DOJ Appeals Ruling Against Trump Order Targeting Law Firm for Election Work
The Department of Justice (DOJ) Monday said it will appeal a judge’s ruling against President Donald Trump’s executive order targeting Perkins Coie, a law firm that has represented his political opponents, as well as plaintiffs in voting rights cases.
The DOJ’s appeal to the DC Circuit Court of Appeals comes just before the end of the 60-day deadline it had to challenge District Judge Beryl Howell’s March ruling.
In her order, Howell described Trump’s order as clearly “retaliatory in nature” against Perkins Coie, which also challenged Trump’s efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election.
Trump’s order sought to paralyze the firm’s ability to represent clients dealing with the federal government by calling on agencies to suspend Perkins Coie lawyers’ security credentials, to bar the lawyers from accessing government buildings and to terminate any contract they had with the firm.
The order said Perkins Coie employees having access to government buildings would “threaten the national security” of the U.S. because of the firm’s work with Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign.
Trump issued similar orders against several other law firms as part of his effort to hamstring opposition and undermine the American legal system.
Some of the firms, like Paul, Weiss, entered agreements with the Trump administration in the face of the orders, which involved pledging tens of millions of dollars worth of pro bono legal work for causes favored by the White House.
The DOJ’s appeal came just days after another federal judge permanently struck down Trump’s order targeting law firm Susman Godfrey, describing it as an unconstitutional assault on protected speech.
In addition to Perkins Coie and Susman Godfrey, two other firms — WilmerHale and Jenner & Block — have sued and successfully secured court orders barring the Trump administration from enforcing the president’s orders against them.
Disclosure: Democracy Docket Founder Marc Elias served as chair of the Political Law Group at Perkins Coie until 2021, and played a role in some of the work that the White House has cited as justification for its executive order.