Latest news with #PaulWeiss
Reuters
a day ago
- Business
- Reuters
Fifth partner leaves Paul Weiss to join new firm
June 2 (Reuters) - Another partner has left law firm Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton and Garrison, joining Karen Dunn and others who split to launch their own firm late last month. Kyle Smith, a Washington-based litigator who has represented Amazon, Uber and other clients at Paul Weiss, is the fifth partner to join newly formed Dunn Isaacson Rhee. Smith, who announced the move in a LinkedIn post on Sunday, could not immediately be reached for comment. Paul Weiss in March became the first of nine firms that struck deals with the White House to avoid being targeted by President Donald Trump's administration. The Wall Street firm pledged $40 million in free legal work to mutually agreed causes with the administration in return for Trump rescinding an executive order that threatened the firm's access to government officials and its federal contracting work. Dunn, a prominent litigator and Washington Democrat, left Paul Weiss on May 23 to found the new firm along with Jeannie Rhee, Bill Isaacson and Jessica Phillips. They did not cite Paul Weiss' deal with Trump in an internal email announcing their departures that was viewed by Reuters. Last month, former U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson retired from Paul Weiss for a leadership post at Columbia University. Paul Weiss in a statement thanked Smith for his contributions to the firm. Its chairman Brad Karp has defended the agreement with Trump, arguing it was necessary to protect the firm. Dunn Isaacson Rhee said the new firm would soon formally announce its expanded team. 'Since the news of our firm became public last week, we have received a truly overwhelming amount of support and interest from lawyers and staff who want to join us," the firm said. The firm since its launch is continuing to represent Google and Qualcomm in litigation, alongside Paul Weiss lawyers that are still on the cases, court records show. Four firms sued the Trump administration after they were hit with executive orders like the one against Paul Weiss. Judges have permanently struck down the orders in three of the cases so far, ruling that Trump unconstitutionally retaliated against the firms for their past cases and associations.
Yahoo
a day ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Editorial: Standing by the rule of law: Fighting back against Trump's attack
In a lengthy ruling last week, U.S. District Judge Richard Leon of D.C. knocked down President Donald Trump's efforts to punish the law firm WilmerHale by stripping its lawyers of security clearances and attempting to prevent government contractors from working with it, part of a broader strategy to target the legal sector. Leon channeled the feelings of all those who care about American political liberty and democracy in sounding bewildered and exasperated by the government's actions, writing that Trump's order 'must be struck down in its entirety as unconstitutional. Indeed, to rule otherwise would be unfaithful to the judgment and vision of the Founding Fathers!' using one of my many exclamation marks in his judgement. His overall position was simple and straightforward: to punish law firms for work that the executive considered politically disfavored would in effect be to end the justice system as we know it, and certainly to take it from a flawed but necessary arbiter of the law to yet another tool in the president's arsenal. On this basic premise he agreed with two fellow federal judges that have already ruled against similar efforts targeting Perkins Coie and Jenner & Block. As the firms and the judges pointed out, the president's actions had immediate impact on their business, causing both existing and prospective clients to flock away. Still, it seems now that these consequences aren't going to be as acute as they are for some of their competitors, who instead went the route of negotiating with and attempting to appease Trump. Most infamously, Paul Weiss was the first to strike a deal that had it pledging $40 million in free legal services to advance the president's agenda, in addition to all manner of other concessions. There have already been numerous reports that high-level clients have dropped the law firms that bent the knee, including Microsoft switching from Simpson Thacher & Bartlett to Jenner & Block. Multiple high-level partners have recently left Paul Weiss. To that we say: good. It should be made clear to powerful law firms, which have the resources and connections to effectively fight back if they want to, that capitulation is the wrong strategy not only morally but financially and reputationally. After all, who is going to vest their trust in $1,000-an-hour lawyers that won't go so far as to defend themselves against an aggressive federal government? These reputations, built over decades – or, in the case of certain universities, centuries — cannot be easily recovered. Trump will not succeed in his project of knocking down the foundations of the American experiment, but everyone will remember the institutions that, for the sake of expediency, ease and next quarter's profits, decided they could stomach turning their backs on the principles that they once claimed to hold dear. These fights in these judgments have a higher order effect too. They are clear indications that the administration's efforts to appear all-powerful and unstoppable are a veneer. As much as they have tested our democratic system, they have not won a total victory, and are losing steam. Every single crack in the wall makes it harder for the administration to keep up the myth that it is unbeatable and can subjugate its enemies with ease. The firms fighting back will reap the rewards. ___
Yahoo
a day ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Editorial: Standing by the rule of law: Fighting back against Trump's attack
In a lengthy ruling last week, U.S. District Judge Richard Leon of D.C. knocked down President Donald Trump's efforts to punish the law firm WilmerHale by stripping its lawyers of security clearances and attempting to prevent government contractors from working with it, part of a broader strategy to target the legal sector. Leon channeled the feelings of all those who care about American political liberty and democracy in sounding bewildered and exasperated by the government's actions, writing that Trump's order 'must be struck down in its entirety as unconstitutional. Indeed, to rule otherwise would be unfaithful to the judgment and vision of the Founding Fathers!' using one of my many exclamation marks in his judgement. His overall position was simple and straightforward: to punish law firms for work that the executive considered politically disfavored would in effect be to end the justice system as we know it, and certainly to take it from a flawed but necessary arbiter of the law to yet another tool in the president's arsenal. On this basic premise he agreed with two fellow federal judges that have already ruled against similar efforts targeting Perkins Coie and Jenner & Block. As the firms and the judges pointed out, the president's actions had immediate impact on their business, causing both existing and prospective clients to flock away. Still, it seems now that these consequences aren't going to be as acute as they are for some of their competitors, who instead went the route of negotiating with and attempting to appease Trump. Most infamously, Paul Weiss was the first to strike a deal that had it pledging $40 million in free legal services to advance the president's agenda, in addition to all manner of other concessions. There have already been numerous reports that high-level clients have dropped the law firms that bent the knee, including Microsoft switching from Simpson Thacher & Bartlett to Jenner & Block. Multiple high-level partners have recently left Paul Weiss. To that we say: good. It should be made clear to powerful law firms, which have the resources and connections to effectively fight back if they want to, that capitulation is the wrong strategy not only morally but financially and reputationally. After all, who is going to vest their trust in $1,000-an-hour lawyers that won't go so far as to defend themselves against an aggressive federal government? These reputations, built over decades – or, in the case of certain universities, centuries — cannot be easily recovered. Trump will not succeed in his project of knocking down the foundations of the American experiment, but everyone will remember the institutions that, for the sake of expediency, ease and next quarter's profits, decided they could stomach turning their backs on the principles that they once claimed to hold dear. These fights in these judgments have a higher order effect too. They are clear indications that the administration's efforts to appear all-powerful and unstoppable are a veneer. As much as they have tested our democratic system, they have not won a total victory, and are losing steam. Every single crack in the wall makes it harder for the administration to keep up the myth that it is unbeatable and can subjugate its enemies with ease. The firms fighting back will reap the rewards. ___
E&E News
4 days ago
- Business
- E&E News
Top lawyer in climate litigation elected to Harvard board
An attorney who has represented Exxon Mobil in its fight against lawsuits that seek to hold the oil and gas industry liable for climate change has been selected as a member of the powerful body that oversees Harvard University. Kannon Shanmugam, who leads the Supreme Court practice at the firm Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, will join the Harvard Corp. as its newest member on July 1. Shanmugam has represented Exxon in its push to quash the raft of lawsuits for nearly a decade, arguing before the Colorado Supreme Court in February that a lawsuit filed by the city of Boulder should be rejected. Advertisement Shanmugam's election to the Harvard board comes as the school is under attack by the Trump administration, which has moved to cancel the school's federal funding and prevent it from enrolling foreign students.
Yahoo
6 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Judges on Trump's war on Big Law: 5 explosive quotes from recent orders
Trump is on a losing streak in court against law firms challenging his executive orders. Judges cite constitutional violations and lack of national security justification. The Paul Weiss deal has repeatedly come up in rulings striking down executive orders. President Donald Trump's recent string of court losses in his war on Big Law has resulted in sweeping smackdowns from federal judges. The judges, all sitting in the US District Court for Washington, DC, ruled against the Trump administration and blocked executive orders targeting WilmerHale, Jenner & Block, and Perkins Coie. A decision is still pending in a fourth lawsuit brought by Susman Godfrey over an order targeting the firm. Nine other law firms have struck deals with Trump, promising a collective near-$1 billion in pro bono work toward his political priorities while averting a punitive executive order. But the deal struck with Paul Weiss — the first firm to reach an agreement, resulting in a rolled-back executive order — may have backfired on the Trump administration. In ruling after ruling, judges cite the Paul Weiss affair as an example of how Trump's purported "national security" justifications for his executive orders never made any sense. Here are the five sharpest takedowns from judges in the Big Law fight. Coming out of the gate with the first summary judgment decision, US District Judge Beryl Howell compared Trump's executive order targeting Perkins Coie to a quote from William Shakespeare's "Henry VI." "In a cringe-worthy twist on the theatrical phrase 'Let's kill all the lawyers,' EO 14230 takes the approach of 'Let's kill the lawyers I don't like,' sending the clear message: lawyers must stick to the party line, or else," Howell wrote. Trump's executive order, Howell said, was meant to disarm a law firm that might challenge his power. "When Shakespeare's character, a rebel leader intent on becoming king, hears this suggestion, he promptly incorporates this tactic as part of his plan to assume power, leading in the same scene to the rebel leader demanding '[a]way with him,' referring to an educated clerk, who 'can make obligations and write court hand,'" Howell wrote. "Eliminating lawyers as the guardians of the rule of law removes a major impediment to the path to more power." In an order protecting Jenner & Block, US District Judge John Bates wrote that Trump's order violated the US Constitution in two ways: It violated the First Amendment by using "the power of the State to punish or suppress disfavored expression," and it sought to undermine the courts. "Going after law firms in this way is doubly violative of the Constitution," Bates wrote. The "more pernicious" message of Trump's order was to prevent lawyers from protecting people against "governmental viewpoint becoming government-imposed orthodoxy," according to Bates. "This order, like the others, seeks to chill legal representation the administration doesn't like, thereby insulating the Executive Branch from the judicial check fundamental to the separation of powers," he wrote. Like the other judges, Bates pointed to Trump backtracking his executive order targeting Paul Weiss as evidence that his legal justifications for executive orders targeting other law firms were not sincere. In each order, Trump has claimed that "national security" issues — which Justice Department lawyers struggled to explain in court filings and hearings — allowed him to issue orders stripping law firm employees of security clearances and cutting them off from government buildings and employees. Bates wrote that the rollback of the order targeting Paul Weiss demonstrated that it was never the real reason behind Trump's order targeting Jenner & Block. "If any doubt remains as to the sincerity of the invocation of national security, take a look at the Paul Weiss saga," Bates wrote. "Paul Weiss's executive order imposed the same tailored process on its employees' security clearances," he continued. "What it took to escape that process — denouncing a former partner, changing client selection and hiring practices, and pledging pro bono work to the President's liking — had not even a glancing relationship to national security." US District Judge Richard Leon's exclamation point-ridden order knocking down an executive order targeting WilmerHale quotes from Alexander Hamilton and the Federalist papers about the importance of an independent judiciary. He wasn't alone — Howell said in her earlier order that John Adams made the unpopular decision to represent British soldiers accused of murder for their roles in the Boston Massacre. "The cornerstone of the American system of justice is an independent judiciary and an independent bar willing to tackle unpopular cases, however daunting," Leon wrote. "The Founding Fathers knew this!" Trump's executive orders violated those "fundamental rights," he wrote. "I have concluded that this Order must be struck down in its entirety as unconstitutional," he wrote. "Indeed, to rule otherwise would be unfaithful to the judgment and vision of the Founding Fathers!" Leon's gumbo metaphor is, once again, a spicy swipe at Paul Weiss. In arguments leading up to each decision, judges weighed whether to block the entirety of each of Trump's orders or allow some parts to stand. In a footnote, Leon broke down the five different sections of the WilmerHale order and compared them to gumbo ingredients. "The Order is akin to a gumbo. Sections 2 through 5 are the meaty ingredients — e.g., the Andouille, the okra, the tomatoes, the crab, the oysters," the judge wrote. "But it is the roux — here, §1 — which holds everything together." Leon wrote that Trump rescinding Paul Weiss's order "in full" after it struck a deal shows that he intended the orders "to stand or fall as a whole." "A gumbo is served and eaten with all the ingredients together, and so too must the sections of the Order be addressed together," he wrote. The judge also made clear that the gumbo is spicy. "As explained in this Memorandum Opinion, this gumbo gives the Court heartburn," he wrote. Read the original article on Business Insider
