While lawsuits against the Trump administration are nothing new—one law journal at NYU School of Law currently counts 434 legal challenges to the Trump administration—if you look closely, you’ll see that there’s been an uptick in a particular kind of case in the last few months: suits from high-profile public office holders like Lisa Cook fighting removal from their posts. And if you look even closer, you’ll see that these cases share a very specific kind of attorney—former Big Law lawyers who took leave of their former firms right after their paymasters started capitulating to Trump’s attacks on the legal industry.
In case you are unfamiliar, the term “Big Law” refers to the 100 or so most prestigious and profitable law firms in the United States. When Trump began his assault on these firms this past February, he was breaking virtually every legal and political taboo that existed. But it was the weakness of character of so many of these industry leaders that ultimately proved to be the biggest surprise.
It began on February 25, when Trump issued a memorandum calling out the firm Covington & Burling for representing Jack Smith, the federal prosecutor who helped to investigate Trump and build criminal cases against him in relation to the January 6, 2021, Capitol attack and his mishandling of government records. On March 6, Trump followed up that memorandum with his first official executive order targeting a major law firm, in this case Perkins Coie.
The executive order was not exactly shy about the reasons that Trump was targeting Perkins Coie—it referred to the firm’s association with both Hillary Clinton and George Soros in the first few sentences—and sought to punish the firm in various ways, including by stripping the lawyers who worked there of security clearances and directing the termination of any existing government contracts with the firm. Trump then followed up with orders targeting several other firms for similar reasons.
These orders shocked the legal industry in several ways. The frontal assault caught the industry by surprise. While lawyers are used to representing clients in the firing zone, they are far less used to being in the firing zone themselves. Additionally, the fact that the administration brought such a weak legal case against exactly the category of people—high-powered litigators—who were best suited to beat it was thoroughly unexpected. The administration’s brazen unconstitutionality, which was egregious even by Trump’s standards, was just the icing on the cake.
Part of what made these orders so egregiously unconstitutional was that Trump was clearly using his presidential power for personal retaliation. But from a legal perspective, what was even more grievous was the fact that Trump had launched a hot war against the legal system itself. By going after not only his political enemies but the lawyers who represented them, Trump was stating loud and clear that he did not believe that his opponents deserved the same legal rights as his allies. This undercut a fundamental tenet of American democracy—equal access to the law, regardless of viewpoint—and constituted one of his most serious attacks on the rule of law to date.
But the most appalling part of this whole sordid conflict? The speed with which most of these high-powered firms immediately decided to roll over and play dead.
The first to go was Paul Weiss, which had previously been a firm that proudly touted both its litigation expertise and its ties to various Democratic causes, and which made a deal with Trump less than a week after he issued an executive order targeting the firm. The next firm to capitulate was Skadden Arps, which is regularly ranked as one of the top three most prestigious firms in the whole country. Then came Wilkie Farr, then Millbank; and then the rest of them began to fall like dominoes—including Kirkland & Ellis, which is the largest law firm not just in the United States but in the whole world.
When all was said and done, 11 of the most prestigious law firms in the country had made deals with Trump. Perhaps most astonishingly, most of these firms sought out Trump preemptively, seeking to make deals with him before he ever actually took any action against them, effectively making promises to get him to stop doing something that he hadn’t yet done—hardly the kind of behavior that one would expect from the country’s top-paid dealmakers. Even Trump was surprised at how quickly these firms rolled over—and for Trump to be surprised at his own success, the ground he was standing on must have been tenuous indeed.
What was also surprising was just how bad these deals were, both in terms of their vagueness and in terms of how unfavorable they were toward the firms. When pressed by Congress for details of what their deal contained, the firm Milbank just told Congress to go look at Trump’s post on Truth Social for the entire contents of the deal. Another firm, A&O Shearman, told Congress to go look at an email that had been reprinted in an industry trade magazine behind a paywall—not exactly a model of effective and diligent advocacy. The vague terms that did exist were incredibly unfavorable to the firms, including not only a commitment on behalf of the firms to do away with various diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives but the promise to devote nearly a billion dollars of the firms’ collective services toward causes of Trump’s choosing for free—in exchange for no express promises on Trump’s part whatsoever.
These deals received a huge amount of public scrutiny and condemnation, both from the legal community and from the public at large. This led to a number of efforts from various parties to hold the capitulating firms accountable for their cowardliness, including: law students organizing to deprive the capitulating firms of access to talent; the aforementioned congressional inquiry into the firms’ behavior (an inquiry that was just resurrected a couple weeks ago); and, perhaps most significantly, a not-so-quiet exodus of lawyers who were so fed up with their firms’ capitulation that they got up and left their six- and seven-figure salaries behind.
One of the earliest and loudest of the attorneys to leave was Rachel Cohen, an associate at Skadden, who began agitating for Skadden to fight back as she saw other firms begin to capitulate. She went so far as to post her conditional notice of resignation to LinkedIn, declaring publicly that she would leave her position at Skadden if the firm did not agree to fight back.
When the firm did not agree to fight back, two more Skadden associates—Brenna Frey and Thomas Sipp—followed in Cohen’s footsteps shortly thereafter, also making public statements regarding their unwillingness to continue working at a firm that would not stand up for the rule of law. Then associates at other capitulating firms began to exit, as well: Siunik Moradian and Taylor Wettach both left Simpson Thacher, with Moradian sending an internal email stating that the firm was “kissing the ring of authoritarianism.” Andrew Silberstein left Wilkie Farr after sending a similar email that stated, “The principles this firm purportedly valued over the years I’ve worked here are now so deeply compromised.” Nathaniel Zelinksy left Milbank around the same time; the list goes on.
Nor was the phenomenon confined to associates. Peter Davis, a partner at Latham & Watkins, decamped from the firm for a new partnership a few months after his firm made a deal; Damian Williams similarly abandoned his partnership at Paul Weiss around the same time. Paul Weiss—the first firm to capitulate—also saw an additional four litigation partners leave to start a new firm … which then immediately hired another three partners and three associates away from their former firm. Steven Banks, the head of pro bono at the firm, left after making a statement that he felt he belonged “on the front lines fighting for the things that I have believed in.” Meanwhile, at Wilkie Farr there was a “mass exodus” of partners over the course of the summer after the firm’s deal with Trump. And Cadwalader has lost at least 10 partners and nearly 40 total attorneys this year since it made its deal with Trump.
In the world of Big Law, this kind of movement is extraordinary. Getting a job at a Big Law firm is a bit like getting a golden ticket. It gives you the best résumé line in the industry and the possibility of working anywhere you want after. It promises to hone you into one of the best lawyers in the world. It puts you on a salary ladder that starts at $250K a year and ends at per-partner profits of roughly $6 million a year (at Skadden, at least). These are not jobs that people leave lightly—particularly when you add in the need to pay back the $130,000 in debt that the average law student carries with them after graduation. And yet the few months after these firms made their deals with Trump saw a veritable flood of lawyers running away from these coveted positions.
But the most striking part was not what these lawyers were running from—it’s what these lawyers were running to.
This movement of lawyers away from the capitulating law firms was highly directed, with many of them ending up at organizations that were expressly devoted to fighting the fights that their former firms wouldn’t. This included not only existing firms but brand-new organizations devoted to defending the rule of law—organizations that are now handling much of this new wave of litigation on behalf of high-profile public servants suing Trump over their jobs.
Lowell & Associates is one such organization. It is a firm that was launched this past May, headed by a veteran Washington lawyer. Lowell quickly scooped up two of the aforementioned Skadden associates (Cohen and Frey) who publicly quit in protest. The firm’s self-stated mission? “The provision of pro bono and public interest representation in matters that defend the integrity of the legal system and protect individuals and institutions from government overreach and other threats to fundamental rights.” They are currently representing Lisa Cook, three senior FBI agents who were fired for improper political reasons, and Susan Monarez, the former director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, among others.
The Washington Litigation Group is another firm that emerged in the months following Big Law’s Big Capitulation. It is a new “boutique non-profit firm” that was launched this past August, and whose stated mission is to “represent individuals and institutions who have been unlawfully targeted for exercising their rights.” It hired Nathaniel Zelinsky, an associate who left Milbank in the aftermath of the deal, and is currently representing three members of the Financial Oversight Management Board who were improperly relieved of their positions; Tara Twomey, who was ousted from her position as the director of the Executive Office for U.S. Trustees; and Cathy Harris, a former member of the Merit Systems Protection Board who was removed by Trump from her post, among others.
There are also organizations that have built out new capacities that expressly take advantage of all this Big Law talent, such as the new appellate practice at Democracy Forward. Democracy Forward is a “national legal organization that advances democracy and social progress through litigation, policy and public education, and regulatory engagement” that was formed as an express response to Trump’s election in 2016, and has been at the forefront of recent litigation against Trump. Its new appellate practice was launched in August—and then immediately hired a number of big-name former Big Law partners. They are now representing Shira Perlmutter, whom Trump removed from her position as register and director of the U.S. Copyright Office; Alvin Brown, who was removed from his post as vice chair of the National Transportation Safety Board; and Jocelyn Samuels, who was removed from her position as commissioner of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, among others.
Then there are all the lawyers who fled the capitulating firms for organizations that, while not new, have nevertheless taken up the fights from which the capitulating firms fled. Jenner & Block—one of only four Big Law firms targeted by Trump that actually fought back (along with my former firm, WilmerHale)—has been a destination for many. It is now home not only to former partners from Latham & Watkins and Paul Weiss but the “mass exodus” of partners from Wilkie Farr. And the new firm started by former Paul Weiss attorneys, Dunn Isaacson Rhee, makes it clear on its website where the firm stands: “While others may shy away from difficult cases, we seek them out. We’re not afraid of big fights, powerful opponents, or hard challenges.” Heavy emphasis on the “others.”
In short, Trump’s attacks on law firms—dire as they were for the rule of law itself—seem to have had an entirely unexpected effect: He’s pushing a large number of lawyers away from the biggest-name firms and into positions that are better aligned with traditional lawyerly principles.
A Big Law firm is a mess of contradictions. On the one side, there is the ideal that every lawyer learns in law school: A lawyer is someone who represents the rule of law at its best and constitutes an essential part of the American legal system. And on the other side, there is the harsh reality that these firms are massively profitable businesses that care primarily about protecting those profits. Trump’s attack, and the industry’s divided response, exposed this contradiction very publicly for the first time—and in the case of the capitulating firms, made it very clear where those firms stand.
This seems like it was sufficient to prompt significant numbers of attorneys not only to give up these plum positions but to alter the course of their careers toward pro-democracy causes to such an extent that a series of new organizations have been created—organizations that are not quite Big Law firms and not quite a direct service organization either, but something that combines some of the best attributes of both. This is a striking development, particularly in an industry that is not exactly known for its rapid innovation.
It is difficult to say with certainty if it is the existence of these new organizations that has enabled so many public servants like Lisa Cook and Rebecca Slaughter to affirmatively take their fight to Trump, or whether these firms are simply good at being in the right place at the right time. But the degree to which this particular type of litigation has increased in tandem with these new organizations’ involvement certainly suggests that there is some correlation.
Regardless, it seems that an unexpected countermovement to Trump’s authoritarian overreach may have begun in a place not exactly known for its underdog resistance: the highest-paid echelons of the legal industry. And with young legal talent clearly moved by this issue, there is even hope that it may continue to grow.
In short, by doing something so blatantly unconstitutional that nobody else ever dared to do it—attack lawyers for representing his political opponents—Trump inadvertently may have managed to do the one thing no one else thought possible: make highly paid lawyers stand up for what they believe in.
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