The lawsuits were filed in federal court.
Two law firms on March 28 sued President Donald Trump over orders that directed the revocation of their security clearances.
Jenner & Block LLP and Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr LLP, or WilmerHale, said Trump’s orders revoking their clearances and directing officials to terminate contracts the firms have with the federal government are unconstitutional.
Trump’s orders,
issued this week, say the firms engaged in activities that “undermine justice and the interests of the United States.”
The order against Jenner & Block “sanctions Jenner for its representation of clients in cases adverse to the government, for its prior association with an individual who has not worked at the Firm in four years but has been critical of the President, and for its hiring practices,” the firm
said in its suit. “Each of these grounds, standing alone, is a constitutionally impermissible basis to target Jenner.”
WilmerHale
said in its suit: “The President’s sweeping attack on WilmerHale (and other firms) is unprecedented and unconstitutional. The First Amendment protects the rights of WilmerHale, its employees, and its clients to speak freely, petition the courts and other government institutions, and associate with the counsel of their choice without facing retaliation and discrimination by federal officials.”
Both legal actions were lodged with the federal court in Washington.
Jenner & Block has more than 500 lawyers in the United States and UK. It says it has more than 1,950 clients.
WilmerHale says it has about 1,200 lawyers based in offices around the world.
The firms are asking the court to declare Trump’s order in violation of the U.S. Constitution, including the First Amendment, and enjoin officials from implementing the order.
“Democrats and their law firms weaponized the legal process to try to punish and jail their political opponents,” Harrison Fields, a White House spokesperson, told The Epoch Times in an email. “The President’s executive orders are lawful directives to ensure that the President’s agenda is implemented and that law firms comply with the law.”
Trump has in recent weeks targeted multiple law firms that worked closely with Democrats or former special counsel Robert Mueller.
One of the firms, Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, agreed to provide $40 million in legal services in support of the Trump administration, resulting in the
withdrawal of Trump’s order against the company.
Trump’s orders say each of the firms has “abandoned the profession’s highest ideals, condoned partisan ‘lawfare,’ and abused its pro bono practice to engage in activities that undermine justice and the interests of the United States.”
In his order against Jenner & Block, he
wrote that the firm “engages in obvious partisan representations to achieve political ends, supports attacks against women and children based on a refusal to accept the biological reality of sex, and backs the obstruction of efforts to prevent illegal aliens from committing horrific crimes and trafficking deadly drugs within our borders.”
In his order against WilmerHale, he
wrote that the firm “engages in obvious partisan representations to achieve political ends, supports efforts to discriminate on the basis of race, backs the obstruction of efforts to prevent illegal aliens from committing horrific crimes and trafficking deadly drugs within our borders, and furthers the degradation of the quality of American elections, including by supporting efforts designed to enable noncitizens to vote.”
Trump also noted that Jenner & Block formerly employed Andrew Weissman, a federal prosecutor who worked on Mueller’s team, while WilmerHale employed Mueller and two of his top aides.
“Jenner was ‘thrilled’ to re-hire the unethical Andrew Weissmann after his time engaging in partisan prosecution as part of Robert Mueller’s entirely unjustified investigation,” the one order states. “WilmerHale is also bent on employing lawyers who weaponize the prosecutorial power to upend the democratic process and distort justice. For example, WilmerHale rewarded Robert Mueller and his colleagues ... by welcoming them to the firm after they wielded the power of the Federal Government to lead one of the most partisan investigations in American history,” the other says.
A judge overseeing a lawsuit brought by a different targeted firm, Perkins Coie, on March 12
temporarily paused Trump’s order targeting the firm as its case, which alleged constitutional violations, advances.
U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell, the judge who paused that order, recently
turned down the government’s request to recuse herself from the case.
Howell has also been assigned to the Jenner & Block case. No judge has yet been assigned to the WilmerHale proceeding.
