The White House is directing federal law enforcement officials to seek sanctions against attorneys or law firms that challenge President Donald Trump’s actions in court, a move seen as an escalation of the president’s attacks on those who oppose his aggressive policy changes or who have litigated against him in the past.
A White House memo issued late Friday night orders Attorney General Pam Bondi and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi L. Noem to pursue ethics challenges against lawyers who they accuse of bringing meritless cases or making arguments that are not backed up by fact, including in immigration courts.
The memo told Bondi to consider taking actions against law firm partners for perceived misconduct by junior attorneys and to review cases against the government from the past eight years to look for “misconduct that may warrant additional action.”
The directive comes as the Trump administration faces more than 130 lawsuits over its efforts to dismantle agencies and diversity programs, freeze spending, fire federal workers and deport immigrants without due process.
Federal judges have issued about three dozen injunctions against the administration so far, while ruling in its favor in a little more than a dozen cases.
Friday’s memo is part of a series of extraordinary executive actions in recent weeks that include punishing judges and lawyers who have taken positions against Trump. A continuing lawsuit over the deportation of reported Venezuelan gang members based on the wartime Alien Enemies Act has been a particular sticking point, with the federal judge in the case calling the administration’s actions “problematic and concerning.”
Vanita Gupta, who served in top Justice Department posts in the Obama and Biden administrations, said the memo is a blatant threat to the justice system.
“I have both sued and defended the government with equal vigor,” Gupta said in a statement. “This presidential memorandum attacks the very foundations of our legal system by threatening and intimidating litigants who aim to hold our government accountable to the law and the Constitution.”
The action also follows a string of recent attacks by Trump and his allies on federal judges who have ruled against him or are merely taking up court challenges; the suspension of security clearances for various Biden administration officials and prosecutors; and various executive actions targeting three prominent law firms: Perkins Coie, Covington & Burling and Paul Weiss.
The new memo suggests additional punishments may be coming, calling on the attorney general to pursue “attorneys and law firms who engage in frivolous, unreasonable, and vexatious litigation against the United States or in matters before executive departments and agencies of the United States.”
New Jersey Attorney General Matthew Platkin, who has led several lawsuits against the Trump administration and joined with a coalition of state attorneys general in other cases, called the memo “an unprecedented and frankly outrageous attempt to threaten lawyers simply for doing their jobs.”
“The President has consistently violated the law and hurt our residents in very real and direct ways — cutting their healthcare, denying their kids a quality education and making them less safe,” Platkin said in a statement. “No baseless threat will stop me from doing my job, which is to protect my state from harm.”
The White House stood by Trump’s directive. “President Trump is delivering on his promise to ensure the judicial system is no longer weaponized against the American people. President Trump’s only retribution is success and historic achievements for the American people,” said Taylor Rogers, assistant White House press secretary, in a statement.
Federal judges already have the power to punish attorneys and law firms for bringing meritless lawsuits and legal arguments. For instance, several of Trump’s attorneys before the 2024 election racked up sanctions and ethics complaints in various cases for conduct judges determined to be unethical, conspiracy-related or frivolous. Among the most prominent examples was the disbarment of former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, who lost his law license in D.C. and New York for pushing election fraud claims about the 2020 election.
But the wording of Friday’s memo suggests that the Justice Department or Department of Homeland Security could deem routine and proper legal representation of clients to be problematic.
Lawyers have an ethical obligation to seek the best outcome for their clients — a fact that could leave attorneys in Trump’s crosshairs just for accepting cases. It could also mean government lawyers will make more formal complaints against their colleagues, which is now a rare event.
In general, wide leeway is given to both sides to make a case based on a reasonable reading of facts. Even lawyers who make far-fetched arguments in court are not typically pursued legally or assumed to be acting in bad faith.
The hardball tactics in recent weeks have strained a movement that relies on legal nonprofits and private law firms to take on sometimes costly challenges to issues they consider a threat to democracy or civil rights.
Paul Weiss recently struck a deal with Trump to provide $40 million in pro bono work for the government on issues important to the president, leading Trump to withdraw the executive action targeting the firm and its clients. While the deal may have saved business for the firm, it was seen as a betrayal of the independence of law firms and a potential road map to coerce other firms to make concessions.
“The executive branch should neither fear nor punish those who challenge it and should not be the arbiter of what is frivolous — there are protections in place to address that,” Gupta said. “This moment calls for courage and collective action, not capitulation, among lawyers and the legal profession.”
Perkins Coie, a big firm that represented Hillary Clinton during her campaign in 2016, is suing the Trump administration for stripping its security clearances and limiting lawyers’ access to government buildings. Covington & Burling, which represents former special counsel Jack Smith, also lost security clearances. Trump said Covington & Burling engaged in “weaponization of government” by advising Smith, who led the federal investigations of Trump for reportedly mishandling classified documents and obstructing government efforts to retrieve them as well as reportedly trying to block Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory.
Sue Hendrickson, president and CEO of Human Rights First, which advocates against antidemocratic policies, said the new memo is directly aimed at silencing legal opposition to Trump’s agenda.
“This policy is likely to go after cases that are opposed to (Trump’s) political views versus cases that are meritless,” Hendrickson said, adding that the president is “after suppression.”
“It was clear that (Trump) has had difficulty controlling the judges with lifetime appointments and now is going after the legal systems and the lawyers who are representing individuals in cases and in connection with immigration cases, asylum cases and efforts to protect due process and the First Amendment.”
Hendrickson added that recent actions against the legal world by Trump have had the “desired chilling effect right now, and it’s creating a kind of pause” on fighting the government in court.
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