by John Seymour, a retired attorney living in Arlington, Virginia.
During President Theodore Roosevelt’s terms of office he frequently referred to his office as a “bully pulpit” — the perfect place from which to advocate for his foreign and domestic agendas. Today, President Trump’s “bullying” embodies the word’s more contemporary meaning — one who seeks to harm or intimidate those he views as weaker and more vulnerable.
In recent days, Trump has issued an executive order stripping security clearances from lawyers at the law firm of Covington & Burling who are providing pro bono legal assistance to Jack Smith. As Special Counsel, Mr. Smith led the Justice Department investigation into Trump’s involvement in the January 6th insurrection at the Capitol. His report concluded that the charge against Trump for election subversion represented one “in which the offense was most flagrant, the public harm the greatest, and the proof the most certain.” Unsurprisingly, Mr. Smith is now under attack by Trump and his allies.
Even more recently, Ed Martin, Trump’s acolyte at the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the District of Columbia, sent a letter to Georgetown University Law Center, demanding that the School cease all diversity, equity and inclusion efforts and warning that, if it did not, the Office would not hire the School’s graduates. Mr. Martin also reportedly referred to the School as a hive of anti-Trump activism and urged that Georgetown’s federal grant and loan fees be cut.
As a legal matter, both President Trump’s and Mr. Martin’s actions violate the U.S. Constitution in the most flagrant and brazen way. Its First Amendment protects the rights of individuals and institutions to freedom of expression — the rights of individuals to petition the courts and retain legal counsel, the rights of attorneys to practice their profession without fear of political reprisal, and the rights of universities to determine what they may teach, and to whom. Indeed, in recent days a federal district court condemned Trump’s attacks on another prominent D.C. law firm, Perkins Coie, for engaging in legal work on behalf of the Hillary Clinton campaign. In a strongly worded opinion, the court found that the attacks “threatened the very foundation of our legal system” in a way that “sends chills down my spine.”
In addition to its legal infirmities, the Trump Administration’s impulsive and vindictive bullying of law firms and law schools will almost certainly prove self-defeating. Law firms who represent clients persecuted by powerful interests command respect from current clients and present an irresistible appeal to prospective ones. Covington & Burling, in particular, has an enviable and long-standing reputation as a law firm that stands up to intimidation. Over the decades, Covington has won numerous national awards for its pro bono practice, taking on some of the most difficult and controversial national legal matters. A firm lawyer served as defense attorney for Fred Korematsu in his landmark Supreme Court challenge to the World War II internment of Japanese Americans. Firm lawyers today represent numerous Guantanamo Bay detainees and prisoners on death row. Their courage and integrity on behalf of clients in times of national turmoil, like today’s, have been tested time and time again and proven utterly immune to political attack.
Trump’s actions against the firm for its representation of Jack Smith, a career prosecutor to whom the nation owes a profound debt of gratitude for his unwavering service in the face of partisan attacks on his character and professional probity, will fail to harm the firm, as they are intended to. They will only burnish Covington’s reputation for exemplary advocacy on behalf of those facing government persecution, in the best tradition of the legal profession.
The same can be said for Georgetown Law Center. Despite the Supreme Court’s recent decision to ban race-based affirmative action programs at universities, the Jesuit institution continues to design and implement lawful, yet aggressive, programs designed to increase minority representation in the legal profession locally and nationally. In his response to Mr. Martin’s threat, the Dean of the Law School, William Treanor, remains steadfast — the federal government simply cannot “direct what Georgetown and its faculty teach and how to teach it” and expressed his conviction that Mr. Martin must ensure that Georgetown students receive full and fair consideration in any hiring decision.
If Mr. Martin fulfills his threat to penalize newly-minted lawyers because the School’s refuses to end programs and teachings deemed offensive to the Trump Administration, the Office and the people of the District will suffer the loss of superb legal talent. He will discourage well-qualified and public-service minded attorneys, graduates of both Georgetown and other law schools, from applying there. Young lawyers, in particular, still believe that the law “is the stone in David’s sling.” They want to work within institutions, and attend law schools, that share that same belief.
As one who was fortunate to have practiced with, and learned from, talented and passionate Covington & Burling lawyers as a young associate there decades ago, and also was selected to work with equally accomplished and dedicated government attorneys at the U.S. Attorney’s Office in D.C. while studying law at Georgetown, I was appalled, but not surprised, by the Administration’s threats.
From Trump, we have long learned to expect only contempt for the law, and spite and malice in his dealings with his opponents. From Mr. Martin, it appears, we can expect only the skimpiest and most ideologically distorted understanding of the law. From Covington & Burling and Georgetown, though, we can expect the best in legal training and practice, and the continued honorable defense of the institution that protects us all from tyranny — the rule of law itself.
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