, so there are not a ton of options. But I would take a visitor to a small lake in my hometown where I spent a lot of time as a kid swimming, fishing, and walking our dogs.

Q: Legal figure you admire?

A: Robert H. Jackson was an important legal figure who served as the U.S. Attorney General, a U.S. Supreme Court Justice and the Chief U.S. Prosecutor at the Nuremberg Trials. He paired brilliant legal thinking with integrity and moral clarity, and is a great example of someone who demonstrated how legal authority can be exercised with both restraint and principle. I admire Robert Jackson even more because he rose to these prominent legal heights despite lacking a formal legal education.

Q: Misconception about your work?

A: That it is static or boring. There are always new legal issues and new practice methods emerging, all of which makes for a job that is far more dynamic — and, yes, even fun at times — than people realize.

Q: Favorite book, movie or TV show about lawyers?

A: For movies about lawyers, it’s hard to top “My Cousin Vinny.” For books, “The Informant” by Kurt Eichenwald is a fascinating and true caper that reveals the good, the bad and the ugly when it comes to government investigations and corporate crime.