When the Government Targets Lawyers: The State Bar Pushes Back
The State Bar of California has stepped into a fight over whether the federal executive branch can punish law firms for the cases they take and give the Department of Justice special power to slow or sideline ordinary state‑bar investigations of DOJ’s own lawyers. In early April 2026, the Bar announced that it is supporting challenges to Trump‑era executive orders aimed at specific firms and opposing a new DOJ rule that would let the Department insert itself ahead of state bars when complaints are filed against DOJ attorneys.
To understand what the Bar is reacting to, you have to start with the executive orders themselves.
Factual background: the targeted executive orders
In 2025, President Trump issued several measures singling out particular law firms by name, based on their past work opposing him and his administration.
The most prominent is Executive Order 14230, “Addressing Risks from Perkins Coie LLP,” issued March 6, 2025 and published at 90 Fed. Reg. 11781. Perkins Coie has long represented Democratic campaigns, handled election‑law and voting‑rights matters, and worked on litigation adverse to Trump and his allies. Executive Order 14230 directs federal agencies to:
Immediately suspend all security clearances held by Perkins Coie lawyers and staff, pending review.
Halt access to secure facilities and restrict Perkins Coie employees’ access to federal buildings.
Refrain from hiring Perkins Coie lawyers unless specifically authorized.
Review and, to the maximum extent permitted by law, terminate federal contracts with Perkins Coie.
Prohibit federal funding to contractors who use Perkins Coie for legal work.
A similar order, Executive Order 14237, “Addressing Risks from Paul Weiss,” issued March 14, 2025, targets Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP. Paul Weiss attorneys have been involved in investigations and prosecutions Trump has publicly attacked, including work connected to former Special Counsel Jack Smith and prosecutions of Trump‑aligned figures. Executive Order 14237 suspends Paul Weiss employees’ security clearances, restricts their access to government facilities, and directs agencies to review and terminate Paul Weiss contracts where possible.
In addition, a presidential memorandum titled “Suspension of Security Clearances and Evaluation of Government Contracts” (Feb. 24–25, 2025) orders the suspension of clearances for certain Covington & Burling lawyers who worked on matters involving Jack Smith and instructs agencies to terminate Covington engagements and review all federal contracts with the firm.
These measures all follow the same template: pick a firm that has been a thorn in the administration’s side, label it a “risk,” and then direct the federal government to strip it of clearances, contracts, and access.
Multiple lawsuits were filed by the targeted firms, including Perkins Coie LLP v. U.S. Department of Justice, challenging Executive Order 14230 and related actions. District courts have issued temporary restraining orders and permanent injunctions blocking enforcement, finding that Executive Order 14230 in particular is unconstitutional retaliation against protected First Amendment activity. The administration appealed, and those appeals are now pending in the D.C. Circuit.
What the orders are really trying to do
On paper, the orders talk about “addressing risks” and “protecting national interests.” In practice, they are aimed at law firms whose “offense” is representing political opponents, defending election results Trump disputes, or working on investigations he characterizes as “weaponization.”
The sanctions are not limited to simply declining to hire these firms going forward. They include:
Suspension of existing security clearances for firm lawyers and staff.
Loss of access to government facilities and systems.
Termination of active federal engagements “to the maximum extent permitted by law.”
Economic pressure on third‑party contractors not to retain the firms.
The intended effect is to punish those firms and to send a broader signal to the bar: if you take on certain clients or cases against the administration, you and your firm can be singled out and subjected to career‑ and business‑ending sanctions by executive fiat.
Commentators and courts alike have described this as a deliberate chilling effect on lawyers’ willingness to represent disfavored clients or sue the administration—and on clients’ ability to find counsel willing to take those cases at all.
The State Bar’s amicus: clients’ rights and lawyer independence
Against that backdrop, the State Bar of California announced that it has joined the Oregon State Bar and the Washington State Bar Association in filing an amicus curiae brief in the consolidated D.C. Circuit appeals brought by the targeted firms.
As summarized by the Bar, the brief makes three core points:
Clients’ First Amendment rights. Punishing law firms for their choice of clients and cases infringes the First Amendment rights of those clients to choose their own counsel and to petition the courts for redress. If firms are deterred from taking certain matters, those rights become hollow.
Independence of counsel. Lawyers are supposed to be independent advocates, not subject to political retaliation for representing unpopular parties or arguments. Executive orders like 14230 and 14237 threaten that independence by making the economics of high‑stakes advocacy contingent on political favor.
Courts’ authority over the profession. Regulation of who may practice law, and on what terms, has traditionally been a judicial and bar‑regulatory function. When the executive branch effectively blacklists firms from large swaths of federal work because of their advocacy, it intrudes on courts’ core role in supervising the bar.
Put bluntly, the Bar is telling the D.C. Circuit that these orders are not ordinary procurement decisions—they are constitutional outliers that weaponize executive power against lawyers and their clients.
DOJ’s proposed rule: state bars vs. federal shielding
The State Bar’s announcement also addressed a separate issue: a DOJ proposal titled “Review of State Bar Complaints and Allegations Against Department of Justice Attorneys” (AG Order No. 6653‑2026‑A, RIN 1105‑AB82).
Under existing law, DOJ lawyers are subject to state ethics rules and discipline “to the same extent and in the same manner” as other attorneys. If someone files a complaint with a state bar about a DOJ attorney’s conduct, the state bar can investigate and, if warranted, prosecute discipline.
The proposed rule would insert DOJ into that process as a gatekeeper. DOJ would:
Reserve for itself the right to review any complaint involving current or former DOJ attorneys “in the first instance.”
Request that state bars suspend their own investigations while DOJ conducts an internal review.
Provide no clear deadline for DOJ to complete that review, while hinting at “appropriate action” if a bar declines to pause.
Many bar organizations and commentators, including the National Organization of Bar Counsel and Attorney General Rob Bonta, have warned that this would allow DOJ to delay or effectively obstruct independent state‑bar discipline of its own lawyers.
The State Bar’s objections to the DOJ rule
In its comment letter, the State Bar of California characterizes the DOJ proposal as “unprecedented, unnecessary, [and] inappropriate,” and says it lacks both congressional and constitutional authority.
The Bar’s reasons track familiar structural concerns:
State authority over attorney discipline. States, through their supreme courts and bar regulators, have long held primary authority to license and discipline lawyers. Letting DOJ dictate when state bars can and cannot investigate federal lawyers undercuts that authority and raises Tenth Amendment and federalism problems.
Equal application of ethics rules. Congress has already required that DOJ attorneys be subject to state rules of professional conduct just like any other lawyer. Creating a special delay mechanism and internal review process exclusively for DOJ attorneys contradicts that mandate and effectively creates a two‑tier disciplinary regime.
Public protection and delay. If DOJ can park bar complaints against its own lawyers for extended periods, the public is less protected from serious misconduct, and confidence in the discipline system is undermined.
Conflicts for California‑licensed DOJ lawyers. The proposed rule would put California‑licensed DOJ attorneys in a bind between DOJ’s expectations and their obligations under California statutes and bar rules, including duties to cooperate with disciplinary investigations and to comply with court orders.
For those reasons, the State Bar has formally asked DOJ to abandon the proposal.
Why any of this matters
This is not just “inside baseball” for lawyers.
If the executive branch can use Executive Orders 14230, 14237, and similar measures to punish law firms for taking on disfavored clients and cases, fewer firms will be willing to stand between ordinary people and the government when it counts. If DOJ can insert itself ahead of state bars and delay or derail discipline of its own attorneys, federal government lawyers move closer to being above the rules that bind the rest of the profession.
The State Bar’s recent actions—filing an amicus in the D.C. Circuit and submitting formal comments to DOJ—are institutional ways of drawing a line: lawyers should not be punished by the executive branch for who they represent, and DOJ lawyers should not enjoy a special shield from the ethics rules everyone else must follow.
That is not just a lawyer’s concern. It goes directly to whether clients can find independent counsel willing to take hard cases, and whether the rule of law is more than a slogan when the government itself is on the other side of the “v.”
