A new memorandum of President Donald Trump authorized to the Attorney General and the Secretary of National Security of Sanctions of law firms that present demands that consider “frivolous” is an important escalation of his intensifier assaulting law firms, legal experts and former officials of the Department of Justice to NBC News.
The presidential memorandum, “prevention of the abuses of the legal system and the Federal Court” also ordered the attorney general PAM Bondi to revoke the authorizations of security of the lawyers or the termination of the federal contracts of the law firms if he considers his demands against the “irrational” or “vexatory” administration.
The memorandum, which was issued on Saturday, continues at the executive orders against three companies: Covington & Burling, who provided legal services for the former special advisor Jack Smith, who assured an accusation against Trump; Perkins Coie, who represented the Hillary Clinton campaign in 2016 and worked with an opposition investigation firm that compiled a dossier issued against Trump; And Paul Weiss, where a former firm partner, Mark Pomrantz, tried to build a criminal case against Trump while working at the Manhattan district prosecutor several years ago.
The executive orders suspended the security authorizations of the employees of the companies and prohibited them from some federal buildings, steps that would make it difficult to represent customers.
The most important thing, orders said that federal client contracts of law firms must also be reviewed. Brad Karp, the president of Paul Weiss who was criticized for reaching an agreement with Trump last week, cited that threat in a message to the employees who leaked shortly after sending it.
“The executive order could have easily destroyed our company,” Karp wrote. “In particular, he threatened our clients with the loss of their government contracts and the loss of access to the government, if they continued to use the company as their lawyers.”
Trump’s ally, Steve Bannon, said Trump’s goal is to be bankrupt of the companies that the administration perceives as enemies.
“He is going to get those law firms,” said Bannon. “What we are trying to do is get you out of business and bankruptcy.”
A group of 22 civil rights organizations, including NAACP and the American Union of Civil Libertads, condemned the new memorandum in a statement. They argued that he intended to “relax the dissent, avoid responsibility and arm the government to attack the opponents of this administration and their actions without law.”
White House officials defended the move.
“President Trump is fulfilling his promise to ensure that the judicial system will no longer be armed against the US people. The only remuneration of President Trump is the success and historical achievements for the US people,” said the assistant press secretary of the White House, Taylor Rogers, in a statement to news organizations.
David Laufman, former head of the Counterintelligence Section of the Department of Justice that served in Republican and Democratic Administrations, described the use of the power of the Executive Branch to intimidate the signatures of unprecedented lawyers and lawyers.
“If someone, in any previous White House in the modern era, would have plotted such an authoritarian plan to silence and punish the legal profession, the attorney general and the White House advisor would have intervened silently and the plan would quickly have filed,” he said by text message.
The spokesmen of the Department of Justice and the Department of National Security did not immediately respond to the requests for comments.
A former official of the Senior Department of Justice described the autocratic measure.
“The president does not appreciate how an adversary legal system and the role of an impartial judge in that process works,” said the former official, who requested anonymity due to concerns about reprisals.
“That is the best way to expose weak evidence and defective arguments,” he added. “The president rejects that system in favor of one in which he wins and his adversaries lose and are punished. That is not justice; that is autocracy.”
Legal experts also accused Trump of Hypocrisy, noting that their own lawyers have violated rule 11 of the federal rules of civil procedure, which prohibits lawyers from making false or frivolous claims in court.
Senior’s former Justice Department of Justice said that Trump’s legal statements that Joe Biden had won key states in 2020 by presenting fraudulent ballots “completely did not meet the standards of rule 11 that Trump quoted in his memorandum.”
Last year, the Supreme Court rejected an appeal of Sydney Powell and other Trump lawyers who were ordered to pay $ 150,000 in sanctions for submitting a lawsuit that questions the 2020 electoral results in Michigan. Powell also declared himself guilty in Georgia for state criminal charges related to his efforts to cancel Trump’s loss there.
A main lawyer of a law firm who has sued the administration said the bets are clear.
“The same sector of society is relaxing between Trump and tyranny,” said the lawyer. “The lawyers present demands and receive decisions that judge whether what the administration has done is constitutional or not. And that is our government system.
“I don’t think the severity of this can be exaggerated,” added the lawyer, a former federal prosecutor. “The law firms like this are a check. And if no one is bringing things to the courts, nothing will stop.”
