About McKenna Louise
McKenna Louise Cox built a legal career that moves from public service to private practice. She trained as an advocate in law school and has combined courtroom work with mediation and clinic coordination across more than two decades.
Cox earned her bachelor’s degree in English, Spanish and Latin American studies from Wofford College in 1999. She continued her studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, receiving a master’s in Romance languages and literature in 2002. She completed her legal training at the University of Tennessee College of Law, taking her J.D. in 2005 after concentrating on advocacy and law.
Her early legal work began at Legal Aid of East Tennessee, where she served as a staff lawyer starting in 2005. That experience kept her close to clients who relied on legal services for family and immigration matters. She moved into private practice over the following years, becoming a partner and owner at Cox and Lee, PLLC in 2012. Two years later she opened her own firm, serving as owner and managing lawyer of The Cox Firm from 2014 onward.
Across her career she has maintained active involvement in professional organizations. She holds memberships in the Tennessee Bar Association and the LGBT Bar Association and has been part of the American Immigration Lawyers Association and the Federal Bar Association’s Immigration Section since 2013. She coordinates Lawyers Helping People legal clinics, a role she began in 2009. In 2014 she served briefly as vice president of the Washington County Bar Association.
Cox is admitted to practice in Tennessee, and she holds admissions to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit and the Federal Circuit. She is also a Rule 31 Listed Family Mediator under the Tennessee Supreme Court, which permits her to handle court-referred family mediation matters.
Her work spans direct client representation, mediation and appellate filings in federal circuits when cases require it. She maintains an office listing with Herndon, Coleman, Brading and McKee, LLC alongside her practice. Her current practice emphasizes family and immigration matters.
