In a sharp and stinging blow to Donald Trump’s crusade against some of the nation’s biggest law firms, a federal judge has temporarily blocked most of his executive order targeting Susman Godfrey—calling out what she described as the White House’s “coercion” and “abuse of power.”
U.S. District Judge Loren AliKhan didn’t mince words. From her Washington bench, she froze the administration’s move to strip Susman Godfrey’s clients of federal contracts and bar the firm’s lawyers from government spaces, saying the effort was nothing more than a power grab meant to punish legal opposition.
“The government is purely trying to control what private lawyers may do,” she said in court. “And I do not think that will withstand constitutional scrutiny.”
Susman Godfrey filed suit after being swept into the storm of Trump’s escalating attacks on law firms tied to cases he disapproves of—especially those defending the outcome of the 2020 election. The firm represents Dominion Voting Systems, the company at the center of defamation cases tied to false voter fraud claims Trump has repeatedly promoted.
Judge AliKhan pointed to what she described as a disturbing trend: a growing number of firms capitulating to the administration’s pressure rather than risk retaliation. Since February, nine firms—among them legal powerhouses like Skadden and Paul Weiss—have struck agreements with the administration. Only four have chosen to fight back in court.
“Law firms across the country are entering into agreements with the government out of fear that they will be targeted next,” she said. “And while I wish other firms were not capitulating as readily, I admire firms like Susman for standing up and challenging it.”
The judge emphasized that the administration’s moves weren’t just anti-democratic—they could boomerang on cooperating firms later. “There’s nothing stopping the government from returning to target them in the future,” she warned.
Susman’s suit called Trump’s order a retaliatory attack aimed at punishing the firm for its work defending the truth of the 2020 election, which Trump lost to Joe Biden. Judge AliKhan agreed the order appeared to be deeply personal.
“The executive order is based on a personal vendetta against a particular firm,” she said. “And, frankly, I think the framers of our Constitution would view it as a shocking abuse of power.”
The White House didn’t directly address the ruling but claimed taxpayer dollars shouldn’t go to law firms that “harm national interests.”
Susman, in turn, thanked the court for recognizing the constitutional issues at stake and the threat the order posed not just to one firm—but to the rule of law itself.
This isn’t the first time Trump’s legal blitz has been clipped. Previous orders targeting firms like WilmerHale and Perkins Coie have also been blocked by other judges who found the lawsuits against the administration likely to succeed.
Trump has repeatedly accused major law firms of “weaponizing” the legal system against him and his agenda, citing their work in voting rights cases and their diversity hiring programs—another point of contention in the executive orders. Those orders demanded firms abandon diversity-focused hiring practices, claiming such policies discriminate against white candidates.
Firms that have chosen to settle reportedly agreed to provide vast sums of free legal work in support of Trump’s favored causes and pledged to make hiring decisions based strictly on “merit.”
Donald Verrilli, a former solicitor general and lead attorney for Susman Godfrey in this case, didn’t hold back either. “This is one of the most brazen unconstitutional exercises of executive power in the history of this nation,” he told the court.
And the broader legal world seems to agree. Over 800 law firms recently signed onto briefs supporting legal challenges to Trump’s orders, warning that these moves seek to “cow every other firm, large and small, into submission.”
At the hearing, a Justice Department lawyer insisted the executive order was still in the early stages and argued that it wasn’t punitive—yet. “This is not a fine. This is not jail time,” he said.
But from the bench, the message rang clear: courts won’t wait to act until the damage is irreversible.
