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ICE Arrests Student Activist & Trump Targets Law Firms · Bloomberg Law

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Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Law with June Grosso from Bloomberg Radio.
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Speaker 2: Hundreds demonstrated in Lower Manhattan again today to protest ICE
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Speaker 2: agents arresting former Columbia graduate student Mahmoud Khalil and activists
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Speaker 2: during last year's pro Palestinian protests on campus. Khalil spoke
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Speaker 2: for protesters after students stormed into an academic building last April.
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Speaker 3: This is a movement, an anti war movement.
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Speaker 2: We have sparked similar Gazza solidarity.
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Speaker 3: Encampments across the nation and even across the globe.
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Speaker 2: Khalil is a legal permanent resident married to a US citizen,
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Speaker 2: and he's challenging his arrest, accusing the government of retaliating
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Speaker 2: against him for his constitutionally protected advocacy on behalf of
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Speaker 2: Palestinian human rights. White House Press Secretary Caroline Levitt told
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Speaker 2: reporters today that Secretary of State Marco Rubio has the
1:08
Speaker 2: authority to detain those who engage in behavior that goes
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Speaker 2: against American interests.
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Speaker 4: Actually, it says right here reasonable grounds to believe that
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Speaker 4: the alien's presence or activities in the United States would
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Speaker 4: have potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences to the United States,
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Speaker 4: and I think siding with Hamas makes that quite clear.
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Speaker 2: But a federal judge in New York City has blocked
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Speaker 2: any attempt by the Trump administration to deport Khalil while
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Speaker 2: the court considers his challenge. Joining me is immigration law
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Speaker 2: expert Leon Fresco, a partner at Holland and Knight who
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Speaker 2: is head of the Office of Immigration Litigation during the
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Speaker 2: Obama administration. Leon, the facts of his activism are going
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Speaker 2: to be very important. Here tell us a little about him.
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Speaker 3: The student's fame is Matlut Khalil, and he was a
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Speaker 3: Clawba University student last year. He's not a student anymore,
2:04
Speaker 3: but he was an activist for the Palestinian cause in
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Speaker 3: the university. And if you may recall from the previous year,
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Speaker 3: there were a number of demonstrations at Columbia University that
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Speaker 3: actually really were newsworthy, and you had politicians from both
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Speaker 3: sides going and visiting the university and holding press conferences there.
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Speaker 3: And so there was a time where the student was
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Speaker 3: suspended from the university and then was reinstated. And thus
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Speaker 3: there is quite a lot of developing facts in terms
2:38
Speaker 3: of trying to figure out exactly the level of culpability
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Speaker 3: of what this particular student did or didn't do at
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Speaker 3: Columbia University, and so that part is actually quite relevant
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Speaker 3: to a lot of the legal issues about what the
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Speaker 3: government can't and can't do in this person's case.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, so apparently when they went to arrest him, Homeland
3:01
Speaker 2: Security said that they had an administrative warrant and that
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Speaker 2: the State Department had revoked his student visa. But he
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Speaker 2: has a green card, so he's not on a student visa.
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Speaker 3: Correct, So let's go through both aspects of things. Per second. Normally,
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Speaker 3: if someone has a student visa, the State Department can
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Speaker 3: revoke the visa and then what that means is that
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Speaker 3: ICE can then come in and charge the person as
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Speaker 3: being in the United States with a revoked visa and
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Speaker 3: to place them in removal proceedings. But that's not what
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Speaker 3: happened here because this person is a lawful permanent resident.
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Speaker 3: So unlike in the criminal court, where when someone gets indicted,
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Speaker 3: that document the indictment, can be read by the general
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Speaker 3: public and scene in the immigration court, there actually is
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Speaker 3: a document that's very similar to an indictment called a
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Speaker 3: notice to a peer, but that document is confidential under
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Speaker 3: the immigration law. The only way that the public can
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Speaker 3: ever see that notice to a peer would be if
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Speaker 3: this individual Masmouth Khalil or his attorney would actually release
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Speaker 3: it into the general public. And so that hasn't been
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Speaker 3: done yet, and so we're speculating as to what would
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Speaker 3: be the charge because actually has to be a charge
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Speaker 3: in that document the notice to appear to number one
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Speaker 3: detain mister Khalil, that'd be the first point, but then
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Speaker 3: number twos actually remove him from the country. So there
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Speaker 3: are two potential areas that people are targeting here. The
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Speaker 3: first because of what Secretary Rubio said where he said
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Speaker 3: that he was involved and the State Department was involved
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Speaker 3: in revoking the green card, which is this odd language.
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Speaker 3: But there is a ground of deportation. So all the
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Speaker 3: grounds of deportation are laid out in eight USC. Twelve
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Speaker 3: twenty seven, or what's also known as section two thirty
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Speaker 3: seven of the Immigration Nationality Act. And this one says,
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Speaker 3: and I'll just quote it, an alien who's pres or
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Speaker 3: activities in the United States the Secretary of State has
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Speaker 3: reasonable ground to believe would have potentially serious adverse foreign
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Speaker 3: policy consequences for the United States is deportable. So the
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Speaker 3: way this gets triggered would be as follows, the Secretary
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Speaker 3: of State, which is Mark Rubio, he was saying he
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Speaker 3: triggered something would trigger he would issue a proclamation that
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Speaker 3: says that this individual, Muck Moot Khalil, or anybody else,
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Speaker 3: their presence or activities in the United States would have
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Speaker 3: serious adverse foreign policy consequences. That then becomes the ground
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Speaker 3: of deportation. Then this person can be placed into deportation proceedings.
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Speaker 3: Now where this gets complicated is what happens next, because
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Speaker 3: now this person goes to immigration courts, and what happens
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Speaker 3: does an immigration judge actually overrule Secretary Rubio's determination that
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Speaker 3: this individual's presence has potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences
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Speaker 3: for the United States. This area of case law is
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Speaker 3: very unclear. Also, when this individual then goes to court,
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Speaker 3: they can normally get a review finally in the Court
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Speaker 3: of Appeals, and the question would be would the Court
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Speaker 3: of Appeals make a determination that that's not true? So
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Speaker 3: this is very sort of uncharted territory. This clause was
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Speaker 3: meant in the past for people. Let's say there was
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Speaker 3: some dictator who was in some country making horrible murders
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Speaker 3: and assassinations of people, and then they managed to find
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Speaker 3: their way into the United States, And the question is,
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Speaker 3: don't give refuge to this person because that's going to
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Speaker 3: upset the rest of the world. And so the Secretary
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Speaker 3: of State can say, we're not going to give refuge
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Speaker 3: to this person, We're going to kick them out of
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Speaker 3: the country because this would make the rest of the
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Speaker 3: world very angry at us that we're getting refuge to
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Speaker 3: this person. Here it becomes a more complicated issue of
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Speaker 3: trying to figure out why this particular student's present in
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Speaker 3: the United States actually tends to create adverse foreign policy
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Speaker 3: consequences for the United States. That's a little bit tougher.
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Speaker 3: There's an easier way to get at this issue, and
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Speaker 3: it's unclear if they did and if they didn't do it,
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Speaker 3: why not, which would be to charge this individual under
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Speaker 3: the category of deportation that just says, quote, endorses or
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Speaker 3: espouses terrorist activity, or persuades others to endorse or espouse
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Speaker 3: terrorist activity or support a terrorist organization. And then in
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Speaker 3: that case, if you have any sort of material or
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Speaker 3: chance or quotes or anything else where this person is
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Speaker 3: saying anything positive about AMAS and telling people, you know,
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Speaker 3: we need to support them in what they're doing or whatever.
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Speaker 3: That clause seems to be an easier one, and then
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Speaker 3: you'd have again the same debates in the immigration court
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Speaker 3: whether he actually did this or not. But nevertheless, that
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Speaker 3: seems like it would be more on target than this
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Speaker 3: issue of having the Secretary of State say that these
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Speaker 3: people on campuses are hurting US foreign policy. That seems
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Speaker 3: to be more difficult to fit than just charging them
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Speaker 3: as people who endorse or a spouse terrorist activity.
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Speaker 2: His wife's a US citizen, so that's how he got
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Speaker 2: the green card. She's expecting a child. Green card holders
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Speaker 2: can be deported the same way that illegal immigrants can,
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Speaker 2: or there's a higher standard.
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Speaker 3: So the problem is this in the grounds of deportability,
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Speaker 3: all of these grounds that we're talking about applied to
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Speaker 3: all quote unquote aliens. I know we all dislike this word,
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Speaker 3: but an alien, by definition in the code is someone
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Speaker 3: who is not a US citizen. So literally, any person
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Speaker 3: who's not a US citizen, meaning even a lawful permanent resident,
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Speaker 3: is potentially subject to this ground of deportation. And some
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Speaker 3: grounds of deportation for lawful permanent residents have what are
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Speaker 3: called waivers in them. What happens is you can try
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Speaker 3: to deport someone and you can even win. The charge
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Speaker 3: can be sustained, but then the person can ask for
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Speaker 3: a waiver, which means essentially saying, I'm sorry, can you
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Speaker 3: forgive me for this? I won't do it again, and
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Speaker 3: then the immigration judge would have the ability to grant
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Speaker 3: a waiver. Here there would be no waiver for this.
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Speaker 3: So the defense of this person is either going to
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Speaker 3: have to be that they don't fit within the charge
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Speaker 3: themselves so that the charge cannot be sustained, or perhaps
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Speaker 3: that person is from Syria that deporting them to Syria
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Speaker 3: at this moment might lead them to being tortured or
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Speaker 3: something of a this nature. But other than those two defenses,
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Speaker 3: there's not going to be, unfortunately, a defense for this
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Speaker 3: individual in the immigration court related to their spouse or
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Speaker 3: their child.
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Speaker 2: In that situation, do we know what the charge against
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Speaker 2: him is because apparently the Department of Homeland Security hasn't
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Speaker 2: disclosed the legal basis for his detention.
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Speaker 3: Correct, that's not a nefarious thing that Department of Homeland
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Speaker 3: Security has not disclosed the legal basis for his detention,
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Speaker 3: because the way it works is the document that you
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Speaker 3: are given as a foreign national to be placing you
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Speaker 3: into deportation proceedings. The notice to appear is under the
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Speaker 3: immigration law, a confidential document that's governed by the Privacy Act,
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Speaker 3: which means that the government can't release that document. It's
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Speaker 3: not like an indictment. The only people who can release
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Speaker 3: that document are must Mood Khalil himself or his attorney
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Speaker 3: in this situation. So that's not nefarious in that sense
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Speaker 3: that they're not saying why he is being detained, what
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Speaker 3: he's being charged with, But the language of Secretary Rubio
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Speaker 3: leads people to think that he's being charged under this
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Speaker 3: doctrine that we will deport you if the Secretary of
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Speaker 3: State has a reasonable ground to believe that your presence
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Speaker 3: in the United States or your activities in the United
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Speaker 3: States will potentially have serious adverse foreign policy consequences for
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Speaker 3: the United States. So the idea would be that Secretary
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Speaker 3: of Rubio would have made this determination about this individual.
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Speaker 3: That determination is then the predicate for the placement of
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Speaker 3: the individual in detention, and now that's going to have
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Speaker 3: to be fought out in court in a very rare,
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Speaker 3: if almost nonexistent. Previous precedents about how this actually gets
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Speaker 3: bought out. I mean, if the Secretary of State is
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Speaker 3: saying that you are creating adverse foreign policy consequences for
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Speaker 3: the United States, that's typically the the thing that gets
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Speaker 3: extreme defference in the court. Such that how is it
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Speaker 3: that you know either an immigration judge or even a
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Speaker 3: federal judge is gonna basically say if they're going to
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Speaker 3: overturn such a determination. It seems quite complicated, But again,
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Speaker 3: that would be one way. The other way would be
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Speaker 3: to charge the person under the terrorist activity ground, which
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Speaker 3: is very broad and which one of them just says
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Speaker 3: endorses or aspous as terrorist activity, or persuades others to
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Speaker 3: endorse or as fouse terrorist activity. That one would seem
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Speaker 3: like the better fit. I don't know if that one
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Speaker 3: was charged, if both were charged, you can charge more
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Speaker 3: than one ground of deportation, but that's gonna be what's
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Speaker 3: going to have to be played out. And it would
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Speaker 3: be actually quite helpful if mister Khalil or his attorney
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Speaker 3: would release the notice to appear so that the public
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Speaker 3: can know what the charge was, so that people can
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Speaker 3: actually understand and have a common basis for having a
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Speaker 3: discussion on whether what the government is doing makes sense
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Speaker 3: or not?
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Speaker 2: Coming up next, why did the Department of Homeland Security
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Speaker 2: ship Khalil one thousand miles away? This is Bloomberg. Federal
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Speaker 2: Immigration Enforcement agents arrested and detained Matmuk Khalil, a legal
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Speaker 2: US resident and Palestinian activists who played a prominent role
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Speaker 2: in protests at Columbia last year. The White House Press
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Speaker 2: Secretary said today the administration had moved to deport Khalil
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Speaker 2: under a section of the Immigration and Nationality Act that
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Speaker 2: gives the Secretary of State the power to deport a
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Speaker 2: non citizen if the government has reasonable ground to believe
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Speaker 2: the person's presence could have serious adverse foreign policy consequences
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Speaker 2: for the United States. I've been talking to Leon Fresco
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Speaker 2: of Holland and Knight soly on before the break. You
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Speaker 2: were talking about how unusual, perhaps unprecedented, it is to
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Speaker 2: use this section of the Immigration and Nationality Act to
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Speaker 2: deport someone and how many constitutional questions it raises. One
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Speaker 2: defense I've heard mentioned is that Khalil, you know, he
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Speaker 2: participated in protests in support of the Palestinian people in Gaza,
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Speaker 2: not necessarily in support of Hamas right.
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Speaker 3: This is going to be the fact pattern that's going
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Speaker 3: to need to be fleshed out in the courts, and
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Speaker 3: the courts are going to have to decide. I will
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Speaker 3: say this, There is a case, a very famous case
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Speaker 3: in the nineteen fifties called Hirasiatis versus the United States,
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Speaker 3: which actually has quite a similar fact pattern in that
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Speaker 3: it involved lawful permanent residents with usitis and spouses and
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Speaker 3: US citizen children, and that involved communism and membership in
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Speaker 3: the Communist Party, and the same allegations were being made
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Speaker 3: First Amendment and also, these people are lawful permanent residents
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Speaker 3: and they renounced their membership in the Communists, So what's
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Speaker 3: the problem that they were communists? And that case went
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Speaker 3: all the way to the Supreme Court, and the Supreme
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Speaker 3: Court said, look, if Congress created this ground of deportation
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Speaker 3: of membership in the Communist Party, then that's the ground
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Speaker 3: of deportation. And it doesn't matter the First Amendment. It
15:18
Speaker 3: doesn't matter that you're a lawful permanent resident, it doesn't
15:21
Speaker 3: matter that you have US citizen children. You're subject to
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Speaker 3: that ground of deportation. It was a very close case,
15:27
Speaker 3: but that case remains good law in the United States,
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Speaker 3: and it would be applicable here, meaning that the First
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Speaker 3: Amendment in and of itself isn't going to be a defense. Really,
15:39
Speaker 3: the question is going to be one or the other,
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Speaker 3: which is either if they charged him as a terrorist,
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Speaker 3: did he engage in espousing any terrorist activities? Or if
15:52
Speaker 3: they're charging him as a person whose presence will have
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Speaker 3: potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences. First of all, is
16:00
Speaker 3: that something an immigration judge is even going to have
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Speaker 3: jurisdiction to review or is that literally going to be
16:06
Speaker 3: deemed as something that's not reviewable? And what will ultimately
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Speaker 3: the federal courts say about that question, because that is
16:13
Speaker 3: going to be quite an interesting question here because obviously
16:19
Speaker 3: it's easier on the terrorist ground to say, well, what
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Speaker 3: did someone say? What did someone do? But this is
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Speaker 3: sort of a second order question, is what the person
16:28
Speaker 3: is doing having potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences for
16:33
Speaker 3: the United States that has the potential to have such
16:36
Speaker 3: broad applications. These are the kinds of statutes that people
16:40
Speaker 3: know exist, but they don't get used because they're worried
16:43
Speaker 3: about the implications of using these statutes. And so that's
16:48
Speaker 3: going to be the issue moving forward, is where the
16:51
Speaker 3: courts are willing to go with regard to deference on
16:55
Speaker 3: these topics.
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Speaker 2: His lawyers didn't go to immigration court. They went to
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Speaker 2: federal district court.
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Speaker 3: Yes, here's what's interesting about that this individual, the foreign national,
17:05
Speaker 3: was sitting in New York City and they were detained
17:09
Speaker 3: and then they were transferred first to a detention area
17:13
Speaker 3: in the northeast and then transferred to Louisiana. And so
17:18
Speaker 3: this is another of the fascinating issues of the immigration
17:22
Speaker 3: system that the courts really haven't grappled with, and this
17:26
Speaker 3: might be yet another case where they have to grapple
17:29
Speaker 3: with this issue too. Is okay now that you're in Louisiana,
17:33
Speaker 3: What does that mean? You don't have access to the lawyer,
17:36
Speaker 3: and you know, if there is detention space in New York,
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Speaker 3: why are you being sent to Louisiana? What circuit law
17:43
Speaker 3: is being applied to your case? And also were you
17:46
Speaker 3: being sent there? Because here's what's also happened sometimes and
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Speaker 3: I'm not going to say one way or the other,
17:53
Speaker 3: the motives or anything else. I'll just lay this out,
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Speaker 3: which is you can go look on your own at
18:00
Speaker 3: the Immigration court foroya statistics that are put out every month,
18:05
Speaker 3: and they're done by Syracuse University. It's a program called
18:08
Speaker 3: track Trac, and they actually will show a vast disparity
18:15
Speaker 3: in the rulings of judges. And so, let's say you're
18:18
Speaker 3: in the immigration courts in New York or in San Francisco,
18:22
Speaker 3: you have a far far, far greater chance of succeeding
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Speaker 3: in your case than if you're in the immigration courts
18:28
Speaker 3: in Louisiana or in you know, in a detention facility
18:32
Speaker 3: in Georgia or something like that. And so the question is,
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Speaker 3: first of all, is that a tactical thing that the
18:39
Speaker 3: government actually has at its disposal, which is that they
18:42
Speaker 3: could take someone and move them knowing this information. That's
18:46
Speaker 3: number one, And then number two, can they do that
18:50
Speaker 3: and then apply let's say fifth circuit case law now,
18:54
Speaker 3: which is in Louisiana, which is much more stringent in
18:58
Speaker 3: many different immigration cases, as opposed to second circuit case law,
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Speaker 3: which is the case law that would have been applied
19:05
Speaker 3: in New York. And so part of this abeas was
19:09
Speaker 3: to say, bring this person back to New York so
19:12
Speaker 3: that they can actually have this fight in New York
19:15
Speaker 3: where the lawyer is and the case law and the
19:17
Speaker 3: judges and all of that, and that's going to be
19:19
Speaker 3: a very interesting question to see if Judge Furman, which
19:22
Speaker 3: is the judge who has jurisdiction of this in New York,
19:25
Speaker 3: he's issued a one day say of deportation. There wasn't
19:29
Speaker 3: gonna be a deportation anyway, but he issued a one
19:31
Speaker 3: day stay to sort of try to figure out all
19:34
Speaker 3: of this. Well, once he figures out all of this,
19:36
Speaker 3: what he's going to figure out is there is a
19:39
Speaker 3: massive panoply of constitutional issues in this case, almost dozens
19:44
Speaker 3: of them in just this one case, and he's probably
19:48
Speaker 3: gonna say, Wow, what do I do about this? This
19:52
Speaker 3: is quite an interesting broleo that just sets into my course,
19:56
Speaker 3: including whether he even has jurisdiction to do any of
19:59
Speaker 3: this or have to wait until the whole process plays
20:02
Speaker 3: out and then they can get the federal court. So
20:06
Speaker 3: there's a lot of questions here.
20:08
Speaker 2: Kalia's lawyers said ISI's shell game of transferring him to
20:11
Speaker 2: Louisiana is a blatantly improper but familiar tactic designed to
20:16
Speaker 2: frustrate the New York Federal Court's jurisdiction and isolate my
20:20
Speaker 2: mood far from his lawyers, his home, and his local
20:23
Speaker 2: community of support. Which is what you just said. There's
20:26
Speaker 2: a hearing on Wednesday. Can the judge order him to
20:29
Speaker 2: be brought to New York for the hearing?
20:32
Speaker 3: So there's gonna be two arguments that are going to
20:34
Speaker 3: be made.
20:34
Speaker 2: There's always more than one, why.
20:37
Speaker 3: Right, correct? So the Department of Justice is gonna say
20:41
Speaker 3: that none of these decisions can be made by a
20:44
Speaker 3: federal district court judge outside of the context of the
20:48
Speaker 3: removal proceeding, meaning this person has to go through the
20:51
Speaker 3: removal proceedings get a result one way or the other.
20:54
Speaker 3: If they like the results, then good end of stories.
20:57
Speaker 3: If they don't like the results, they can make all
21:00
Speaker 3: of these fifty different claims that they're going to make
21:03
Speaker 3: all to a Court of Appeals in what's called the
21:05
Speaker 3: petition for review of a final order removal query. Would
21:09
Speaker 3: that be in the Fifth Circuit or would that be
21:11
Speaker 3: in the Second Circuit? That's its own complicated question that
21:15
Speaker 3: hasn't been decided by the court. So the lawyers for
21:18
Speaker 3: Mahmoud Khalil are going to say, look, this needs to
21:22
Speaker 3: be decided independently of all of that, because what's happening
21:26
Speaker 3: is this is not part of the normal issues of
21:30
Speaker 3: immigration law, these issues of where someone is being detained,
21:34
Speaker 3: what jurisdiction they're being brought under. All of this, What
21:38
Speaker 3: good is a petition for review if at the end
21:41
Speaker 3: of the day it's in the wrong court in the
21:43
Speaker 3: first place, and all of that. So they're going to
21:46
Speaker 3: try to say this is governed outside of the context
21:49
Speaker 3: of normal removal proceedings, and that's going to be up
21:52
Speaker 3: to Judge Furman to figure out what does he say,
21:55
Speaker 3: should this all be confined within you know, let's say
21:59
Speaker 3: there's fifty constitutional arguments in this case, all of them
22:02
Speaker 3: need to go up to the Fifth Circuit at the
22:05
Speaker 3: end of this and then maybe the Supreme Court, or
22:09
Speaker 3: does he think, Look, the fact that this case might
22:12
Speaker 3: even be in the Fifth Circuit is its own injustice.
22:15
Speaker 3: That doesn't make it part of the removal process. And
22:19
Speaker 3: so I can come in and make these decisions because
22:22
Speaker 3: they're not even part of the removal process. This is
22:25
Speaker 3: actually a challenge to how the government operates its system,
22:29
Speaker 3: which is different than whether this individual gets deported or not.
22:33
Speaker 3: And so there are so many fascinating issues here.
22:35
Speaker 2: But doesn't a habeas corpus petition allow the district judge
22:40
Speaker 2: to you know, bring the body into court or disintegration.
22:43
Speaker 5: A lot different, correct, But there is actually some very
22:47
Speaker 5: bad case laws in twenty twenty two, I believe, or
22:52
Speaker 5: twenty twenty three from the Supreme Court called Thurid Jossium.
22:56
Speaker 3: Versus the Department of Homeland Security, and I know I'm
22:58
Speaker 3: not doing that name a lot of justice, but where
23:01
Speaker 3: Justice Alito, who wrote the decision for the Court, said
23:04
Speaker 3: that habeas is dead for immigration purposes, that habeas was
23:09
Speaker 3: a thing for the first hundred years of immigration law
23:13
Speaker 3: because the Congress hadn't created this whole structure that they've
23:17
Speaker 3: created now, where there's clearly ways and procedures and pathways
23:22
Speaker 3: and so that those are the ones that have to
23:24
Speaker 3: be used and there's not a separate thing called habeas
23:28
Speaker 3: for this. And so the question for Judge Furman is
23:31
Speaker 3: going to be, irrespective of surigossium, is there some exception
23:37
Speaker 3: that can be used for this type of case where
23:40
Speaker 3: there's all these debates about the forum and the government's
23:43
Speaker 3: use of transferring and what's circuit and everything else, so
23:47
Speaker 3: that he can claim jurisdiction over this. And that's going
23:49
Speaker 3: to be a fascinating question.
23:51
Speaker 2: A lot of fascinating questions are coming up in this case,
23:55
Speaker 2: and tomorrow Judge Furman is holding a hearing, so we
23:59
Speaker 2: should find out more. Thanks so much, Leon, that's Leon
24:03
Speaker 2: Fresco of Honda Knight. President Trump has vowed to make
24:07
Speaker 2: additional arrests of pro Palestinian demonstrators. In a briefing today,
24:12
Speaker 2: the White House Press Secretary said federal authorities have been
24:16
Speaker 2: using intelligence to identify other people involved in campus demonstrations
24:21
Speaker 2: critical of Israel that the administration considered to be anti
24:26
Speaker 2: Semitic and pro Hamas. Coming up next on the Bloomberg
24:29
Speaker 2: Law Show, Trump attacks another law firm and it fights
24:33
Speaker 2: back in court. I'm June Grosso and you're listening to Bloomberg.
24:38
Speaker 2: It's the second direct attack by President Donald Trump on
24:42
Speaker 2: a law firm. Trump signed an executive order last Thursday
24:47
Speaker 2: sanctioning one of the biggest law firms in the country,
24:50
Speaker 2: Perkins Couey, directing agencies to strip the firm's lawyers of
24:55
Speaker 2: security credentials, terminate federal contracts with the firm's clients, and
25:00
Speaker 2: bar its lawyers from entering government buildings. The order also
25:04
Speaker 2: directed the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to investigate possible racial
25:10
Speaker 2: discrimination of leading law firms and accusing Perkins Cooy of
25:14
Speaker 2: adopting race based hiring quotas in twenty nineteen, Why was
25:19
Speaker 2: Perkins Cooy targeted? The firm's lawyers advised Hillary Clinton and
25:23
Speaker 2: retained Washington firm Fusion GPS for the research that resulted
25:28
Speaker 2: in the so called Steele dossier. It didn't take long
25:32
Speaker 2: for Perkins Cooey to fire back, hiring Williams and Connolly,
25:37
Speaker 2: a firm known for its scorched earth approach, to taking
25:40
Speaker 2: on the Justice Department on behalf of clients, and today
25:45
Speaker 2: suing the Trump administration claiming the executive order is unconstitutional
25:50
Speaker 2: and was intended to bully those who advocate for views
25:54
Speaker 2: opposite to the administrations. My guest is David Lopez, a
25:58
Speaker 2: professor at Rutger Law School and the former General Counsel
26:03
Speaker 2: for the EEOC. David, what strikes you about this order
26:07
Speaker 2: targeting Perkins Cooey?
26:10
Speaker 6: I think the first thing that jumps out at anyone
26:12
Speaker 6: reading this is that it just seems like it's as
26:15
Speaker 6: much about political payback as anything, because I think the
26:19
Speaker 6: opening couple of paragraphs discuss, you know, the twenty sixteen
26:23
Speaker 6: election and refer to and this isn't the executive order
26:27
Speaker 6: failed presidential candidate Hillary Clinton and don't discuss DEI at all? Right,
26:33
Speaker 6: And you know, I can't say that I've read every
26:37
Speaker 6: Trump executive order, and certainly can't say I've read every
26:40
Speaker 6: executive order ever written. But I don't think I've ever
26:43
Speaker 6: seen one that was so directed at any individual organization
26:48
Speaker 6: that is seemingly vilified as like a political enemy. And
26:52
Speaker 6: this one is you know, the fact that it's targeting
26:54
Speaker 6: one firm kind of jumps out at you. And then
26:57
Speaker 6: what's kind of odd, you know, I would almost say,
27:00
Speaker 6: even from a literary standpoint, is that then it moves
27:03
Speaker 6: on to DEI. Right, It doesn't start in terms of
27:06
Speaker 6: talking about de I, but then it sort of taps
27:08
Speaker 6: into the other executive orders addressing you know, the sort
27:13
Speaker 6: of opaque idea of DEI and the dangers of DEI
27:17
Speaker 6: to society. And so, you know, it seems like it's
27:20
Speaker 6: a little bit of a forced connection here. But I
27:23
Speaker 6: think it's being used sort of as an opportunity, I think,
27:26
Speaker 6: to open up a new front on what I would
27:29
Speaker 6: certainly call a war on THEI. At this point, I
27:33
Speaker 6: think it has to be viewed, you know, certainly as
27:35
Speaker 6: much through a political lens as through any type of
27:38
Speaker 6: legal lens.
27:39
Speaker 2: There seems to be so many legal arguments against this.
27:43
Speaker 2: Shall we start with First Amendment?
27:45
Speaker 6: Yeah, I mean, I think obviously it has major First
27:48
Speaker 6: Amendment implications, But I think, you know, the really important
27:51
Speaker 6: thing for listeners to understand is that a president can't
27:56
Speaker 6: change the law through executive fiat, and so everything that
28:00
Speaker 6: the president is doing is can implicate you know, pre
28:03
Speaker 6: existing statutes and the Constitution of the United States. Right,
28:08
Speaker 6: so there may be a signal in the executive order
28:10
Speaker 6: that this is what they want to do, and this
28:13
Speaker 6: is what they'll try to do, but you know, to
28:15
Speaker 6: the extent that it rens afel of the Constitution and
28:18
Speaker 6: rensfell of other statutes is going to be pushed back.
28:21
Speaker 6: Who has picked up Williamson Connolly, which is known to
28:24
Speaker 6: be a really kind of a hardball litigation law firm,
28:29
Speaker 6: to represent them in all of this, And I will
28:31
Speaker 6: say from my personal experience as General Counsel of the
28:36
Speaker 6: EEOC is that every time that we would see a
28:39
Speaker 6: law firm, day would fight tooth and nail like this
28:42
Speaker 6: is not you know, because I think that basically, you
28:45
Speaker 6: know what litigators do is that they try to just
28:48
Speaker 6: passionately assess the risks and they don't intimidate, right. And
28:52
Speaker 6: I think a lot of businesses in this age, as
28:54
Speaker 6: we've seen, are like, well, I don't want to be
28:56
Speaker 6: in the crosshairs. I don't want to be on the
28:58
Speaker 6: radar screen, and that they're pulling back what are often
29:02
Speaker 6: legal and necessary efforts to make sure that merit is
29:05
Speaker 6: a true factor in the workplace. But I think when
29:07
Speaker 6: you hope the bearer of a law firm, I think
29:10
Speaker 6: it just puts you in a different situation, right. And
29:13
Speaker 6: I think we've seen with the executive orders time and
29:15
Speaker 6: time again is that there's been a lot of pushback,
29:19
Speaker 6: and a lot of it's been very successful because I
29:21
Speaker 6: think these are as much you know, political or ideologically
29:26
Speaker 6: driven documents as they are I think good faith efforts
29:29
Speaker 6: to execute the laws, which is what executive orders are
29:33
Speaker 6: usually designed to do. I think a lot of them have,
29:36
Speaker 6: you know, certainly a propaganda purpose. But I think this
29:41
Speaker 6: one in many respects stands out just because it does
29:46
Speaker 6: basically declare Perkins Couoi to be like a political enemy,
29:50
Speaker 6: and then it goes through a whole host of actions
29:54
Speaker 6: that they're going to take against this law firm and
29:56
Speaker 6: then suddenly, you know, connects it to the EI. I
30:00
Speaker 6: think if this were like an English creative writing course,
30:03
Speaker 6: this would probably flunk because I think that I think
30:06
Speaker 6: there's a lot of thematic incongruities here. You know, it
30:10
Speaker 6: almost reads like one of these like late night tweets
30:12
Speaker 6: or late night to social posts that it was like
30:14
Speaker 6: kind of written at through in the morning, you know,
30:16
Speaker 6: when somebody can sleep. I mean, that's really how it
30:18
Speaker 6: reads to me. And so we'll see, I mean, you know,
30:21
Speaker 6: we'll see how it plays out. But I think the
30:23
Speaker 6: law firms already signaled that, you know, that there's going
30:25
Speaker 6: to be a pushback and that any effort you know,
30:29
Speaker 6: by the administration to violate First Amendal rights, to violate
30:34
Speaker 6: you know, their efforts to zealously represent their clients, their
30:38
Speaker 6: efforts to do business is going to be challenged.
30:41
Speaker 2: This seems to be part of Trump's just war on
30:44
Speaker 2: the legal profession, you know, judges who don't rule for him,
30:48
Speaker 2: law firms who represent clients who go against him. And
30:52
Speaker 2: is it already having a chilling effect because reportedly some
30:57
Speaker 2: law firms turned down representing.
31:01
Speaker 6: Yeah and I think, you know, I think that's you know,
31:04
Speaker 6: I think that's that's a feature of any of these
31:09
Speaker 6: executive orders, which is sort of intimidation and self censorship
31:13
Speaker 6: and and uh and self restrain. I don't think that's
31:17
Speaker 6: sort of incidental. I think that's part of, you know,
31:20
Speaker 6: what's going on here. And it's not just going on
31:22
Speaker 6: you know obviously with the legal profession, or with with
31:26
Speaker 6: private businesses or with government. You know, it also to
31:29
Speaker 6: a large extent, has been directed at the press as well.
31:33
Speaker 6: And I think there's hope that you know that the
31:35
Speaker 6: press will you know, you see, you see the sort
31:37
Speaker 6: of back and forth with the AP on what seems
31:41
Speaker 6: to be like a pretty incidental and insignificant point. But
31:45
Speaker 6: you know, what you see is like, really, I think
31:47
Speaker 6: an effort to try to secure you know, self censorship
31:52
Speaker 6: or self restraint and to keep people from basically you know,
31:56
Speaker 6: speaking up right at a time when that's probably more
31:59
Speaker 6: importan than it has been in a long time.
32:02
Speaker 2: A lot of legal experts have said, there are so
32:04
Speaker 2: many ways to attack this. It's patently unconstitutional. So tell
32:10
Speaker 2: us about an attack on the executive order based on
32:13
Speaker 2: due process claims.
32:15
Speaker 6: The government can't basically take someone's you know, property interests
32:19
Speaker 6: or livelihood unless they provide some sort of due process protections, right,
32:25
Speaker 6: and you know that that's usually some adversarial adjudication. You know,
32:30
Speaker 6: that allows basically the sharing of evidence, and it allows
32:33
Speaker 6: the cross examination of witnesses. You know, due process could
32:36
Speaker 6: mean different many different things depending upon the context. But
32:39
Speaker 6: what it means is that you just can't let go
32:42
Speaker 6: in and say I'm taking over this business and I'm
32:44
Speaker 6: going to put you out of business because there's a
32:46
Speaker 6: property interest involved. And when the government does that, you know,
32:51
Speaker 6: the constitution requires and the course have said this, you know,
32:54
Speaker 6: consistently requires some protections for the party that's being acted.
33:00
Speaker 6: You know, that's part of what's going on here, right,
33:02
Speaker 6: because you know, clearly, I think anybody who reads this
33:07
Speaker 6: is going to see it as, oh, this is basically
33:09
Speaker 6: an effort to ruin Perkins and Coolie, right, and to
33:12
Speaker 6: make sure that people don't go to them and that
33:14
Speaker 6: they don't do good business, that they're not able to
33:16
Speaker 6: thrive as a law firm in a competitive market. And
33:20
Speaker 6: so I think that's the due process concern.
33:22
Speaker 2: Right.
33:22
Speaker 6: Lawyers can be pretty zealous about their obligation to represent
33:26
Speaker 6: zealously their clients, and you know, and obviously you know,
33:30
Speaker 6: this is sort of a blowback against the representation of
33:33
Speaker 6: the Hillary Clinton campaign. And you know, again it really
33:38
Speaker 6: smells of like political payback. I don't think there's any
33:40
Speaker 6: other way to read this.
33:41
Speaker 2: It was said at the signing that the executive order
33:45
Speaker 2: calls for a holistic review of unlawful DEI in some
33:50
Speaker 2: of the nation's largest law firms, how would they even
33:53
Speaker 2: investigate that?
33:55
Speaker 6: There are a couple of things going on here, right,
33:57
Speaker 6: And so the President issued other de orders and these
34:01
Speaker 6: orders have been enjoined, right, And so there's a discord
34:05
Speaker 6: in Maryland that enjoyed one of the orders, you know,
34:08
Speaker 6: partly on First Amendment grounds, instead that the orders were
34:12
Speaker 6: drafted in an unconstitutionally vague manner, which you know doesn't
34:18
Speaker 6: provide you know, sufficient guidance in terms of conduct. And
34:21
Speaker 6: I think it was that hearing, or maybe it was
34:23
Speaker 6: another one where you know, even the DOJ lawyers and
34:26
Speaker 6: I don't want to fall into the traffic, say the
34:28
Speaker 6: president's lawyers, but even the DJ lawyers really couldn't define
34:32
Speaker 6: what dee I'm meant, right, So I think that there's
34:34
Speaker 6: certainly a real effort to keep that opaque. You know,
34:38
Speaker 6: that kind of runs through this executive order as well.
34:42
Speaker 6: And I think that we've talked before about how, you know,
34:46
Speaker 6: it's been unlawful since you know, nineteen sixty four, did
34:50
Speaker 6: discriminate against a person based on race or based on gender,
34:54
Speaker 6: and that applies to all races and all genders. So
34:56
Speaker 6: to the extent that any white person believed that they
34:59
Speaker 6: were sub to discrimination, and they've always had the right
35:02
Speaker 6: and they have exercised that right to file discrimination claims
35:05
Speaker 6: and to prosecute those discrimination claims, and they're entitled to,
35:08
Speaker 6: you know, certainly the same due process as any other
35:12
Speaker 6: any other litigant or any other complainant. And so, you know,
35:15
Speaker 6: so the President didn't change anything there. That's that's just
35:18
Speaker 6: sort of been the law of the land for a
35:21
Speaker 6: long time. I think the broad concern in terms of
35:24
Speaker 6: this sort of assault on DEI or this sort of
35:27
Speaker 6: stigmatization of DEI, has really two components. One is that DEI,
35:33
Speaker 6: according to you know, many people who are practitioners, and
35:38
Speaker 6: that includes many many, you know, people in the legal profession,
35:42
Speaker 6: is really just designed to ensure merit, to ensure that
35:46
Speaker 6: you have a broad African pool to ensure that as
35:50
Speaker 6: a company, you go back and look at your selection
35:52
Speaker 6: procedures and make sure that they don't exclude, you know,
35:56
Speaker 6: people from any background and that they're related, that they're
36:00
Speaker 6: related to the actual job. That you go back and
36:03
Speaker 6: you make sure that if there are any gender disparities
36:06
Speaker 6: in pay, that those gender disparities are justified for business reasons. Right.
36:11
Speaker 6: In other words, that you go back and you make
36:12
Speaker 6: sure that your procedures, that your processes from recruitment to selection,
36:17
Speaker 6: to promotion to retention, that they are all meritorious features.
36:22
Speaker 2: Right.
36:22
Speaker 6: And so what's going on here is just sort of
36:25
Speaker 6: the most in many ways most remarkable gaslight imaginable because
36:31
Speaker 6: one of the DEI executive orders talked about the restoration
36:34
Speaker 6: of merit, and it was focused on the federal government,
36:37
Speaker 6: which in many ways is the most merit based proceduralized
36:41
Speaker 6: part of the economy. Right that the whole idea of
36:44
Speaker 6: the civil service is about ensuring merit, and it was
36:48
Speaker 6: designed basically as a reaction to hiring people just based
36:53
Speaker 6: on political favoritism.
36:55
Speaker 2: Right.
36:56
Speaker 6: But what happens side by side with this in plain
36:58
Speaker 6: sight is that you know, there's been a real focus on, Hey,
37:02
Speaker 6: we need to hire people throughout the government who are
37:05
Speaker 6: loyal to the president. And you know, loyalty is not
37:08
Speaker 6: a merit factor, right, loyalty. I mean, this is exactly
37:11
Speaker 6: what the civil service protections were designed to prevent. This
37:15
Speaker 6: is exactly what DEI in its best form, is designed
37:19
Speaker 6: to prevent. Like the good old you know, old boys
37:21
Speaker 6: network and let's just tap people, let's just have our
37:23
Speaker 6: friends and just be really clevy and keep out the
37:25
Speaker 6: women and.
37:26
Speaker 3: Da da dah.
37:27
Speaker 6: And so you know, this is all going on at
37:29
Speaker 6: the same time, and like you really don't need to
37:30
Speaker 6: go beyond looking at the personnel choices that have been
37:35
Speaker 6: made at cabinet and subcabinet level positions, which certainly seemed
37:39
Speaker 6: to run a foul of traditional criteria from either replacing
37:44
Speaker 6: a well decorated African American who is head of the
37:48
Speaker 6: Joint Chief of Staff with someone of much more questionable qualifications.
37:54
Speaker 6: The only qualifications merit, right, You see this throughout the government,
37:57
Speaker 6: And so I think that's one thing that's going on.
37:59
Speaker 6: But I think you know, certainly, as a law professor
38:02
Speaker 6: that works with younger people and works with younger people
38:05
Speaker 6: who look like the United States of America. That is,
38:08
Speaker 6: you know, they come from all different backgrounds. You know.
38:11
Speaker 6: I think that this sort of weaponization of DEI as
38:13
Speaker 6: a slur has also had the impact of not the
38:16
Speaker 6: intent of having people question their own qualifications. And so,
38:21
Speaker 6: you know, for those of us who work with people
38:23
Speaker 6: who are entering the job market, you know, a lot
38:26
Speaker 6: of what we do is now pastoral in terms of no,
38:28
Speaker 6: you've worked hard, you deserve this. But I think that's
38:31
Speaker 6: the fallout when you have a plane accident and the
38:33
Speaker 6: president comes out an hour later and say that this
38:36
Speaker 6: was a result of DEI and then when asked, well,
38:38
Speaker 6: what is your basis for saying that, and he says
38:41
Speaker 6: common sense. So this has really really broad impact, right,
38:45
Speaker 6: And I think folks need to understand that this is
38:49
Speaker 6: really an effort to make sure that employers have you know,
38:55
Speaker 6: almost like absolute and better discretion to make personal decisions
38:59
Speaker 6: in every way. You know, that means in this context,
39:02
Speaker 6: let's not be bothered by these like pesky anti discrimination laws,
39:06
Speaker 6: and let's you know, sort of like explicitly say that
39:10
Speaker 6: you know that loyalty is going to be a factor
39:13
Speaker 6: in our selections. But it also extends the organized labor
39:17
Speaker 6: right so you've seen concurrently, you know, the President said,
39:21
Speaker 6: I'm not going to recognize the collective bargaining agreement with
39:25
Speaker 6: the tsamployees. Everyone knows that's a hard job, right, But
39:28
Speaker 6: you know, this is something that almost like hearkens back
39:31
Speaker 6: on President Reagan and going to war with Tacco.
39:34
Speaker 2: Right.
39:34
Speaker 6: It's really intended to send a signal, along with other
39:37
Speaker 6: actions such as the dismissal of Gwnn Wilcox, that organized
39:41
Speaker 6: labor is not going to be an impediment to the
39:45
Speaker 6: ability of employers to basically do as they will in
39:47
Speaker 6: the labor market.
39:48
Speaker 2: Is his campaign against DEI working in a certain extent,
39:52
Speaker 2: understand that you know, some law firms and companies are
39:55
Speaker 2: erasing any language like that in their website, So that
39:59
Speaker 2: must mean that they're also erasing their efforts in that area.
40:04
Speaker 6: Yeah, I mean, I think there's a conversation in the
40:07
Speaker 6: field of whether people are going to continue to their
40:09
Speaker 6: work under a different name. But I think certainly, you know,
40:12
Speaker 6: if you look at companies such as you know, Meta
40:16
Speaker 6: or Amazon, you know, it seems to be like a
40:19
Speaker 6: wholesale retreat in this area. So I mean, I think
40:21
Speaker 6: to the extent that you see that it's something that
40:25
Speaker 6: you know, has been working with I think some really
40:28
Speaker 6: you know, big name employers. Target is another one. You know,
40:31
Speaker 6: I think to a certain extent, it has been working.
40:33
Speaker 6: But I think it's important to say, as someone who's
40:36
Speaker 6: now an academic, Yeah, certainly there's a lot of good
40:39
Speaker 6: faith differences about issues of affirmative action, right, and about
40:45
Speaker 6: you know, issues of the importance of voice and diversity
40:48
Speaker 6: in the workplace or in an academic institution. And you know,
40:53
Speaker 6: the courts have been duk in and out with a
40:55
Speaker 6: lot of five four decisions for a long time. But
40:58
Speaker 6: I think it's really super important to remember that there's
41:01
Speaker 6: also a long history of using anxiety about preferences, particularly
41:08
Speaker 6: racial preferences, as sort of a wellspring for political activity.
41:13
Speaker 6: So like, even if you go back to the nineteenth century,
41:16
Speaker 6: one of the most famous cases Gutting Reconstruction. The justice
41:20
Speaker 6: who wrote it, you know, the civil rights cases is
41:23
Speaker 6: basically like, you know, there comes a time when African
41:26
Speaker 6: Americans need to walk on their own, they need to
41:28
Speaker 6: seize be in the special favorite of the state. Right,
41:30
Speaker 6: this is like just fifteen years after the end of slavery.
41:33
Speaker 6: And then politically we've seen this for a long time.
41:36
Speaker 6: I mean, this is part of the famous Nixon Southern strategy, right.
41:41
Speaker 6: This is like, you know, I don't know if you
41:43
Speaker 6: remember the Jesse Helms ad, you know, where he shows
41:47
Speaker 6: some white hands. He's running against Harvey Gantt, the former
41:49
Speaker 6: African American mayor of Charlotte, very close selection, and he
41:53
Speaker 6: has these white hands. The voiceover is you wanted the job,
41:56
Speaker 6: you needed these the job, but you didn't get the
41:58
Speaker 6: job because of a racial quota. And then at the
42:00
Speaker 6: same time you had a lot of politicization of the
42:04
Speaker 6: effort to codify desperate impact. And you know, George Bush
42:07
Speaker 6: famously is like, I'm not going to sign a quota act,
42:09
Speaker 6: and then you have you know, in the Republican platform,
42:12
Speaker 6: like you know, quotas are the most pernicious form of discrimination,
42:16
Speaker 6: and so you know, certainly in the race area, this
42:18
Speaker 6: is an old playbook. This is not new. You know,
42:21
Speaker 6: I think this is more than sort of a good
42:23
Speaker 6: faith belief in you know, formal equality. You know, this
42:29
Speaker 6: is also basically a dog whistle not so settled dog
42:33
Speaker 6: whistle to the base, because you know, this is sort
42:37
Speaker 6: of building on a long history of using anxieties over
42:41
Speaker 6: racial preferences for African Americans as a way to sort
42:44
Speaker 6: of whip up political support. And I just think that's
42:48
Speaker 6: sad because I think that operates against the backdrop where
42:52
Speaker 6: you know, we have more inequality in the economy than
42:55
Speaker 6: we've ever seen, and it operates against you know, the
42:58
Speaker 6: backdrop of Elon you know, sort of whipping through the
43:01
Speaker 6: federal government and you know, just cutting things like he's
43:05
Speaker 6: the ultimately like bad boss, like coming five things that
43:08
Speaker 6: you've done. I want to write a column called Glen
43:10
Speaker 6: Gary Glenn Musk because he's like worse than Alec Baldwin.
43:14
Speaker 6: It's like, you're gonna do it. I don't care. And
43:16
Speaker 6: you know we've all had the boss, you know that
43:17
Speaker 6: doesn't know anything about what you do but still undervalues it, right,
43:21
Speaker 6: or just basically like I'm the smartest person in the
43:23
Speaker 6: room and everyone's like you have no clue what I do. Right,
43:26
Speaker 6: You're just like looking at boxes and you're just like
43:28
Speaker 6: eliminating boxes. And so you know that's going on, and
43:32
Speaker 6: you know right now there's a lot of I think
43:35
Speaker 6: good faith belief that Medicaid is in peril, and so
43:38
Speaker 6: you know, people are talking about you know, DEI it
43:41
Speaker 6: becomes almost like a distraction at this point, because that's
43:45
Speaker 6: not what is left. Wage is stagnant, and that's not
43:48
Speaker 6: what has created all this inequality in our economy. You know,
43:51
Speaker 6: it isn't the right They becomes like a distraction there.
43:55
Speaker 6: But I think that you know a lot of the
43:57
Speaker 6: anxieties are working people feel, and just to say, hey,
43:59
Speaker 6: a lot of it is is that become like these
44:01
Speaker 6: cultural flashpoints deliberately are often designed to make you not
44:06
Speaker 6: look in the other direction at what's going on over
44:08
Speaker 6: here's the good old Wizard of Oz.
44:11
Speaker 2: Will this be a very slow process to untangle all
44:16
Speaker 2: these things that in his executive order against Perkins KOOI.
44:21
Speaker 6: Well, I mean, I think what you've seen is that
44:22
Speaker 6: just a lot of the executive orders have been enjoyed,
44:25
Speaker 6: So it may not be a slow process at all.
44:27
Speaker 6: You can call me again when briefs start flying, and
44:30
Speaker 6: I imagine that's going to be very soon. You know,
44:32
Speaker 6: there's a real effort to kind of move quickly on
44:36
Speaker 6: a lot of things in a lot of areas. But
44:38
Speaker 6: that becomes like a double ed sword for the administration
44:41
Speaker 6: because what happens is that things are often slowly done
44:45
Speaker 6: and easily struck down. But I think what also happens.
44:49
Speaker 6: And I'm going to just say this as someone who
44:52
Speaker 6: is very proud of my service at the Department of
44:55
Speaker 6: Justice and be able to being able to stand up
44:57
Speaker 6: and say, you know, I represent the United States America.
45:00
Speaker 6: You know, when I was there, it was very frustrated
45:02
Speaker 6: sometimes because I'm like DFJ so bureaucratic, encumbersome and cautious, right,
45:08
Speaker 6: And when I was at the UC, it's like, oh dog,
45:10
Speaker 6: so you know, bureaucratic, compass it. But they do that
45:13
Speaker 6: to maintain the institutional credibility of the institution. And it's
45:16
Speaker 6: really built into the DNA of the lifers who have
45:20
Speaker 6: worked at J that hey, we represent the United States.
45:24
Speaker 6: You know, We're not like the private, contigular areas of
45:27
Speaker 6: the president. We represent the United States, and as administrations change,
45:31
Speaker 6: we always have to maintain the credibility of the institution.
45:36
Speaker 6: As lawyers with the courts, right, that is so built
45:39
Speaker 6: into the DNA of the Department of Justice. And it
45:42
Speaker 6: feels like that's unraveled in one month. It's just sort
45:45
Speaker 6: of like we're going to go there and we're going
45:46
Speaker 6: to say anything, and you know, and then they keep
45:48
Speaker 6: getting kind of slapped down by the courts. You know.
45:51
Speaker 6: Then you see people who are leaving in mass because
45:55
Speaker 6: they understand what's happening and they don't want to be
45:58
Speaker 6: part of it. And often the last form of resistance
46:01
Speaker 6: that many people have is to sort of walk out
46:05
Speaker 6: with the feet. But it really hurts the credibility of
46:08
Speaker 6: the Department of Justice. Hopefully they'll be able to kind
46:10
Speaker 6: of one day claw that back, but the send lawyers
46:13
Speaker 6: in to represent something like this or like some of
46:15
Speaker 6: the other executive orders doesn't really help with the skepture
46:19
Speaker 6: of the nation's lawyers.
46:20
Speaker 2: We're going to have to leave it there. Thanks so much, David.
46:23
Speaker 2: That's Professor David Lopez of Rutgers Law School, and that's
46:26
Speaker 2: it for this edition of The Bloomberg Law Show. Remember
46:29
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46:31
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