The fallout from President Donald Trump’s attack on big US law firms continues to deepen.
While a few firms are fighting Trump’s punitive executive orders in court, others are striking deals with the administration — which include millions of dollars in pro bono work for Trump-aligned causes — to avoid them altogether.
The decision to seek deals with the Trump administration has divided the legal community. Paul Weiss chairman Brad Karp, the first to make a deal with Trump, told his firm last month in an email that the firm had no choice because Trump’s executive orders were an “existential” threat.
Others have characterized the deals as a capitulation and a dangerous precedent. Several associates at targeted law firms have resigned in protest.
On Friday, Siunik Moradian, a Los Angeles-based associate at Simpson Thacher & Bartlett, joined them.
In an email to his colleagues, Moradian criticized the firm’s decision to make a deal with the White House, which included about $125 million in pro bono work.
“By capitulating today, Simpson Thacher joins several other historic, powerful, influential, and well-resourced law firms in bending the knee and kissing the ring of authoritarianism,” he wrote. “If even lawyers won’t fight unlawful governmental weaponization of the courts, who will?”
Moradian then left his position at the firm.
In an interview with Business Insider, Moradian said he previously thought about leaving before Simpson Thacher made its deal with the Trump administration.
“It was something that I was contemplating ever since Paul Weiss and Skadden capitulated, and I saw that, to my surprise, firms were a lot more willing to cut a deal than I thought,” he said.
“When the executive orders and the EEOC letters to the respective firms were sent out, I felt quite confident that these well-resourced law firms are not going to fold — they’re going to fight this,” he continued. “Once I saw that I was, I guess, misguided in that expectation, I had begun thinking what I would do if Simpson was put in that position as well.”
Moradian told BI that “from a legal standpoint, it seems like an easy fight.”
“I think what becomes really concerning for me is that these law firms are not making deals because of the strength of the Trump administration’s claims or potential claims,” he said. “They’re extra-legal extortionist tactics, and it just seems like a dangerous precedent and something that the Trump administration is going to add to their playbook of weaponizing the legal system in the courts.”
Moradian joins former Skadden associates Rachel Cohen and Brenna Frey — who also resigned over their firm’s deal with the administration.
Trump has now secured about $940 million in pro bono legal work from a range of firms, including Simpson Thacher, Skadden, Willkie Farr & Gallagher, Milbank LLP, and Paul Weiss.
Several firms, on the other hand, have fought back.
Jenner & Block, Perkins Coie, and WilmerHale have all sued the administration over the executive orders. And this week, Susman Godfrey, the target of a similar executive order, joined them.
Moradian told BI that he sent his email across the firm to show there were differing views.
“If the only exposure that people have to what the Trump administration is doing is firms capitulating and releasing these really sanitized statements about how promising hundreds of millions of dollars of pro bono legal services and wiping their DEI and being beholden to the Trump administration is a good thing, I think there should also be voices that are vocally saying, ‘No, this isn’t a good thing,'” he said.
“Many more people than those that vocally quit are in opposition to this,” he added.
Moradian told BI that the legal industry is “under threat” and that firms should take a stand. “I think what is alarming to me is the easiest time to resist this type of weaponization and illegal action is as early as possible,” he said.
“This appeasement just seems incredibly shortsighted to me,” he continued. “The Trump administration has started this fight with the legal system, and it’s going to be harder to fight the more that these powerful institutions don’t fight it.”
Simpson Thacher did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.
