Two law firms targeted by President Donald Trump launched legal counterattacks against the White House on Friday over executive orders designed to make their work harder — with one hiring a top conservative attorney to plead their case.
In February, Trump started issuing executive orders against law firms he claimed engaged in illegal discrimination and had wronged him. The orders limit security clearances to the firms’ lawyers and require federal contractors to disclose whether they use the law firms. The White House has said that it will fire contractors who employ law firms that are subject to the orders.
WilmerHale, which employed Robert Mueller and other lawyers on the Justice Department team that investigated Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign and its ties to Russia, was named in an order Thursday night. By Friday morning, it had sued, saying Trump’s attack was “unprecedented and unconstitutional.”
Jenner & Block, which was named in an executive order earlier this week, also filed suit Friday morning. The firm protested that the entire order seems to be based on the notion that Mueller lieutenant Andrew Weissmann still works at Jenner — when he left four years ago.
“The order has had, and will continue to have, a chilling effect on whether and how Jenner & Block will litigate on behalf of certain clients, and is having a chilling effect on attorneys and other persons considering employment with the firm,” Jenner said in its lawsuit.
The two firms’ lawsuits come a week after Paul Weiss, a New York-based firm known for its progressive bona fides, reached a deal with the White House where it offered to devote $40 million in attorney time to pro bono work that aligns with the president’s causes, like supporting veterans and fighting antisemitism. The firm was criticized by some lawyers, but its chairman, Brad Karp, has said the deal was necessary to avert a crisis in confidence that could lead partners and clients to leave and the firm to collapse.
Trump said Wednesday that colleges and “horrible” law firms are eager to cut deals after he threatened to withhold funding or target them in follow-up executive orders. The New York Times reported on Thursday that Skadden, one of the best-known corporate law firms whose equity partners take home over $5 million a year on average, is also looking for ways to avoid the president’s wrath.
“They’re saying, ‘where do I sign, where do I sign,” the president said of law firms. “Nobody can believe it. And there’s more coming.”
Other firms have braced themselves for the possibility that they will be named in an executive order. A lawyer at a top 20 firm previously told Business Insider that their firm had prepared documents to file if Trump turned on them.
Jenner and WilmerHale’s lawsuits said Trump violated the constitution in multiple ways, retaliating against them for their speech, views, and associations in violation of the First Amendment and the due-process protections of the Fifth and Sixth Amendments. Jenner said that some 40% of its business came from government contractors, who were plainly meant to be pressured into dumping Jenner.
But the firms are also represented by two very different groups of lawyers. Jenner is represented by a team at Cooley, a law firm known for its representation of clients in the technology industry. Cooley has hired lawyers from Democratic administrations and hired Andrew Goldstein, another attorney on Mueller’s team. Bloomberg Law reported that Cooley is among several Big Law firms that have edited certain attorney bios to de-emphasize connections to Trump’s enemies.
WilmerHale is known for its connections with Democratic administrations and its affiliations with some of Trump’s enemies. But the firm hired Paul Clement, a legal superstar who was the government’s top appeals lawyer during the George W. Bush administration, to defend it from Trump’s attacks. His firm, Clement & Murphy, is stocked with lawyers who have argued before the Supreme Court.
Clement didn’t immediately return a request for comment from Business Insider.
“It is plain as day that President Trump issued the Order to retaliate against WilmerHale,” the firm’s lawsuit said. “Unlike a typical case where discovery is needed to root out a forbidden retaliatory motive, the Order openly proclaims its retaliatory intent.”
