Sally Bergmann Hardesty is a corporate partner and a member of the firm’s Investment Management Group. Her practice focuses on advising sponsors of private equity funds, including buyout, venture, real estate and credit opportunities funds. Mrs. Hardesty’s recent experience includes acting for clients such as Blackstone Alternative Asset Management, Breakthrough Properties, Burford Capital, Clayton, Dubilier & Rice, EQT, Kelso & Company, KKR, Morgan Stanley, Odyssey Investment Partners, Pine Island Capital Partners, Sequoia Capital, Tishman Speyer and WeWork. Mrs. Hardesty also serves as Co-Chair of Diversity, Equity & Inclusion at the firm.

Mrs. Hardesty is recommended by Chambers Global (2024) and Chambers USA (2023), where clients note that she is “very sharp, practical” and “a tremendous legal adviser” who is “thoughtful, commercial and solution-oriented.” She has also received praise for her “unparalleled” client service, with sources saying that she is “very quick and knowledgeable” and “she always has her finger on the pulse.” She has also been named a Rising Star by Law360 (2023) and listed as a Rising Star for Investment Funds by IFLR1000 (2022). 

Mrs. Hardesty is a co-author of “Expect Fundraising Market To Grow More Competitive,” Law360 (August, 2022). She is also the author of “The Application of Conduit Theory in Interest Rate Swap Transactions: Schering-Plough Corporation v. United States,” 63 Tax. L. 437 (2010).

Mrs. Hardesty is a member of the 2022 Associate Leadership Institute Planning Committee for the NY City Bar Association’s Office of Diversity & Inclusion and was Debevoise’s 2019 Fellow for the Leadership Council on Legal Diversity. From 2009 to 2011, she served as a member of The Tax Lawyer.

Mrs. Hardesty joined Debevoise in 2011. She received a J.D. from the Georgetown University Law Center in 2011, and a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration from Washington University in St. Louis in 2008.