{"id":120548,"date":"2025-05-27T16:03:15","date_gmt":"2025-05-28T00:03:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/2025\/05\/27\/trump-gets-ass-kicked-again-this-time-its-the-order-against-wilmer\/"},"modified":"2025-05-27T16:03:15","modified_gmt":"2025-05-28T00:03:15","slug":"trump-gets-ass-kicked-again-this-time-its-the-order-against-wilmer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/2025\/05\/27\/trump-gets-ass-kicked-again-this-time-its-the-order-against-wilmer\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump Gets Ass Kicked Again\u2026 This Time It\u2019s The Order Against Wilmer"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"
(Photo by PAUL J. RICHARDS\/AFP\/Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This will come as a shock, but the White House can\u2019t just arbitrarily punish law firms for disagreeing with the president. Feel free to pass this message along to Paul Weiss and the crowd<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Fresh off the retaliatory order Trump lodged against Jenner & Block getting struck down<\/a> \u2014 which itself came after the Perkins Coie order got kicked to the curb<\/a> \u2014 a judge just struck down the order purporting to punish WilmerHale.<\/p>\n

It clocks in at a whopping 73 pages<\/a>, but Judge Richard Leon \u2014 a George W. Bush appointee for the record \u2014 prepared a TL;DR for the mouthbreathers at the DOJ who have to deliver a synopsis for Mar-a-Lago.<\/p>\n

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“The FoundingFathers knew this!””to rule otherwise would be unfaithful to the judgment and vision of the Founding Fathers!”Two exclamation points!!storage.courtlistener.com\/recap\/gov.us\u2026<\/p>\n

\u2014 Ryan J. Reilly \u201cpaints a vivid and urgent portrait of\u2026 disarray\u201d (@ryanjreilly.com)<\/a> 2025-05-27T20:29:53.259Z<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

This isn\u2019t exactly a surprise. Even within the universe of unconstitutional power grabs, the orders targeting law firms were especially clumsily written. So much so that there\u2019s little justification for the surrendering firms not to stand up for themselves.<\/p>\n

At least, through cowardice, the firms helped strengthen the position of firms willing to stand on principle:<\/p>\n

\n

This \u201cretaliatory action\u201d is more than \u201csufficient to deter a person of ordinary firmness in [WilmerHale\u2019s] position from speaking again.\u201d See Aref, 833 F.3d at 258 (internal quotation marks omitted). The Order shouts through a bullhorn: If you take on causes disfavored by President Trump, you will be punished! Other firms facing similar Executive Orders have capitulated to President Trump. See, e.g., Pl.\u2019s SUMF \u00b6\u00b6 87\u201391 (explaining that Paul Weiss reached an agreement with President Trump to revoke the Paul Weiss Order because it was \u201can unprecedented threat to the firm\u201d (citing Pl.\u2019s MSJ Ex. 26 [Dkt. #16-4] at 168\u201376)); 13 id. \u00b6\u00b6 102\u201309 (explaining that Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP, Willkie Farr & Gallagher LLP, and Milbank LLP reached agreements with President Trump to proactively avoid Executive Orders); 14 see also Compl. \u00b6\u00b6 102\u201303.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

For those keeping score, there\u2019s another exclamation point. We\u2019ve also gotten a federal judge to officially brand those firms as capitulators.<\/p>\n

Also, while we\u2019re talking about the score, Trump is still 0-fer here.<\/p>\n

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\"Headshot\"Joe Patrice<\/a>\u00a0is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer<\/a>. Feel free to\u00a0email<\/a> any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on\u00a0Twitter<\/a>\u00a0or Bluesky<\/a> if you\u2019re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news. Joe also serves as a Managing Director at RPN Executive Search<\/a>.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The post Trump Gets Ass Kicked Again\u2026 This Time It\u2019s The Order Against Wilmer<\/a> appeared first on Above the Law<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"\"
(Photo by PAUL J. RICHARDS\/AFP\/Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This will come as a shock, but the White House can\u2019t just arbitrarily punish law firms for disagreeing with the president. Feel free to pass this message along to Paul Weiss and the crowd<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Fresh off the retaliatory order Trump lodged against Jenner & Block getting struck down<\/a> \u2014 which itself came after the Perkins Coie order got kicked to the curb<\/a> \u2014 a judge just struck down the order purporting to punish WilmerHale.<\/p>\n

It clocks in at a whopping 73 pages<\/a>, but Judge Richard Leon \u2014 a George W. Bush appointee for the record \u2014 prepared a TL;DR for the mouthbreathers at the DOJ who have to deliver a synopsis for Mar-a-Lago.<\/p>\n

This isn\u2019t exactly a surprise. Even within the universe of unconstitutional power grabs, the orders targeting law firms were especially clumsily written. So much so that there\u2019s little justification for the surrendering firms not to stand up for themselves.<\/p>\n

At least, through cowardice, the firms helped strengthen the position of firms willing to stand on principle:<\/p>\n

\n

This \u201cretaliatory action\u201d is more than \u201csufficient to deter a person of ordinary firmness in [WilmerHale\u2019s] position from speaking again.\u201d See Aref, 833 F.3d at 258 (internal quotation marks omitted). The Order shouts through a bullhorn: If you take on causes disfavored by President Trump, you will be punished! Other firms facing similar Executive Orders have capitulated to President Trump. See, e.g., Pl.\u2019s SUMF \u00b6\u00b6 87\u201391 (explaining that Paul Weiss reached an agreement with President Trump to revoke the Paul Weiss Order because it was \u201can unprecedented threat to the firm\u201d (citing Pl.\u2019s MSJ Ex. 26 [Dkt. #16-4] at 168\u201376)); 13 id. \u00b6\u00b6 102\u201309 (explaining that Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP, Willkie Farr & Gallagher LLP, and Milbank LLP reached agreements with President Trump to proactively avoid Executive Orders); 14 see also Compl. \u00b6\u00b6 102\u201303.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

For those keeping score, there\u2019s another exclamation point. We\u2019ve also gotten a federal judge to officially brand those firms as capitulators.<\/p>\n

Also, while we\u2019re talking about the score, Trump is still 0-fer here.<\/p>\n

\n

\"Headshot\"Joe Patrice<\/a>\u00a0is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer<\/a>. Feel free to\u00a0email<\/a> any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on\u00a0Twitter<\/a>\u00a0or Bluesky<\/a> if you\u2019re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news. Joe also serves as a Managing Director at RPN Executive Search<\/a>.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(Photo by PAUL J. RICHARDS\/AFP\/Getty Images) This will come as a shock, but the White House can\u2019t just arbitrarily punish law firms for disagreeing with the president. Feel free to pass this message along to Paul Weiss and the crowd. Fresh off the retaliatory order Trump lodged against Jenner & Block getting struck down \u2014 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":120549,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-120548","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-above_the_law"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/xira.com\/p\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Headshot-300x200-tfPZSm.jpeg?fit=300%2C200&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120548","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=120548"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120548\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/120549"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=120548"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=120548"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=120548"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}