American Bar Association Sues Trump Over Executive Orders Against Law Firms
WASHINGTON — The American Bar Association is suing the Trump administration over the president’s recent executive orders retaliating against law firms that opposed his policies.
The lawsuit filed Monday in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., says Trump’s orders that have the effect of curtailing the law firms’ government contracts or ban their attorneys from federal buildings interfere with constitutional rights of the law firms and their clients.
The law firms targeted for reprisal sometimes represented clients who were suing the federal government or were political adversaries of Trump. They include nine of the nation’s largest, such as Perkins Coie, Covington & Burling, Jenner & Block, and Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison.
A Paul Weiss attorney helped the Manhattan district attorney prosecute Trump and his business empire for fraud in a civil trial that led to a $464 million judgment against the president last year. Trump is appealing.
The only way the law firms could get the sanctions against them lifted was by agreeing to do pro bono work for causes favored by Trump and Republicans.
Trump’s threats and punishments have compelled law firms to “abandon clients, causes and policy decisions the president does not like,” says the lawsuit. The result has been a “blizzard-like chill” across the legal profession on which clients the law firms will represent, the lawsuit says.
The president coerced some of the firms into agreements to perform nearly $1 billion in free legal work for conservative causes.
Some of the concessions the law firms have made included eliminating their in-house diversity, equity and inclusion programs.
Other firms, such as Perkins Coie, refused to make concessions. Instead, they sued to block the executive orders.
Two federal judges issued injunctions in May against the orders imposed on Perkins Coie and Jenner & Block. One of the court rulings described Trump’s orders as unconstitutional and “motivated by retaliation.”
Perkins Coie performed legal work for the campaign of Hillary Clinton during the 2016 presidential race.
“Using the powers of the federal government to target lawyers for their representation of clients and avowed progressive employment policies in an overt attempt to suppress and publish certain viewpoints, however, is contrary to the Constitution, which requires that the government respond to dissenting or unpopular speech or ideas with ‘tolerance, not coercion,’” said the ruling from U.S. District Court Judge Beryl Howell.
Many of the arguments made by Perkins Coie were reflected in the American Bar Association’s lawsuit.
It argues that Trump’s executive orders violate First Amendment free speech rights because the law firms were threatened for “engaging in speech the government disfavors.”
The ABA also says the president violated the separation of powers required by the Constitution to balance the authorities of government. In this case, it would be the judicial branch of government as opposed to the executive branch.
“Without skilled lawyers to bring and argue cases — and to do so by advancing the interests of their clients without fear of reprisal from the government — the judiciary cannot function as a meaningful check on executive overreach,” the ABA lawsuit says.
A White House press statement responded to the ABA lawsuit by calling it “clearly frivolous.”
“The president has always had discretion over which contracts the government enters into and who receives security clearances,” the statement said. “His exercise of these core executive functions cannot be dictated by the ABA, a private organization or the courts.”
The lawsuit is only the next stage in a simmering dispute between Trump and the ABA.
Until last month, any of the president’s judicial nominees were vetted by the ABA and given a rating that played a key role in whether they won appointment to federal judgeships.
Attorney General Pam Bondi informed the ABA last month that the Trump administration would no longer give the ABA access to judicial nominees for vetting or take their ratings into consideration. She said the ABA demonstrated “bias” in favor of Democrats that disfavored Trump’s nominees.
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