Lawyers Ryan Barack and Ron Weaver joined Shelley on MidPoint on Wednesday, April 2nd, to discuss President Trump’s Executive Orders and crusade against Big Law. We learned about the constitutional power and scope of Executive Orders and their limitations. The President’s power is not without limitation. Unfortunately, while Congress does have the authority to rein in a President’s power to issue and effectuate Executive Orders, the current Republican-dominated Congress shows no signs of moving in that direction with respect to Trump’s efforts to remake American government through the issuance of executive edicts.
In the case of the Executive Orders targeted against Big Law–collectively, the largest and most prestigious law firms in America–Trump is using his power to settle long-held grievances against his political opponents. One of the major law firms first targeted was Paul Weiss. The President ordered that no client with government contracts could have legal representation by Paul Weiss and Paul Weiss lawyers were banned from all federal buildings, among other devastating restrictions to their law practice. That order was rescinded after the firm reached an agreement with Trump under which the firm agreed to provide $40 million in pro bono legal services for causes that the Trump administration supports, among other assurances. Another Big Law firm, Skadden Arps, rushed to negotiate a similar agreement with Trump even before he had issued an Executive Order targeting that firm, this time offering $100 million in pro bono legal services to support the Trump agenda. Other law firms are fighting back in the courts, challenging the Executive Orders issued against them on constitutional and ethical grounds and winning injunctions against enforcement of the orders in the federal district courts. No such case has yet reached the U.S. Supreme Court.
Our discussion got heated when a dispute arose over whether Paul Weiss, the first law firm to capitulate to Trump’s terms, was justified in submitting to protect itself from losing clients and government contracts that could have crippled the firm’s finances and perhaps its very existence, as opposed to standing firm and challenging the President in court as Perkins Coie, Jenner & Block, and other law firms have chosen to do despite the risks to their client base and profitability. If you were the Managing Partner of a Big Law firm, what would you do?
Listen to the full audio of the show here, on the WMNF app, or as a WMNF MidPoint podcast on Spotify or Apple music.
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