Welcome to legal strategy whiplash. Earlier this month, the U.S. Department of Justice appeared ready to drop appeals defending President Donald Trump’s executive orders targeting four major law firms. Then, with the decision garnering a flurry of press attention, the Justice Department immediately reversed course and said it would fight on.
The appeals stem from suits brought by WilmerHale, Jenner & Block, Perkins Coie, and Susman Godfrey to permanently block Trump’s orders, which were designed to punish them for representing clients who had opposed the president, administration officials, or political allies. In every instance, the firms won in court, and thanks to those successes, they set a template that the rest of the legal industry could follow to blunt the administration’s wrath.
Meanwhile, nine other firms targeted with similar executive orders chose to settle, making deals with Trump to retool or scrap diversity initiatives, hire lawyers from across the political spectrum, and offer nearly $1 billion in free legal services to fund pro-administration legal causes. A year later, the firms continue to face criticism for their decisions. “The blowback from the legal profession is incredibly strong," one legal ethicist recently told The American Lawyer,
And the episode continues to present a thorny question for clients. Given the choice, which type of firm would a client rather have—one that holds its ground when faced with intense government opposition, or one that gives way?
Where Things Stand
While clients ponder that question, practitioners and firms are continuing to grapple with several key issues:
- Constitutional Coverage. By fighting back, Wilmer, Jenner, Perkins, and Susman have won a measure of relatively durable constitutional protection. U.S. district courts issued permanent injunctions against the government, and those orders will stand even as the Justice Department pursues its appeals. The question is how the appeals courts will react.
- Settlement Questions. While the firms that fought back won substantial protections, the nine that settled may have left themselves open to further demands from the administration. The deals were unwritten and offered little protection from Trump’s whims. As the American Bar Association noted in a lawsuit, “the president can change his mind at any time.”
- The Chilling Effect. In spite of its losses in court, the Trump administration may have won a larger victory. Vulnerable litigants in politically sensitive areas, like immigration, have struggled to find pro bono legal support—particularly from Big Law. And at many firms, diversity efforts—long believed essential to increasing the number of minority and women partners—have been scaled back, abandoned, or hidden from public view.
- Political and Legal Instability. The ping-pong positioning by the DOJ on whether it will pursue appeals is hardly good news for clients whose law firms depend on government contract work. The unpredictable decision-making—which appeared influenced by political rather than legal considerations—heightens uncertainty and business risk.
- Other Litigation. While the government pursues its appeals, other litigation over the president’s executive orders continues. Even as the DOJ was flip-flopping on its appeals of the law firm cases, a federal judge was hearing arguments on the government’s motion to dismiss an American Bar Association lawsuit that could extend protections beyond the four firms currently shielded by permanent injunctions.
The Firms That Fought Back—And What They Won
To date, judges have been skeptical—and sometimes withering—in their reactions to the administration’s orders. Judge Beryl Howard of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, in her decision granting a permanent injunction to Perkins Coie, described the administration’s actions as “a cringe-worthy twist on the theatrical phrase ‘Let’s kill all the lawyers.’” Trump’s executive order, she wrote, “takes the approach of ‘Let’s kill the lawyers I don’t like,’ sending the clear message: lawyers must stick to the party line, or else.”
Each of the four firms represented clients in matters opposing Trump or those aligned with him. Susman, for instance, was targeted in an April 2025 executive order for allegedly spearheading “efforts to weaponize the American legal system and degrade the quality of American elections” for its successful work on behalf of Dominion Voting Systems in a post-2020 election defamation case against Fox News. Susman, in court documents, countered that “the executive order makes no secret of its unconstitutional retaliatory and discriminatory intent to punish Susman Godfrey.”
The permanent injunctions have offered a roadmap for other firms that might have been targeted. They cite the firms’ First, Fifth, and Sixth Amendment rights, and contend that the executive orders exceeded Trump’s Article II constitutional authority and violated the separation of powers doctrine. As the lawyer representing Jenner & Block in court told a judge, the executive order “reeks of unconstitutionality.”
Fighting back has also burnished the firms’ reputations among some in-house counsel and the public at large. Morgan Stanley’s GC and other in-house lawyers made it clear that the financial services giant was looking to do business with firms that had not signed agreements with Trump, The Wall Street Journal reported. The decision to fight “is what we expect from good lawyers, to give it their all for justice,” the Seattle Times wrote in a March 9 editorial praising Perkins Coie and the other three firms that had “refused to capitulate.”
The Settlement Calculus—And Its Hidden Costs
The same editorial was less-than-complimentary about the firms that settled. “Nine firms bowed to Trump’s bullying and made deals with the administration that raised eyebrows among lawmakers,” the Seattle Times wrote.
Indeed, congressional Democrats peppered the nine law firms that settled with Trump with letters questioning the legality of the deals and asking them to renounce them. The lawmakers also raised questions about whether the deals violated state and federal bribery, racketeering, and anti-fraud laws and the Hobbs Act (which prohibits affecting commerce through extortion). While the questions have gained little traction in the GOP-led Congress, a possible switch in party control after the midterm elections might reopen the matter.
Potential congressional questions aside, the greatest impact on the firms appears to be reputational. That’s particularly true for firms like Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, which have been closely associated with the Democratic Party and liberal causes. The other firms that reached deals with Trump included Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom; Willkie Farr & Gallagher, Cadwalader Wickersham & Taft; Milbank; Kirkland & Ellis; Allen Overy Shearman & Sterling; Latham & Watkins; and Simpson Thacher & Bartlett.
Pro Bono Dwindles Under Executive Orders
From a business perspective, the impact appears more muted. The Wall Street Journal last summer reported that at least 11 major corporations were “moving work away” from firms that signed deals with Trump. But a year later, “what remains to be seen is the midterm and longer-term consequences for the firms, both in terms of their ability to recruit and retain lawyers, and in terms of their ability to retain clients,” a legal ethics expert recently told Law.com. In fact, several of the firms that settled are expected to post strong financial returns for 2025.
What is clearer is the impact on pro bono work and diversity efforts. In an investigation last July, Reuters found that “dozens of major law firms, wary of political retaliation, have scaled back pro bono work, diversity initiatives and litigation that could place them in conflict with the Trump administration.”
Forty-six of the American Lawyer’s 50 highest-grossing firms had “removed or altered website references to diversity, equity, and inclusion,” Reuters reported. In addition, 17 eliminated mentions of immigration and racial justice from the pro bono descriptions on their sites, and three added information about their support of Trump-backed pro bono causes. “Many firms are making a strategic calculation: withdraw from pro bono work frowned on by Trump, or risk becoming the next target,” Reuters said.
The ABA’s Case
The pro bono pullback is “not a side effect of the crackdown. It was the purpose all along,” the ABA contends in its case over the administration’s attacks on the legal industry.
In American Bar Association v. Executive Office of the President, the ABA argues that “law firms that once proudly contributed thousands of hours of pro bono work to a host of causes—including causes championed by the ABA—have withdrawn from such work because it is disfavored by the administration, particularly work that would require law firms to litigate against the federal government.”
The ABA’s suit describes the executive orders as an “intimidation policy” designed to severely damage particular law firms and intimidate other firms and lawyers. At a hearing on March 4 reported on by Bloomberg, an attorney for the ABA called the DOJ’s decision to continue pursuing its appeals a “doubling down on this policy.”
The hearing, Bloomberg noted, came one day after the administration’s “about-face” on the DOJ’s decision to pursue its appeals. A DOJ lawyer told the court, however, that the agency’s appellate strategy had no impact on the ABA suit and asked the court to dismiss the ABA’s claims. The DOJ’s lawyer, Abhishek Kambli, a deputy associate attorney general, is also representing the Trump administration in the appeals. Susman Godfrey is representing the ABA.
Deep Impact
The Justice Department has argued that the ABA does not have standing to bring the case. The ABA counters that as an organization representing the legal industry as a whole, it has the right to defend lawyers and law firms facing peril and has done so in the past.
A win by the ABA in the case could extend the constitutional protections won by Susman, Perkins, Wilmer, and Jenner to the entire profession and set a precedent for future administrations. On a practical level, an ABA victory would prevent federal officials from arbitrarily terminating security clearances, access to federal building and employees, banning hiring for federal jobs from firms, and eliminating government contracts.
“Many members of the ABA…have been harmed,” the ABA said in court documents. “The ABA itself is also experiencing the effects, as it has had to forgo litigation against the administration because counsel who previously were willing to take on such work are no longer willing to do so.”
The Client Questions No One Is Asking—But Should Be
During the last year, corporate clients, particularly overseas, have raised concerns that the broad terms of the deals with Trump could trigger potential conflicts. And bar associations in Europe have also expressed alarm that the agreements may violate rules around lawyer independence. With the government’s decision to mount its appeals, such questions are likely to continue.
For clients concerned about a firm’s stance should it face intense government pressure, a few questions may be in order:
- What protection does the firm have if it faces intense political pressure?
- Does it have a plan in place to cope with a political crisis?
- What will it do to make that pressure disappear?
- Will it pull back from matters, clients, or causes that could trigger political pressure and scrutiny?
- How will it handle potential conflicts? Are key lawyers sticking with the firm or jumping ship?
- If it acquiesces to political pressure, how tolerant is the client to potential risk?
Clients may assume their law firm has the skill to handle a complex legal matter. But as the last year has demonstrated, they might ask whether their law firms possess the stamina and independence to hold fast should their work put them at political risk.
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David L. Brown is a legal affairs writer and consultant, who has served as head of editorial at ALM Media, editor-in-chief of The National Law Journal and Legal Times, and executive editor of The American Lawyer. He consults on thought leadership strategy and creates in-depth content for legal industry clients and works closely with Best Law Firms as senior content consultant.