Washington — A federal judge on Tuesday said she will prevent the Trump administration from enforcing portions of an executive order that targets the law firm Susman Godfrey, finding that the directive likely retaliates against the firm and its clients for their exercise of constitutionally protected speech.
U.S. District Judge Loren AliKhan granted the firm’s request for a temporary restraining order following a hearing and said Susman Godfrey is likely to succeed on its claims that the executive order, signed by President Trump last week, violates the First and Fifth Amendments. She specifically blocked the administration from enforcing provisions relating to federal contracting and restricting Susman employees’ access to federal buildings and from engaging with government workers.
AliKhan said while delivering her ruling from the bench that the government “sought to use its immense power to dictate the positions that law firms may or may not take,” which threatens the foundation of legal representation in the U.S. She said the executive order is “based on a personal vendetta” against Susman Godfrey.
“The framers of our Constitution would see this as a shocking abuse of power,” AliKhan, who sits on the federal district court in Washington, D.C., said.
Susman Godfrey is the fourth law firm to succeed in the early stages of lawsuits that challenge executive orders signed by Mr. Trump. The orders, signed over the past few weeks, each threaten the firms with sanctions because of their legal work, as well as lawyers who are currently or were previously on their payrolls.
Susman Godfrey represented Dominion Voting Systems in a defamation lawsuit filed against Fox News over baseless claims it aired about the 2020 election, which Mr. Trump falsely claims was rigged against him. The case ended with a $787 million settlement agreement before the start of the trial. The firm is also representing Dominion in a defamation case against Newsmax, a conservative television network. A jury trial in that dispute is slated to begin at the end of the month.
During the hearing, Donald Verrilli, who is representing Susman Godfrey, called Mr. Trump’s executive order “one of the most brazenly unconstitutional exercises of executive power in the history of this nation.” He told the court it “runs roughshod” over the separation of powers.
Pointing to other law firms that have reached deals with the White House, likely to head-off being targeted by Mr. Trump, Verrilli said they have done so to “stay on the president’s good side.” Those nine firms have agreed to provide between $40 million and $125 million in pro bono work to causes backed by the president.
“We’re sliding very fast into an abyss,” Verrilli said. “There’s only one way to stop that slide: for courts to act decisively and act decisively now.”
In addition to Susman Godfrey, Mr. Trump has signed executive orders that seek to punish the firms Perkins Coie, Jenner & Block, and Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr. The firms have all filed lawsuits challenging the constitutionality of the orders, and judges have issued temporary orders blocking enforcement of portions of them while the litigation continues.
