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The head of Paul Weiss defended his decision to strike a deal to end a dispute with US President Donald Trump on Sunday, arguing that the survival of the elite law firm was at risk.
Brad Karp, the chair of Paul Weiss, wrote in a note to colleagues that Trump’s executive order targeting the firm posed an existential threat and left him no choice but to negotiate.
“Only several days ago, our firm faced an existential crisis,” Karp wrote in the email on Sunday, which was circulated on social media. “The executive order could easily have destroyed our firm. It brought the full weight of the government down on our firm, our people, and our clients.”
Paul Weiss is one of the most high-profile law firms to come under attack from the White House in recent weeks as Trump punishes perceived enemies. Other law firms including Perkins Coie and Covington & Burling have also been targeted through executive orders, with the former still fighting the administration in court.
About a dozen more are likely to be the subject of new executive orders, according to a White House official.
Without the deal, Karp said that it was “very likely” the firm would not have been “able to survive” a drawn-out dispute with the White House. He also criticised rival law firms’ behaviour since the executive order, arguing that some of them had seen the fight as an opportunity to target Paul Weiss clients.
Paul Weiss initially prepared a lawsuit to fight the executive order in court, but decided to negotiate with Trump after it became clear the directive threatened to unravel the firm by scaring off existing clients and new business, Karp said.
The deal struck between the White House and Paul Weiss last week commits the law firm to providing $10mn worth of legal services on a pro bono basis annually over the next four years. That legal counsel will focus on issues important to the administration, including supporting veterans and fighting antisemitism.
In the email to colleagues, Karp denied that the administration was controlling which matters the law firm took on, insisting that they were areas of “shared interest”.
In the initial executive order this month, Trump took issue with former Paul Weiss partner Mark Pomerantz, who in 2021 joined the Manhattan district attorney’s office where he investigated Trump and his businesses.
On Friday, Trump issued another statement outlining the agreement with Paul Weiss, writing that the law firm had “indicated that it will engage in a remarkable change of course”.
Karp, who was a prominent supporter of and fundraiser for Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign, added that his decision to negotiate with the White House was driven in part by a fiduciary duty to the firm’s employees.
“There was no right answer to the predicament in which we found ourselves,” he wrote.
“All of us have opinions about what is going on right now in America . . . But no one in the wider world can appreciate how stressful it is to confront an executive order like this until one is directed at you.”
Additional reporting by Joe Miller
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