Two more legal firms have reached agreements with Donald Trump to avoid executive orders that could significantly harm their business.
The settlements come as many have expressed deep alarm at the US president’s effort to target law firms affiliated with his political rivals and see the actions as a thinly-veiled anti-democratic effort to intimidate lawyers from taking cases hostile to the administration.
One firm, Willkie Farr & Gallagher, reached an agreement on Tuesday with Trump in which it agreed to commit $100m in pro bono work to causes that both the firm and Trump champion, Trump said in a statement on Truth Social. The firm also agreed to not engage in race-based hiring and committed to representing a wide array of clients, including those “who have not historically received Legal representation from major National Law Firms”.
Kamala Harris’s husband, Doug Emhoff, joined Willkie Farr & Gallagher in January and told the firm it should not settle with Trump, according to the New York Times. The firm also helped represent two Georgia election workers, Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss, who successfully sued Rudy Giuliani for more than $148m after her defamed them following the 2020 election. Timothy Heaphy, the lead investigator for the congressional committee that investigated the January 6 attacks on the US Capitol.
“The firm looks forward to having a constructive relationship with the Trump administration, and remains committed to serving the needs of our clients, our employees, and the communities of which we are a part,” Thomas Cerabino, the chair of Willkie Farr, said in a statement.
Trump announced a similar agreement on Wednesday with another firm, Milbank LLP, which also agreed to commit $100m in pro bono work.
It wasn’t immediately clear why Milbank was interested in reaching a deal with Trump. Neal Katyal, a former acting solicitor general and well-known supreme court litigator who wrote a book making the case for impeaching Trump, recently joined the firm.
Another firm, Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom, reached an agreement to avoid an executive order last month. The law firm Paul Weiss reached an agreement on 21 March to have an executive order against it rescinded. The decision to settle has roiled lawyers at the firms, some of whom have quit in protest. Other lawyers have said that the settlements only embolden Trump to continue to go after other firms.
There is a deep divide in the legal community about how to respond to Trump’s efforts to punish lawyers. Three firms – Perkins Coie, Jenner & Block, and WilmerHale – have all sued and successfully gotten court orders to at least partially block the executive orders. Covington and Burling, another major firm targeted by Trump because of its legal assistance to Jack Smith, has not taken any public action.
But many of the country’s most prominent law firms have declined to speak out against the orders. Trump himself has bragged about how easy it has been to get firms to acquiesce.
“They’re all bending and saying: ‘Sir, thank you very much.’ Nobody can believe it,” Trump said last month. “Law firms are just saying: ‘Where do I sign? Where do I sign?’”
