Brad Karp Heckling Shows Anger at Law Firms Hasn’t Faded

It’s been a difficult year for Brad Karp, chair of Wall Street law firm Paul Weiss. In January he suffered a heart attack and then, a few months later, he chose to strike a pro bono deal with the Trump administration to stave off a punitive executive order.

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In a recent speech at a gala event in New York, Karp said the latter was more painful than the former. But during that speech, a fellow attorney stood up and heckled him—an indication of how raw feelings within the legal industry still are over the pro bono deals.

Bloomberg Law reporter Mike Vilensky was at the event and saw all of this go down. He joins our podcast, On The Merits, to talk about who shouted at Karp, why, and what the two had to say to each other after the event concluded.

Do you have feedback on this episode of On The Merits? Give us a call and leave a voicemail at 703-341-3690.

This transcript was produced by Bloomberg Law Automation.

Host (David Schultz):

Hello, and welcome back to On the Merits, the news podcast from Bloomberg Law. I’m your host, David Schultz.

So today we’re talking about the law firm Paul Weiss and its chairman, Brad Karp. The firm has had its ups and downs this year, but for Karp himself, it’s unfortunately been more down than up. In January, he suffered a heart attack, and then in March, his firm, along with many others, came under attack from the Trump administration. To fend off these attacks, Paul Weiss struck a deal with the White House to provide millions in pro bono legal services to causes supported by the White House. This angered many who felt it was a capitulation to the president, and as evidenced by what went down a few weeks ago, that anger has not faded.

Anti-Trump activists protested outside of a legal industry gala in New York that Karp attended, and then inside, an attorney shouted Karp down as he tried to deliver a speech. Bloomberg Law reporter Mike Vilensky was at the gala where this all went down, and he’s going to describe what it was like and describe the surprising conversation Karp had with his heckler after the event. We also reached out to Paul Weiss to see if Karp himself wanted to come on the podcast, but the firm declined.

So let’s get to my conversation with Vilensky. I started by asking him to catch us all up on what happened earlier this year with Paul Weiss and the White House.

Guest (Mike Vilensky):

Back in March, the Trump administration targeted a number of big law firms, and Paul Weiss was one of them. The executive order threatened the contracts with the federal government of Paul Weiss’ clients. It also threatened to revoke Paul Weiss’ security clearances for their attorneys and restrict their access to federal buildings. And in response, Paul Weiss came to an agreement with President Trump to provide $40 million in free legal services. And according to the president’s version of the deal, they would also cut back on their DEI programs and hiring.

Host:

So do we know how this has been going since then? Like how close is Paul Weiss is sort of fulfilling its end of the deal for the pro bono work?

Guest:

I think it’s pretty opaque at this point. What Paul Weiss is substantively doing to make good on this deal, but how it’s going more broadly for the firm since then, I think is also a little unclear, but mixed. I mean, the firm continues to be quite lucrative according to what metrics we have. They, in quarter three, were overseeing deals of an average of more than $2 billion, but have lost some high-profile litigation partners at a time when firms like Kirkland are prioritizing litigation.

And some of the attorneys they’ve lost include Jeh Johnson, a former Obama administration official, and Damian Williams, who is a former Manhattan US attorney. And I would, many others have left as well. Those were two of the more high-profile departures. And Williams, notably, went to Jenner & Block, which is a firm that was also targeted by the president in an executive order, but rather than make a deal, has sued and has so far been successful in that litigation .

This event that I attended earlier this month, this was one of the first, if not the first time, Brad Karp, the chair of the firm, has ever commented publicly on this deal.

Host:

All right, well, let’s get into this event. Where was it, what was the event, and what was the occasion? Tell me all about what this was.

Guest:

Sure, so this was an anniversary gala for an organization called the New York Bar Foundation, which is the philanthropic arm of the New York State Bar Association, or NYSBA. NYSBA is the largest voluntary state bar organization in the country.

Host:

Where was this, in the city?

Guest:

Yeah, so it was in Midtown at an event hall called Gotham Hall. It’s a former bank, very elaborate, sort of dramatic space.

Host:

Right, I was looking at some photos people posted, and this is a pretty formal event, like tuxes, ball gowns. I saw that New York Knick Jalen Brunson was in attendance.

Guest:

Yeah, I felt pretty underdressed. There was some tuxes in the crowd. There was, New York Knick player Jalen Brunson was actually honored at this event, but really, there were many, many big law partners. The chief judge of New York State Courts, Rowan Wilson, was there, and the other honorees included Paul Weiss’ partner, Loretta Lynch, and Carrie Cohen of Morrison Foerster, and the chief legal officer of Apollo Global, so definitely a room of legal elites.

Host:

Sure, so let’s get to the protesting and the heckling. It sounds like it started sort of as people were entering, that there were protesters at the entrance to the event. Was this something where everyone who entered the building had to pass by them?

Guest:

Yeah, you couldn’t miss them. They were at the main entrance that, as far as I know, all attendees entered through. They were holding letters that spelled out no kings. There was a pretty sizable crowd. I mean, less than 100, but more than a dozen. Can’t miss them, and holding signs, which, to my surprise, I suppose, had the name Paul Weiss on it. It said, like, Paul Weiss sold out democracy. Other signs referenced the deal with Trump. There were some signs targeting other firms as well, but really kind of specific .

Host:

Yeah, and then let’s get into sort of the meat of the story, which is during Brad Karp’s speech, someone got up and started heckling him. Tell me what that was like. Did everyone kind of gasp in the room, or were people kind of expecting it? Like, what was this moment like?

Guest:

This was kind of savvy heckler, because it almost became like a call and response, where the heckler was responding to Karp’s remarks in real time, and just as any speaker kind of pauses. So Karp would say, we’ve committed a record number of pro bono hours this year. And then the heckler would say, for Trump? And Karp would say, we’ve done XYZ in our pro bono work, and the heckler would say, for Trump? So it had this kind of rhythmic quality to it, even as Karp tried to ignore it .

Host:

This event wasn’t open to the public, right? It was just sort of, you know, invitees and the press.

Guest:

Exactly, yeah.

Host:

So the reason I ask that is because this means that the person who was heckling Karp was an invitee, and now thanks to your reporting, we know who that was. It was Raymond Dowd, a partner at the firm Dunnington Bartholow & Miller. And you spoke to Dowd about this. What did he tell you about why he decided to do this?

Guest:

Yeah, that’s right. So Dowd is a longtime civil litigator. He specializes in copyright law, not someone who regularly protests, but someone who is there as a member of the bar, not as a demonstrator. And he told me that he did this spontaneously. He had no plan to do it. He was sort of overtaken by the moment, and in particular by the idea that Karp would make these remarks unchallenged, that in this forum of giving a speech to a room of legal elites, there was no one to offer another perspective on the deal that Paul Weiss had cut. And he felt it was incumbent on members of the bar to speak out against these executive orders, which he described as targeting firms over their viewpoint.

Host:

But it doesn’t sound like it was a premeditated thing on his behalf.

Guest:

Definitely not.

Host:

So what was it like when Dowd stood up and started yelling? Like, what was the reaction from people inside the room?

Guest:

It was very awkward, but it was kind of already awkward before that. So Karp was not an honoree. He was just a speaker. And he spoke for about 30 minutes, and maybe two thirds of the speech was literally a list of Paul Weiss’s pro bono work, beginning at the foundation of the firm through today, as though someone had prompted him, like, would you mind listing what Paul Weiss has done? But no one had given that prompt, and that wasn’t really what the other speeches were about. So his speech stood out even before the heckler started speaking for its kind of defensive quality, I would say.

Host:

Yeah, I mean, the other thing that I saw that just kind of stopped me in my tracks when I was reading your story was him talking about having a heart attack earlier this year in January, and him saying that the executive orders and the attacks on the law firms were worse than having a heart attack. That was pretty remarkable.

Guest:

Yeah, exactly. I also found that remarkable. Because he’s spoken so infrequently about the firm’s agreement, I sort of anticipated that he wanted to say something and he would maybe bring it up, but when he did, the room was quiet. People were paying attention. This was not kind of your average let’s all toast champagne type of speech. He wanted to get something off his chest. He wanted to say something. And speaking personally about his health issues was also very notable.

Host:

So when Dowd stood up and started yelling, did Karp acknowledge him, or did he just sort of continue and pretend like he wasn’t there?

Guest:

Karp did not acknowledge him in real time at all, but while they didn’t purposefully interact in real time, or Karp didn’t respond in real time, Dowd told me that Karp later called him and they discussed what went down. Dowd didn’t provide details of the conversation, but said Karp didn’t come with rage. He wanted to kind of explain his position more and talk it through. I think Dowd appreciated the call, but has not changed his position on the issue.

Host:

That’s fascinating. So they actually spoke afterward and it sounds like they kind of agreed to disagree. It doesn’t sound like they’re gonna be best friends now, but they are on better terms, I guess?

Guest:

Yeah, I think that’s fair. It sounded like they heard each other out respectfully and Dowd feels the same as he did before about the issue itself, but maybe has a little bit better idea of where Karp is coming from.

Host:

Wow, I wish I could have been a fly on the wall during that conversation. Okay, well, in addition to speaking to Dowd, you also spoke to some of the protesters who were outside the event. What did they tell you?

Guest:

Yeah, so I spoke with one protester, James Kunen, who is himself an attorney, and he just really wanted to signal to these firms that they could not go unchallenged in their conduct related to these Trump executive orders, that he wanted them to be shamed, as he put it, not to sort of make these deals and sort of walk away reputationally unscathed.

Host:

And you mentioned that they were planning on showing up to law firms’ offices after this and kind of continuing this protest. Have they actually done that?

Guest:

Yeah, so I’ve spoken with another demonstrator since the event. And this demonstrator, Zach Winestine, he’s a filmmaker. He sort of described an increasingly organized collective of demonstrators against firms that cut deals with the Trump administration. And yes, they’ve begun protesting outside the offices. They do it every Tuesday. He said there’s been between 10 and 50 people from his description, and they take like a walk, essentially, where they go from Paul Weiss’s office to the Latham & Watkins office, as well as other firms that made these deals, and they carry signs. And they also now are going to the firms that have sued Trump, like Jenner & Block and Susman Godfrey, with signs saying, thank you for upholding the rule of law.

Host:

All right, well, we’ll see what happens. But for now, that was Mike Vilensky talking with us about a very interesting evening he had in New York City. Mike, thank you so much.

Guest:

Thank you for having me.

Host:

And that’ll do it for today’s episode of On The Merits. For more updates, visit our website at news.bloomberglaw.com. Once again, that’s news.bloomberglaw.com.

The podcast today was produced by myself, David Schultz, our editors were Chris Opfer and Alessandra Rafferty, and our executive producer is Josh Block. Thanks everyone for listening. See you next time.