Susman Law Firm, Hit with an Executive Order, Sues Trump in DC Court

Bloomberg’s Justin Henry and Tatyana Monnay report that Susman Godfrey has joined the list of law firms resisting Trump administration executive orders. Susman Godfrey v. Executive Office of the President was filed in the US District Court for the District of Columbia on April 11.

According to the firm’s complaint, Trump’s order was “in retaliation against organizations and people that he dislikes.” The order claims that the Sussman firm “spearheads efforts to weaponize the American legal system and degrade the quality of American elections.”

In their article about the lawsuit, the reporters note that Susman represented Dominion Voting Systems Inc. in its successful defamation lawsuit against Fox Corp. for claiming that Dominion’s voting machines were “rigged,” as part of a conspiracy to steal the 2020 election.

The Susman firm has also sued Trump associate Mike Lindell, CEO of MyPillow.

The executive order both restricts the firm’s lawyers from accessing government buildings and directs agencies to terminate federal contracts with its clients.

“Simply put,” the complaint says, “the Order endeavors to foreclose the Firm from practicing law—for the perceived transgression of undertaking representations with which the President disagrees.”

“Nothing in our Constitution or laws grants a President such power,” says the complaint.

The lawsuit comes at a time when a growing list of law firms has struck deals with Trump, pledging a total of $940 million in free legal services, in order, according to the article, “to stay out of the bull’s eye.”

Donald Verrilli is now representing Susman, a former Obama administration solicitor general with the Munger Tolles & Olson law firm. That firm has taken a leading role in resisting the Trump executive orders, including by organizing an amicus brief involving hundreds of law firms in support of those that have been targeted.

“Today it is our firm under attack, but tomorrow it could be any of us,” Susman Godfrey said in a statement.