Biglaw

75 Percent Of Lawyers Say They Wouldn't Support Their Firm If They Represented Donald Trump

Lawyers do *not* approve of what Jones Day's doing.

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(Photo by SAUL LOEB/AFP/Getty Images)

Even though President Trump’s legal options for undoing the election results are rapidly dwindling — seriously, he’s basically down to a Third Circuit appeal on whether he can amend his complaint or a loophole in whatever Faustian deal he signed to get elected in the first place — the impacts on the legal profession will live beyond his term in office. The lawyers involved in the various election litigations have just gotten blasted from all sides.

District court Judge Matthew Brann wrote a blistering indictment of the lack of evidence and coherent legal arguments in the Pennsylvania case that will long live in the annals of benchslaps:

One might expect that when seeking such a startling outcome, a plaintiff would come formidably armed with compelling legal arguments and factual proof of rampant corruption, such that this Court would have no option but to regrettably grant the proposed injunctive relief despite the impact it would have on such a large group of citizens. That has not happened.

And the Biglaw firms that lent their credibility to the affair, like Jones Day and, for a time, Porter Wright and Snell & Wilmer, have been rightly criticized (and picketed) both internally and by observers. Though the feeling that these representations were outside of the legal norm was prevalent, it was largely anecdotal.  Now, we have some good old numbers to match that sense.

Fishbowl, a workplace social network for verified employees, conducted a survey of 4,546 verified law professionals in the U.S. on their app. They asked a simple, yes/no question: “Would you support your firm if it represented the Trump campaign as it files lawsuits challenging the outcome of the election in several states?”

An overwhelming number — 74.92 percent — answered no. Fishbowl also broke out the results by location, and the place with the highest percentage of “no” answers was Washington, D.C., with 97.44 percent. That was followed by Massachusetts (81.92 percent) and Maryland (81.25 percent). And even the places with the highest percentage of “yes” answers, still, on balance, were resoundingly against the idea of standing behind your firm as it litigates on behalf of the Trump campaign (64.41 percent of lawyers in North Carolina said “no” to the question, which corresponds to the highest “yes” answers).

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Now the really interesting data:

Out of the 103 Jones Day law professionals who answered the Fishbowl survey question, only 22.3% (23 in total) responded with Yes, almost 3 points lower than the overall survey average.

I told you folks there aren’t happy. And I guess when the situation isn’t a mere hypothetical, there’s a bit more clarity.

headshotKathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, and host of The Jabot podcast. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email her with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter (@Kathryn1).

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