President Donald Trump speaks in the White House East Room on July 16, 2026, in Washington, D.C. (Saul Loeb/Pool via AP, File).
A federal judge has firmly rejected the Trump administration’s effort to remove Susman Godfrey from a closely watched lawsuit challenging the government’s treatment of law firms.
In the underlying case, the American Bar Association sued over a series of executive orders issued by President Donald Trump. The orders, according to the 93-page complaint filed in June 2025, “used the vast powers of the Executive Branch to coerce lawyers and law firms to abandon clients, causes, and policy positions the President does not like.”
In a six-page order, the court outlined the dispute in language that could signal how the broader case may proceed.
“The ABA’s complaint details a 14-week period leading up to this suit in which the government launched and executed a coordinated campaign to intimidate and punish law firms and their lawyers based on their speech,” U.S. District Judge Amir Ali, a Joe Biden appointee, wrote.
The executive orders issued by the 45th and 47th president sought to impose “virtually identical sanctions on law firms and their lawyers.” Several firms agreed to concessions to avoid those penalties, while others went to court seeking protection.
“Susman Godfrey was one of the law firms targeted for sanctions by an executive order, and it obtained a permanent injunction against that order,” Ali wrote. “Susman Godfrey later filed this suit as counsel for the ABA. Because one of the executive orders targeted Susman Godfrey, some of the discovery in this case has sought information related to that order.”
In July, the Justice Department asked the court to disqualify Susman Godfrey, arguing that the firm’s participation violated Washington, D.C., legal-ethics rules.
The judge has now concluded that the government’s position “is not persuasive for a few reasons.”
The DOJ characterized the dispute as “the textbook case where the rules of professional conduct prohibit…a lawyer from serving as both advocate and witness.”
The government’s argument was that Susman Godfrey should be barred from representing the ABA because one of the firm’s attorneys might ultimately be called to testify.
Ali found no evidence that such a situation was likely to arise.
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“Here, the government does not identify any lawyer at Susman Godfrey who is likely to be a necessary witness at trial,” the order states. “To the contrary, the government concedes it cannot identify any lawyer who fits that description.”
The judge also declined to assume that a Susman Godfrey lawyer would become a necessary witness simply because the firm had previously challenged Trump’s order and prevailed.
“That the ABA’s discovery requests include inquiries about an executive order that targeted Susman Godfrey does not establish that any Susman Godfrey lawyer is ‘likely to be a necessary witness,’” Ali wrote. “Indeed, the government does not explain which party is likely to call a Susman Godfrey lawyer as a witness or what subject that lawyer would testify about, let alone that the lawyer’s testimony would be necessary to a contested issue in the case.”
The DOJ’s central contention was that Susman Godfrey is a “central player” and “essential actor” in the litigation. The government argued that the ABA’s discovery requests concerning the executive order aimed at the firm “effectively concedes [the law firm’s] attorneys are material fact witnesses.”
The court identified a separate problem with what it called the Trump administration’s “unpersuasive” disqualification request.
The order explained:
Rule 3.7(a) limits representation by individual attorneys, not automatically by their entire firms. Thus, even if the ABA had identified a Susman Godfrey lawyer who was likely to be a necessary trial witness, the rule’s language would not disqualify the rest of the firm. The rule’s comments also state that “there is no general rule of imputed disqualification applicable to Rule 3.7.” Under Rule 3.7, one lawyer’s disqualification is attributed to another attorney at the same firm only “if the other lawyer would be precluded from acting as advocate in the trial by [other rules].”
“The court finds the lawyers representing the ABA in this case are not likely to be necessary witnesses,” Ali concluded. “Indeed, based on the record before the court, none were even involved in representing Susman Godfrey in its challenge to the executive order targeting the firm.”
The court’s order is likely to clear the path toward resolving a long-simmering discovery dispute between the DOJ and the ABA.
The judge took note of that dispute in the order.
“That the ABA seeks discovery about communications related to Susman Godfrey does not indicate the lawyers representing the ABA here, who may not have even been involved in the communications, are likely to be necessary witnesses,” Ali wrote.
The post ‘Not likely’: Judge rejects Trump admin’s ‘unpersuasive’ effort to disqualify major law firm in American Bar Association case first appeared on Law & Crime.
