In the early 1970s, after a short period in private practice, Fahner became an
Assistant U.S. Attorney in the
U.S. Attorney's Office for the Northern District of Illinois, serving under then-U.S. Attorney
James R. (Jim) Thompson. Fahner served on the firm's management committee from 1985 to 2007, and was its co-chairman from 1998 to 2001 and its chairman from 2001 to 2007. In 2015, Fahner wrote a letter to U.S. District Judge
Thomas M. Durkin urging a lenient sentence for former
House Speaker Dennis Hastert, who had pleaded guilty to unlawfully
structuring bank withdrawals to avoid
reporting requirements. (Hastert had made secret payments to a man whom he had
sexually abused decades earlier, when Hastert was a high school teacher and coach.) Fahner referred to Hastert as "a kind, strong, principled, and unselfish man" and wrote: "I urge the court to permit him to live the rest of his life in freedom with his family and friends, and all those who love and admire him." In the
2016 Republican Party presidential primaries, Fahner was a delegate pledged to the
presidential campaign of
Jeb Bush.
Memberships and board service In 1988,
Ronald Reagan appointed Fahner to the
Board of Foreign Scholarships, for a term ending in 1991. ==Personal life and death==