By Mike Scarcella and Sara Merken
(Reuters) – Powerful Wall Street law firm Paul Weiss faced heavy criticism on Friday over a deal it struck with the White House to escape an executive order imperiling the firm’s business, even as some lawyers said the firm faced few other options.
Lawyers at some companies and law firms skewered Paul Weiss online for appearing to capitulate to Republican President Donald Trump by scrapping internal diversity policies and donating $40 million in free legal work to support his administration’s causes.
“Embarrassed to be associated with this firm today,” a lawyer at Amazon Web Services who previously worked at Paul Weiss wrote on LinkedIn.
The lawyer and Amazon, a Paul Weiss client, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Paul Weiss Chairman Brad Karp said in an internal email to its lawyers, viewed by Reuters, that the agreement with Trump was in line with the firm’s principles, including a commitment to remaining politically independent.
Trump has attacked major law firms for weeks over their work for his Democratic adversaries and their internal diversity policies, amid broader moves by the president to use funding cuts and other measures to pressure universities and private companies to follow his priorities.
A person familiar with Paul Weiss’ decision to make a deal with Trump said it was facing an existential threat. Paul Weiss had already lost at least one white-collar client over Trump’s order, court records show.
Experts said Trump’s orders against Paul Weiss and another big firm, Perkins Coie, marked an unprecedented attack on their ability to do business.
The order against Perkins Coie was “life-threatening” to the firm, its lawyer said last week in that firm’s ongoing lawsuit against the administration.
Asked for comment, the White House referred to Trump’s social media post on his agreement with Paul Weiss.
Trump’s order against Paul Weiss cited its association with a prosecutor who investigated the president and the firm’s internal diversity policies. The order suspended security clearances for the firm’s lawyers and restricted their access to government buildings and officials.
Trump in an earlier order suspended security clearances for two lawyers at Covington & Burling who represent Jack Smith, the U.S. special counsel who brought criminal charges against Trump in two cases.
On Monday, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission sent demands to 20 major law firms for detailed information about their diversity initiatives and racial and gender demographics, expanding the administration’s legal industry crackdown.
Paul Weiss could face blowback from some of its lawyers and clients over its truce with Trump, said University of Connecticut law professor and legal industry expert Leslie Levin, but she said the firm likely saw a deal as the safest way forward.
The White House said on Thursday that Trump met with Karp, a longtime Democratic fundraiser and top outside lawyer for financial companies, and worked out the accord.
Marc Elias, a former Perkins Coie partner and top lawyer for Democrats, assailed the Paul Weiss agreement in a social media post late on Thursday, calling it “a stain on the firm, every one of its partners, and the entire legal profession.”
(Reporting by Mike Scarcella in Washington and Sara Merken in New York; Editing by David Bario and Richard Chang)
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