DLA Piper has signed on to represent Al Jazeera America Holdings, which last month announced a $100M deal to acquire Al Gore and Joel Hyatt’s Current TV.

The firm is to handle “informational communications regarding client’s cable TV channel,” according to its federal lobbying report.

Current TV is available in 60M U.S. households, while the Arab satellite TV network reaches about 5M American households.

DLA’s team is led by Ignacio Sanchez (co-chair of its government affairs group) and John Merrigan (co-chair federal law & public policy group) and includes Mark Paloletta (aide to President Bush I) and Matthew Bernstein (aide to the late Ohio Senator Howard Metzenbaum.)

Hyatt, who was Metzenbaum’s son-in-law, unsuccessfully ran for his seat in 1994.
AL Jazerra is owned by the government of Qatar.