Democracy Watch episode 275: Marc Elias discusses Trump's extortion attempt against law firms.
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NewsTranscript
00:00What do you say to critics who say that your actions towards law firms amount to coercion?
00:05Well, the law firms all want to make deals.
00:08You mean the law firms that we're going after, that went after me for four years ruthlessly,
00:13violently, illegally?
00:14You mean, are those the law firms you're talking about?
00:16They're not babies.
00:17They're very sophisticated people.
00:20Those law firms did bad things, bad things.
00:24They went after me for years.
00:26This is Democracy Watch.
00:27Mark, that was a clip of Donald Trump in the Oval Office just a couple of days ago being
00:30asked about this idea that he is coercing law firms into doing his bidding.
00:35Basically he will impose sanctions or these overbearing executive orders onto law firms,
00:42and only when they promise him something, they come in and offer him money or pro bono
00:46legal services to causes that he cares about, will he deign to take them away.
00:51If there wasn't a clear example of extortion, I don't know what would be.
00:57Can I have your reaction to, first of all, this whole idea of Donald Trump coming in
01:02and imposing these sanctions or imposing these penalties on law firms only to take them away
01:09if that law firm disgraces itself enough by basically cowing to him in whatever way he
01:15wants?
01:16Yeah.
01:18That's a really important place to start because so far he has imposed by executive order consequences
01:26on three law firms.
01:28Let's talk about what those three law firms allegedly did.
01:31The first is Covington & Burling, which allegedly is no longer can be trusted with national
01:37securities among some of its lawyers because those lawyers happen to meet with Jack Smith
01:44and provide him legal advice.
01:46That alone was sufficient to say that they cannot be trusted with government secrets.
01:51They can't enter government buildings and the like.
01:53Second law firm, Perkins Cooley, my former law firm.
01:57What did they do wrong, according to Donald Trump?
02:00Number one, I worked there until 2021.
02:04That's reason number one.
02:05Number two, they have DEI practices that Donald Trump doesn't like.
02:09So what is the consequence of that?
02:11Number one, they too are a grave threat, such a grave threat to national security that no
02:15one at the law firm can have a security clearance.
02:18No one at the law firm can enter into a government building.
02:22No one at the law firm can ever go into government service that that that they can't have government
02:27contracts.
02:28Right.
02:29Completely preposterous.
02:30The third law firm, Paul Weiss, a big multinational law firm headquartered in New York.
02:34What were they alleged to have done?
02:36They had a partner who left in 2012, who in 2022 went to work for free for the Manhattan
02:43DA's office.
02:44Again, what are the penalties?
02:46The same ones that I just listed.
02:47So this is preposterous.
02:49It is preposterous what Donald Trump says he can impose on a big law firm for what I
02:55just laid out.
02:56It is so preposterous that when one of those law firms, the one I formerly was at, went
03:01to a federal court, the federal court said it sent chills down her spine and it and she
03:07on the spot blocked all of the provisions that the law firm asked them to ask to be
03:12blocked and excoriated the Department of Justice for for for for for for defending this.
03:19But here's the deal.
03:21And this is the worst part, Brian, because as you point out, one of those law firms,
03:26Paul Weiss, the third law firm, went into the Oval Office and made a deal with Donald
03:31Trump.
03:32And what did Donald Trump do?
03:33He lifted the restrictions.
03:35But ask yourself, if Paul Weiss was a threat to national security because of the actions
03:42of Mark Pomerantz, the former partner, how did doing how did making this deal make them
03:47less of a threat to national security?
03:50He lifted a bunch of sanctions that bore no relationship to the deal they made because
03:56Mark Pomerantz already wasn't at the firm.
03:58And so it was just out and out.
04:01I am the president.
04:02I can impose these sanctions.
04:04I can threaten you.
04:06You will come grovel when you give in to me.
04:09I will I will bestow beneficence upon you.
04:13And it's an absolute disgrace that he did it.
04:16It is a worst disgrace that Paul Weiss went along with it.
04:19And my last thing is and then I'll stop my rant.
04:22Where the fuck is the rest of the big law?
04:24You know, where the hell are the rest of the big law firms?
04:27Why aren't they standing up right now and saying, well, you did to Perkins School is
04:31wrong.
04:32What you did to Covington Burling is wrong.
04:33Paul Weiss, what you did, not only were you wrong, but you're even worse because you went
04:37along with it.
04:39And the silence that is deafening from the rest of the legal establishment is an absolute
04:43disgrace.
04:44It bears a striking resemblance to the silence that really swallowed up the entirety of the
04:49media when the AP was being blocked from from being able to go into the White House because
04:55they dared call the Gulf of Mexico the Gulf of Mexico and didn't and didn't ascribe to
05:00whatever, you know, fleeting whim Donald Trump had.
05:03And he wants to call the Gulf of America's now all of a sudden the AP has to change their
05:06style guide.
05:07But but it's the same kind of sign and they're still it's they're still being blocked in
05:10the White House.
05:11They're still right.
05:12Legacy Media is still not not standing up for that.
05:14Like it wasn't like like remember in the first few days and this is a little this does sort
05:18of parallel big law.
05:20Right.
05:21Like in the first few days, you got a lot of bullshit out of the out of the the legacy
05:25media saying, well, we're working quietly behind the scenes and we have a strategy to
05:29help AP as all nonsense because AP is still banned.
05:33And you know what?
05:34When you turn on the TV and I'm not going to call out any particular anchor, but when
05:37you call when you turn on cable news, you hear some of the legacy media refer to it
05:41as the Gulf of America because they have capitulated.
05:44And so here we are with the media as the you know, the the the you know, one of the pillars
05:51of democracy.
05:52Well, what's another pillar of democracy?
05:53Big law.
05:54Right.
05:55The big law firms, the legal industry.
05:57And the fact that you have a major law firm cutting this deal, betraying their principles.
06:02You know, this is this is a law firm that has a long tradition of progressive politics.
06:07Lot of Democrats in that firm, you know, a lot of Democrats, a lot of words from that
06:13law firm about how they support Kamala Harris and they support Joe Biden and Donald Trump's
06:17a threat.
06:18Well, here they are bending in a they're bending so far they can't even stand up.
06:22They're like in a permanent squat position now.
06:24Yeah.
06:25And by the way, what client wants to hire a law firm that is this that is this compromised
06:29by the by the by by doing this?
06:32But but, you know, this is where we are right now.
06:34You know, of any institution, one might think that the most that that one that would be
06:40the most prone to engaging in litigation to fight for itself to defend itself would be
06:45a law firm, especially one as prominent as Paul Weiss.
06:49And so, look, you're composed of people who should who are better situated to fight against
06:55this than anybody else.
06:56If ever there was an institution or a company that could fight back against this, one might
07:02imagine that it would be them.
07:03And so and so why would they, of all people, decide to not only embolden Trump, but really
07:09sacrifice their own their own expertise in doing so?
07:13Yeah.
07:14So it's it's one step worse, worse than that, worse than that.
07:16And I'll answer your question.
07:18It's worse than that because Perkins had already gone to court and won.
07:21So literally all Paul Weiss had to do was go to the same judge and say, your honor,
07:26they've done to us exactly what they did to Perkins.
07:28Yeah, they would have won.
07:29Right.
07:30So it's it's color by numbers at that point.
07:32Exactly.
07:33So so the question is, why didn't they?
07:35And the answer is because they're scared because they're scared that they will lose clients.
07:40They're scared that that Donald Trump will exact further retribution.
07:43They're scared that that clients will say, well, we don't want to hire a law firm that
07:47is on the outs with the Trump administration because Donald Trump may hire it, may hold
07:52it against us.
07:53And look, that is the kind of cowardice that that is contagious.
07:56Like it is that cowardice that is contagious.
07:58It is.
07:59It is not just it is not just what Paul Weiss does.
08:02It is what is the next big law firm going to do and what's the next big law firm going
08:05to do after that?
08:06And what about the law firms, like I said, that have not already been targeted, but who
08:11refuse to stand up and issue statements in support of Paul Weiss?
08:15What about the law firms that are cutting off doing pro bono that that right now is
08:19much needed but is fighting the Trump administration?
08:22You know, like like this is the thing, like Paul Weiss made a decision that they can cut
08:28this deal and that it won't be too bad for them.
08:33Because they'll it won't because they'll suffer no harm economically.
08:37They may even benefit in the short term economically.
08:39But what it does to the rest of the legal field is it puts pressure on other big firms
08:44that then feel like they have to do the same thing.
08:46And then, Brian, when enough big law firms do it, you know, the first one, Paul Weiss
08:50got a lot of outrage.
08:52The second one will get less outrage.
08:54Right.
08:55The third, the fourth, the fifth.
08:56Soon it'll just be the normal thing for big law firms to do.
09:00Right.
09:01And they'll one after another follow it.
09:02And then what do you do if you are someone who is wronged by Donald Trump?
09:07Where do you go to find a lawyer?
09:08Right.
09:09But but he knows full well what he's doing.
09:11And so by it's the same thing he's done to the big tech companies.
09:15It's the same thing he's done to the media companies.
09:18He knows full well that if he can get these people in line to fall in line, the big people
09:23at the top, then there really won't be resistance among the smaller players.
09:27And so he chooses who he's going to go after deliberately.
09:32And that's what he did here.
09:34But then the flip side of that is that you have Paul Weiss not only undermining, you
09:39know, what they themselves purport to stand for, not only undermining the clientele that
09:43they've built up and the trust they've built up among the clientele over the years, but
09:47they make it they make it exponentially more difficult for the next law firm down the line
09:52to be able to stand up, knowing full well that there's no bulwark, that that that there
09:56is no that there is no appetite among among their colleagues in the broader community
10:02to stand up against this.
10:03Yeah.
10:04And I want to add two things to this.
10:06The first is that we also saw this among the Republican Party.
10:11You know, you and I talked about this very phenomenon when Donald Trump was was nominating
10:18his cabinet.
10:20And we talked about, you know, why is he choosing Pete Hexeth, who's totally unqualified?
10:25Why is he choosing Tulsi Gabbard, who is literally an anathema to anyone who care, any Republican
10:30who cares about national security?
10:32Why is he choosing Kash Patel, who has a literal enemies list to run the FBI?
10:37And one of the things you and I talked about is that he wanted to bring forward these terribly
10:42unqualified, odious nominees because he knew that once he got Republican senators to vote
10:47for them, they wouldn't be able to oppose him on anything, right?
10:51He'd own them on everything.
10:53And so in many respects, this is the strategy.
10:55Like you said, we saw the business community with the media now with big law.
10:58We saw it with with the Republican Party.
11:00He specializes on picking these fights to make the strong players, U.S. senators in
11:06the Republican Party, I would say, are among the strongest independent voices or could
11:10be.
11:11They run only every six years.
11:12Right.
11:13Right.
11:14And but he picked on them because he knew if he got them in line, then would he ever
11:18face resistance?
11:19Right.
11:20If he got Mike Johnson in line, would he ever face a house that would stand up to him?
11:24So I wanted to make that point.
11:25But if I can, if you can indulge me for just one second about Paul Weiss, and I want to
11:29look very much in the camera and speak to partners at Paul Weiss, you know, I grew up
11:35a Jewish kid on Long Island and then in Rockland County, New York.
11:39And when my parents would tell me about, you know, being a lawyer, my parents, you know,
11:45never achieved anything like being a partner at Paul Weiss.
11:48When they talked to my brother and I about us going to college and going to law school
11:52and really, you know, achieving, they talked about places like Paul Weiss as a place that
11:58was a Jewish law firm, the first law firm in New York that hired Jews and non-Jews to
12:04work in the same law firm.
12:06And that had such a strong commitment to racial justice, to social justice, to being a critical
12:14part of the fabric of making sure that the least among us had legal representation that
12:20made a showing at every opportunity of how generous they were to causes and to make sure
12:27that women were promoted and that African-American lawyers had a way and that this was part of
12:33who Paul Weiss was and it was something that was very important.
12:37And I just have to say, as someone who's never worked at Paul Weiss, but as a Jewish partner
12:40in another city, you know, from New York, it is especially painful to watch Paul Weiss
12:46of all firms bending a knee to Donald Trump and not just bending a knee to Donald Trump,
12:52but among the things that Paul Weiss, you all agreed to do is to do pro bono that Donald
12:58Trump agrees with around anti-Semitism.
13:02You are the law firm that took on the Charlottesville Nazis.
13:07You Paul Weiss did that case because it was important that a law firm like Paul Weiss
13:12took on the neo-Nazis in Charlottesville, the people that Donald Trump said there were
13:16good people on both sides.
13:17And now to strike a deal with him and not just strike a deal with him, but to strike
13:22a deal with him that includes doing anti anti-Semitism pro bono.
13:27It is what we refer to as a Shanda.
13:30It is a shameful act in the Jewish community that you have done, and you will never live
13:35that down.
13:37Perfectly put.
13:38We will leave it there again for folks who are watching right now.
13:41I think the best best thing that we can do in the face of so much cowardice, not, you
13:46know, from whether it's law firms, media companies, tech billionaires themselves.
13:51It really highlights the importance of the few companies, the few entities that are willing
13:56to stand up and show some backbone and actually fight.
13:59And Democracy Docket, which is the news outlet that Mark found it to focus on everything
14:02voting elections.
14:03Democracy Docket does that on a daily basis.
14:06It's also a great way for us to show our support for him and the fearless journalism that he
14:11and his team are spreading here.
14:14So if you haven't yet signed up for Democracy Docket, please make sure to sign up.
14:17I'll put the link right here on the screen and also in the post description of this video.
14:20I'm Brian Taylor Cohen.
14:21I'm Mark Elias.
14:22This is Democracy Watch.