Trump’s attack on Big Law puts London lawyers into an awkward place
US President Donald Trump has set his sights on a new target for his attacks: American lawyers and law firms. However, due to the dominance of US law firms in recent years in London, this problem has major reverberations across the Atlantic.
One could argue that Trump has lost his shock factor; what he does would be career-ending for any other US President, from threatening allies to trying to take over Canada.
But despite all of that, his new target is Big Law, and over the last week, he has put the legal sector in the US into crisis mode.
It stemmed from executive orders he signed against Covington & Burling and Perkins Coie earlier this month.
But it was no random pickings. Perkins represented the 2016 campaign of Hillary Clinton, while Covington represents Jack Smith, the man who brought criminal charges against Trump.
This was followed by another executive order over the weekend against Paul Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison. All because Mark Pomerantz, the man who investigated Trump’s finances and payments to Stormy Daniels, was a member.
The three firms had their US government security clearances revoked, and any government contracts held by the firms are now under review.
And the headache for the sector is far from over.
On Monday, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), a Federal agency, sent 11-page letters to 20 law firms requesting information on their DEI policies.
Among those 20 law firms are A&O Shearman, Freshfields, Hogan Lovells and Latham & Watkins.
The EEOC chair, Andrea Lucas, said it “is prepared to root out discrimination anywhere it may rear its head, including in our nation’s elite law firms”.
While commenting on the move, White House Press Secretary Harrison Fields said, “Law firms in America shouldn’t be fearful of President Trump; they should be fearful of the lawfare being perpetuated by federal judges hellbent on upending the Executive Branch.”
The move prompted the world’s largest legal professional body, the International Bar Association, to condemn it, calling it the “ongoing erosion of the rule of law”.
Now, Trump’s crackdown on DEI is not new; he has been spinning this narrative since he stepped back into the Oval Office. However, executive orders against lawyers because of their clients and work is a big red flag.
As lawyers across the Atlantic scratch their heads on whether to bury their heads in the sand or to stand up for the “rule of law”, the lawyers in London are in an awkward position.
As a London-based senior lawyer at a multinational firm told City PM, “We are giving careful consideration to the implications for both our clients and the firm if we put our head above the parapet.”
Most of the firms Trump set his venom on have big offices in London.
Client expectations, the law and the sheer difference in culture in the UK mean that law firms will find it tricky to step away from DEI policies in the City. As addressed in a previous Eyes on the Law column, the law in the UK will get in the way first.
Natasha Adom, partner at GQ|Littler, said in a recent release that she does not expect UK companies to engage in an aggressive reversal of DEI policies in the UK.
She noted that scrapping some DEI initiatives could create legal risks for employers in the UK.
Despite that, London partners may find themselves sitting awkwardly in the emergency board meetings across those US firms.
It is no secret that the US law firms dominate the London market, driving up salary wars in the City and posting record revenues. Globally, over 2024, Latham & Watkin generated $7bn in revenue, while its London office alone took in $850m.
However, Trump’s scare tactics are working for some. It was reported that a few firms have renamed their DEI pages while others have removed pronouns from emails.
No matter how big of a rainmaker London lawyers are, at the end of the day, the buck at some of these US firms stops at its HQ in New York, Chicago or Los Angeles.
Eyes on the Law is a weekly column by Maria Ward-Brennan focused on the legal sector.