Paul Weiss Chairman Accuses Rival Firms of Pursuing Clients (1)

Competing law firms tried to poach Paul Weiss clients and attorneys after President Donald Trump issued an executive order targeting the firm, its chairman, Brad Karp, said in an internal message Sunday.

Paul Weiss was hit with an executive order March 14 that directed federal agencies to scrap contracts with companies who were its clients. The firm made a deal with Trump to persuade him to withdraw the order—after, Karp said, other firms did not rally to its defense.

“Disappointingly, far from support, we learned that certain other firms were seeking to exploit our vulnerabilities by aggressively soliciting our clients and recruiting our attorneys,” Karp said in a Sunday afternoon firmwide email.

Karp acknowledged the deal “has generated intense feelings across the firm and indeed across the entire legal and broader community” in his message, which was earlier reported by Original Jurisdiction.

Rather than taking Trump to court, the firm made a deal to ax the order in exchange for a range of stipulations, including not pursuing diversity, equity and inclusion practices and spending $40 million on pro bono matters that are important to the Trump administration.

“The administration is not dictating what matters we take on, approving our matters, or anything like that,” Karp said.

Karp also said that the firm initially planned to sue, but couldn’t see a way to survive the fight, even if it successfully halted the executive order. Like Perkins Coie, which was targeted by a March 6 executive order and is suing over it, Karp said existing clients at the firm were preparing to find new lawyers. Perkins said it lost clients because of the executive order.

Trump issued another executive order March 21 directing Attorney General Pam Bondi to sanction attorneys and firms “who engage in frivolous, unreasonable, and vexatious litigation against the United States or in matters before executive departments and agencies of the United States.”