American advocacy groups and small law firms fear that major laws will withdraw from civil rights lawsuits after Donald Trump’s executive order pressures businesses to choose ethics and interests.
The Trump administration launched an attack on the legal department’s perceived enemy, directing federal agencies to suspend security clearances and review or close contracts with law firms Wilmer Hale, Perkins Coy, Jenner & Brock, Paul and Weiss. He also issued an executive order against the narrow-range Covington & Burling.
Some companies have started their challenges, but Legal Juggernaut Paul, Weiss and others are instead negotiating transactions that include pro bono jobs.
The surrender, and the uncertainty of other companies they may next, promotes fears that a large law firm that helped them fight some of the most famous civil rights wars in American history might now withdraw to avoid Trump’s rage.
This would be disastrous for nonprofits and advocacy groups that work closely with vulnerable communities and rely heavily on the resources of large law firms.
LGBT+ protesters condemn the attack on minority rights promoted by the Donald Trump administration in front of the US embassy in Brasilia, Brazil in January ©Adriano Machado/Reutersa Pro-Palestinian Rally will be held in New York last month.
The big law “when you don’t want to incorporate these cases, it leaves a big gap,” said Jesse Weber, managing partner at Brown Goldstein & Levy, a medium-sized law firm with strong civil rights practices. “We have capacity limitations. I’m worried that we don’t have enough lawyers to really take on these issues.”
Shannon Minter, legal director at the National Center for Lesbian Rights, an LGBT advocacy group, warned that the move was “very harmful” to his organization.
“It would also send a terrible message to the courts and the public that we have no support from the mainstream legal community,” Minter added.
The Trump administration will also benefit from advocacy efforts on criminal justice and issues surrounding immigration to LGBT rights, whilst taking steps to say critics are violating such protections under the law.
The Justice Department in January directed lawyers to suspend civil rights lawsuits. The government is trying to deport students with green cards related to suppressing protests among Palestinians, gender transitions, and closing out the homeless.
Homeless tents are set up in the heart of the business district in downtown DC, Washington, DC in February ©Anthony Quinn/SIPA USA/REUTERS CONNECTPOLICE and public worker workers will remove the homeless camp next to the State Department 48 hours after President Donald Trump complained about the homeless camp on social media last month © Andrew Leyden/Zumded
If a large law firm ceases to participate in such cases, “civil rights will undoubtedly suffer in this country,” said Michael Langley, executive director of the Florida Institute of Justice, a nonprofit law firm focusing on state rights. “Unfortunately, I think that’s the government’s goal.”
Big laws have a long history of participating in civil rights lawsuits. Paul and Weiss have been working on cases against state abortion laws and racism. Kirkland & Ellis defends voter rights. Latham & Watkins defends asylum seekers.
Their retreat may have already begun. A senior Washington area lawyer said he is evaluating lawsuits relating to “really vicious treatment” of immigrants after a large law firm broke partnership with nonprofits out of “terror.”
Nonprofits have warned that such a drop in challenges will have major consequences for civil rights during Trump’s second presidency.
When the government ordered transgender women to be moved to men’s prisons and blocked medical care for them, the group, including NCLR, along with law firm Lowenstein Sandler, is “essential,” Minter said.
“Everyone knew exactly what would happen if they were moved to a man’s prison,” Minter said. “They’ll be raped. They’ll be sexually assaulted.”
The number of mainstream companies that avoid such civil rights lawsuits remains unclear how many mainstream companies can avoid.
The American Civil Liberties Coalition, which has filed more than 20 lawsuits against the government since Trump returned to the White House in January, “it’s not too late,” said Ben Windsor, the organization’s attorney.
ACLU, a national nonprofit with 500 staff attorneys, draws from law firm resources, but often litigates cases independently.
“Whether we receive support from the big law or not, we will continue to bring in the same cases that we would otherwise bring before the court, and we will find people who will help us when we need it,” he added.
Winzer doesn’t believe that the entire sector will submit to the president’s wishes.
“It’s hard to believe that a few orders bystanding the entire profession will bystanding the entire profession,” he noted that a federal judge found Trump’s order against Perkins illegal and stopped a critical part of it. Other federal judges have followed the case in separate cases.
Langley, at the Florida Institute of Justice, said Trump’s broadside and civil rights to the legal industry “remindes that the legal system can bring about positive change in our community, but in reality it can do more harm than good in the wrong hands.”
“No one is beyond the law,” he said. “No one should be underneath it.”
