A federal judge on Friday permanently blocked another of President Donald Trump’s executive orders targeting a major law firm, calling it unconstitutional retaliation designed to punish lawyers for their legal work that the White House does not like.

The ruling from U.S. District Judge John Bates marks the second time this month that a judge has struck down a Trump executive order against a prominent firm.

The decision in favor of Jenner & Block follows a similar opinion that blocked the enforcement of a decree against a different firm, Perkins Coie.

Judge John Bates permanently blocked President Donald Trump’s executive order targeting the Jenner & Block law firm. New Africa – stock.adobe.com

“Like the others in the series, this order — which takes aim at the global law firm Jenner & Block — makes no bones about why it chose its target: it picked Jenner because of the causes Jenner champions, the clients Jenner represents, and a lawyer Jenner once employed,” Bates wrote.

The spate of executive orders announced by Trump sought to impose the same consequences against the targeted firms, including suspending security clearances of attorneys and barring employees from federal buildings.

The orders have been part of a broader effort by the president to reshape American civil society by targeting perceived adversaries in hopes of extracting concessions from them and bending them to his will.

Several of the firms singled out for sanctions have either done legal work that Trump has opposed, or currently have or previously had associations with prosecutors who at one point investigated the president.

This is the second time this month a judge has struck down a Trump executive order against a prominent law firm. AP

In the case of Jenner & Block, the firm previously employed Andrew Weissmann, who served as a prosecutor on special counsel Robert Mueller’s team that investigated ties between Trump’s 2016 campaign and Russia.

Bates had previously halted enforcement of multiple provisions of the executive order against Jenner & Block and appeared deeply skeptical of its legality during a hearing last month.

In his ruling Friday, he said he was troubled that the orders retaliated against the firms for the “views embodied in their legal work” and seek “to chill legal representation the administration doesn’t like, thereby insulating the Executive Branch from the judicial check fundamental to the separation of powers.”

Two other firms, WilmerHale and Susman Godfrey, have also asked judges to permanently halt orders against them.

Other major firms have sought to avert orders by preemptively reaching settlements that require them, among other things, to collectively dedicate hundreds of millions of dollars in free legal services in support of causes the Trump administration says it supports.

A federal judge on Friday struck down an executive order signed by President Trump that threatened penalties against the law firm Jenner & Block, which once employed a top attorney who helped investigate the president alongside the team run by Robert S. Mueller III, who was then the special counsel.

It was the second time a federal judge found one of Mr. Trump’s orders targeting elite law firms unconstitutional, after another judge ruled earlier in May that an essentially identical order targeting the firm Perkins Coie appeared retributive and designed to strong-arm the firm into serving the White House. Two other firms — WilmerHale and Susman Godfrey — have asked for similarly decisive rulings in lawsuits they brought.

In March, after a string of similar orders that openly detailed the president’s political grievances and furthered his campaign of retribution, Mr. Trump released an order targeting Jenner & Block, citing its past decision to hire Andrew Weissmann after the special counsel’s investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election. Mr. Weissman left the firm in 2021.

The order leveraged the full force of the federal government to curtail Jenner & Block’s business.

In an opinion on Friday, Judge John D. Bates wrote that the orders were “doubly violative of the Constitution.” Not only did they violate the First Amendment by seeking to muzzle a perceived critic of the president, he wrote, they also had the effect of intimidating all other lawyers whose work “protects against governmental viewpoint becoming government-imposed orthodoxy.”

In a significant legal setback for the Trump administration, a U.S. judge in Washington has blocked President Donald Trump’s executive order targeting the prestigious law firm Jenner & Block. The order, which sought to suspend security clearances for the firm’s lawyers, was deemed unconstitutional by U.S. District Judge John Bates.

Bates, appointed by Republican President George W. Bush, highlighted the infringement of rights, noting that the order sought to punish Jenner & Block for its legal representation of causes deemed adversarial to Trump. This decision follows a similar ruling against another law firm, Perkins Coie.

The judge emphasized the importance of protecting free speech and legal representation, serving as a check on executive power. While the White House criticized Jenner & Block’s legal pursuits, the firm praised the ruling for upholding the constitutional right to independent legal counsel. An appeal may be forthcoming.

(With inputs from agencies.)

A judge on Friday struck down Donald Trump’s executive order against the Big Law firm Jenner & Block, ruling the order unconstitutional. Evelyn Hockstein/REUTERS

The executive order targeting Big Law firm Jenner & Block was ruled unconstitutional on Friday.

In his ruling, District Judge John Bates said the EO retaliated against the firm for protected speech.

This is the second executive order targeting a Big Law firm that has been struck down.

Another of President Donald Trump’s executive orders targeting a Big Law firm has been struck down after a US District Judge on Friday said the action against Jenner & Block was unconstitutional.

The entire order, which revoked the security clearances of the firm’s attorneys and required a review of its government contracts, was invalidated by the judge’s ruling, representing a major win for Jenner & Block.

“The order raises constitutional eyebrows many times over. It punishes and seeks to silence speech ‘at the very center of the First Amendment,'” US District Judge John Bates, of the District Court of DC wrote in his ruling, adding that Trump’s order did so “via the most ‘egregious form of content discrimination — viewpoint discrimination,'” and “in an unacceptable attempt to ‘insulate the Government’s laws from judicial inquiry.'”

A spokesperson for Jenner & Block directed Business Insider to their public statement following the ruling, which said that the firm is “pleased with the court’s decision to decisively strike down an unconstitutional attack on our clients’ right to have zealous, independent counsel and our firm’s right to represent our clients fully and without compromise.”

“Our decision to fight the executive order in court is rooted in Jenner & Block’s history and values: we fiercely advocate for our clients under all circumstances,” the firm’s statement continued. “This ruling demonstrates the importance of lawyers standing firm on behalf of clients and for the law. That is what Jenner will continue to do for our clients — paying and pro bono — as we look to put this matter behind us.”

Representatives for the White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.

The federal government can appeal the decision, in which case the proceedings will be heard in the court of appeals. Any subsequent appeal would be heard by the Supreme Court.

The decision from US District Judge John Bates, an appointee of former President George W. Bush, is the second order striking down an executive order from Trump targeting a law firm.

Earlier this month, another judge blocked an order targeting Perkins Coie, ruling that Trump’s use of federal power “an overt attempt to suppress and punish certain viewpoints.”

Judges have also temporarily paused executive orders targeting the law firms Susman Godfrey and Wilmer Hale, pending decisions on whether to permanently block them.

At an April hearing for Jenner & Block’s case, Bates snapped at the Justice Department lawyer, Richard Lawson, who argued Trump’s executive order should stand.

“Give me a break,” Bates said, as Lawson argued federal agencies should follow Trump’s command because Jenner & Block engaged in “racial discrimination.”

In the now-blocked executive order, Trump specifically singled out attorney Andrew Weissmann, a Jenner employee who served as a lead prosecutor in Robert Mueller’s special counsel’s office, which investigated Trump’s ties to Russia in 2016. The order described Weissmann’s career as “rooted in weaponized government and abuse of power.”

Judge Bates’s ruling described Trump’s order and the subsequent legal battle over its legality as “no run-of-the-mill retaliation case,” adding that the president “has displayed a great deal of animosity toward Jenner.”

“Further adverse actions would not be shocking — and could very well offend the Constitution as plainly as Executive Order 14246 does,” Bates wrote. “But Article III requires this Court to place its faith in future courts to prevent harm from befalling Jenner if and when that occurs.”

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President Trump’s attempts to punish law firms for political reasons failed for the second time on Friday when a federal judge permanently struck down his executive order sanctioning Jenner & Block. DC District Judge John Bates ruled Trump’s order an unconstitutional abuse of presidential power, Bloomberg Law reports. “This order, like the others, seeks to chill legal representation the administration doesn’t like, thereby insulating the Executive Branch from the judicial check fundamental to the separation of powers,” Bates wrote.

The firm had sued Trump after he sought to strip it of government contracts and its lawyers of access to federal buildings and officials, per the Washington Post. The order singled out former partner Andrew Weissmann, who worked on special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into accusations of Russian interference in the 2016 election, for criticism. Perkins Coie, WilmerHale, and Susman Godfrey also sued over Trump’s orders and have had judges at least temporarily block most of the punishments the president sought. Perkins Coie won a ruling similar to the one in the Jenner & Block case.

Bates, who was appointed by President George W. Bush, went beyond his temporary pause on the executive order while the case was being considered. This time, he overturned every part of Trump’s order, per CNN. “The challenged executive order targets Jenner for what it has said and thereby attempts to dampen what it might yet say,” Bates wrote. “That is unconstitutional under any view of the First Amendment.” The Trump administration did not immediately announce whether it will appeal the ruling. (More President Trump stories.)