'Pawns in Trump’s game': Ex-US attorney flags key reason law firms are being targeted

President Donald Trump has been lately focused on bringing some of the nation's biggest law firms to heel, with many deciding to accommodate the White House rather than fight back. But according to one legal veteran, they be unwitting accomplices toward helping Trump accomplish a larger goal.

Trump has signed a multitude of executive orders blacklisting multiple law firms known for representing Trump's political opponents to be blacklisted by the federal government. Under the orders, attorneys who work at the firms in question can be stripped of their security clearances and banned from entering federal buildings, while the firms themselves can have their existing contracts terminated while federal agencies are prohibited from entering into any further contracts with them. Some law firms have cut deals with Trump to provide millions of dollars in free work in exchange for no longer being in his crosshairs, while others have fought back.

In a Friday op-ed for MSNBC, former U.S. Attorney Barbara McQuade — who former President Barack Obama appointed to the Eastern District of Michigan — suggested that Trump could be enlisting these firms as part of his aim to rewrite the history of the 2020 election. She pointed out that through their agreements to do pro bono work on behalf of the administration, these firms may now be legally bound to "advance Trump’s disinformation campaign" to legitimize his false claims that the 2020 election was stolen from him.

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"These firms, which Trump said have agreed to pay from $40 million to $125 million each, are allowing themselves to be used as pawns in Trump’s game to change public perception about his own legal troubles," McQuade wrote. "He is characterizing the enormous payouts as concessions; proof that he has been a victim of what White House aide Will Scharf referred to as 'lawfare.'"

According to Democratic election attorney Marc Elias, nine firms have so far agreed to provide $940 million worth of free labor for the Trump administration. McQuade noted that Trump's latest order targeting the firm Susman Godfried appears to be because its lawyers represented Dominion Voting Systems, which found itself having to defend baseless claims of voting machine rigging in 2020. The order targeting Susman said the firm "spearheads efforts to weaponize the American legal system and degrade the quality of American elections."

Additionally, the Susman order was accompanied by a "fact sheet" that proclaimed Trump was "delivering on his promise to end the weaponization of government and protect the nation from partisan and bad faith actors who exploit their influence." And the administration said without evidence that other firms that had been targeted by prior orders were singled out for “election misconduct.”

McQuade praised the three law firms that sued to stop Trump's attacks against them from going into effect. Perkins Coie, WilmerHale and Jenner & Block all sued successfully, winning temporary restraining orders allowing them to keep their contracts, security clearances and access to federal buildings. She argued that those firms should "be applauded for their courage," and that when defending attorneys' right to do their work uninhibited by the administration, "there is no right and left. There is only right and wrong."

Click here to read McQuade's op-ed in full.