Growing Discomfort at Law Firms Representing Trump in Election Lawsuits

Like many huge regulation companies, Jones Day, whose roots return to Cleveland within the late 1800s, has prided itself on representing controversial purchasers.

There was Big Tobacco. There was the Bin Laden family. There was even the hated owner of the Cleveland Browns soccer workforce as he moved the franchise to Baltimore.

Now Jones Day is essentially the most distinguished agency representing President Trump and the Republican Celebration as they put together to wage a legal war difficult the outcomes of the election. The work is intensifying issues contained in the agency in regards to the propriety and knowledge of working for Mr. Trump, in accordance with attorneys on the agency.

Doing enterprise with Mr. Trump — together with his historical past of inflammatory rhetoric, meritless lawsuits and refusal to pay what he owes — has lengthy induced heartburn amongst attorneys, contractors, suppliers and lenders. However the issues are taking up new urgency because the president seeks to lift doubts in regards to the election outcomes.

Some senior attorneys at Jones Day, one of many nation’s largest regulation companies, are anxious that it’s advancing arguments that lack proof and could also be serving to Mr. Trump and his allies undermine the integrity of American elections, in accordance with interviews with 9 companions and associates, who spoke on the situation of anonymity to guard their jobs.

At one other massive agency, Porter Wright Morris & Arthur, primarily based in Columbus, Ohio, attorneys have held inside conferences to voice comparable issues about their agency’s election-related work for Mr. Trump and the Republican Celebration, in accordance with individuals on the agency. No less than one lawyer give up in protest.

Already, the 2 companies have filed at the very least 4 lawsuits difficult elements of the election in Pennsylvania. The circumstances are pending.

The most recent salvo got here on Monday night, when the Trump marketing campaign filed a suit in federal court docket in Pennsylvania in opposition to the Pennsylvania secretary of state and a variety of county election boards. The swimsuit — filed by attorneys at Porter Wright — alleged that there have been “irregularities” in voting throughout the state.

In current days, Mr. Trump and his allies have been making an attempt to lift cash to bankroll their authorized efforts. A few of the fund-raising entreaties have famous that a portion of donated cash is likely to be used to pay down the marketing campaign’s current money owed, relatively than to fund new authorized efforts.

Whereas it isn’t clear which regulation companies might be submitting the fits, Jones Day has been one in every of Mr. Trump’s most steadfast authorized advisers.

As Mr. Trump campaigned for president in 2016, a Jones Day companion, Donald F. McGahn II, served as his outdoors lawyer, main recount fights in crucial states. Mr. McGahn later turned Mr. Trump’s White House counsel, earlier than returning to Jones Day.

On the time, some senior attorneys at Jones Day objected to working carefully for a polarizing presidential candidate, in accordance with three companions on the agency. They grimaced on the sight of Mr. McGahn standing with Mr. Trump onstage after he gained the New Hampshire main in February 2016. A month later, the agency hosted a gathering at its Capitol Hill workplace with Mr. Trump and Republican lawmakers as he sought to win over the celebration institution.

The agency’s work for Mr. Trump has additionally garnered it unfavorable public consideration. “Jones Day, Fingers Off Our Ballots,” learn a mural painted on the street outdoors the regulation agency’s San Francisco workplaces late final week.

In the course of the Trump presidency, Jones Day has been involved in some 20 lawsuits involving Mr. Trump, his marketing campaign or the Republican Celebration, and it worked for the Trump campaign on government investigations into Russian interference within the 2016 election.

The work has been profitable. Since 2015, Jones Day has acquired greater than $20 million in charges from the Trump campaigns, political teams linked to Mr. Trump and the Republican Nationwide Committee, in accordance with federal records. Jones Day attorneys mentioned that was a small portion of the agency’s total income.

Along with Mr. McGahn, a variety of different companions on the agency joined the Trump administration. Noel Francisco became Mr. Trump’s first solicitor common. Eric Dreiband is an assistant attorney general within the Justice Division.

Earlier than the 2020 marketing campaign, some companions at Jones Day mentioned, they needed to reassure purchasers that the agency’s illustration of the Trump workforce wouldn’t affect the remainder of the agency’s work, in accordance with 4 companions. Legal professionals on the agency have labored to advertise gun control and have represented unaccompanied minors, together with many detained by the federal authorities.

However companions typically swallowed their issues in regards to the shut relationship with Mr. Trump.

Then the president and his allies, down within the polls, started fanning fears about voter fraud, a part of a broader effort to sow doubts in regards to the integrity of the election.

“Most of the GOP’s litigation issues are meritorious in precept. However the president’s inflammatory language undercuts the declare that Republicans search merely to uphold statutory safeguards wanted to validate the outcomes’ credibility,” Benjamin L. Ginsberg, a longtime Republican elections lawyer who left Jones Day in August, wrote in The Washington Post the next month.

After the election, as Mr. Trump’s reported lead in Pennsylvania was evaporating, Jones Day and Porter Wright petitioned the Supreme Court docket to segregate all ballots acquired after Nov. three. Pennsylvania, they wrote of their temporary, “might effectively decide the following President of america.” A distinguished Republican lawyer, John M. Gore, helps to steer the trouble at Jones Day. He beforehand served as an assistant lawyer common in Mr. Trump’s Justice Division.

On Friday night, Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. ordered election officers in Pennsylvania to maintain late-arriving ballots separate and to not embrace them in introduced vote tallies. (Pennsylvania’s secretary of state had already given the identical steerage.)

Six Jones Day attorneys mentioned that given the small variety of late-arriving ballots concerned within the litigation, and the truth that they already had been segregated, the primary aim of the litigation appeared to be to erode public confidence within the election outcomes.

Jones Day didn’t reply to a request for remark.

In current days, two Jones Day attorneys mentioned that they had confronted heckling from associates and others on social media about working at a agency that’s supporting Mr. Trump’s efforts.

A lawyer in Jones Day’s Washington workplace felt that the agency risked hurting itself by taking up work that undermined the rule of regulation. “To me, it appears extraordinarily shortsighted,” the lawyer mentioned.

This 12 months, Jones Day has acquired greater than $four million in charges from Mr. Trump, political teams supporting him and the Republican Nationwide Committee, in accordance with the latest Federal Election Committee records.

A lot of Democratic and Republican companions at Jones Day mentioned that whereas a few of their colleagues have been grumbling in regards to the Trump relationship, it was the agency’s obligation to proceed representing long-term purchasers, even when particular person attorneys disagreed with their politics or ways. Two companions recalled how Jones Day had caught with Artwork Modell, the embattled Cleveland Browns proprietor, even when there have been demise threats in opposition to the agency’s attorneys and safety workers needed to escort workers in Cleveland to their vehicles.

The outcry at Porter Wright, which like Jones Day was based within the 1800s in Ohio, seems extra intense.

Prior to now week, the agency has filed a number of lawsuits in Pennsylvania, making an attempt to poke holes within the reliability of the election outcomes on behalf of the Trump marketing campaign and the R.N.C., amongst others. Porter Wright has acquired at the very least $727,00zero in charges this 12 months from the Trump marketing campaign and R.N.C., in accordance with federal records.

Over the summer time, some attorneys at Porter Wright have been dismayed to study that the agency can be representing the Trump marketing campaign in Pennsylvania, in accordance with three present and former workers.

Chief amongst their issues: How might attorneys, whose occupation relies on the rule of regulation, symbolize somebody who they felt had ceaselessly tried to flout it? One lawyer mentioned he was involved that the agency is likely to be requested to attempt to delay the election. One other mentioned he give up in response to the choice to symbolize Mr. Trump in Pennsylvania.

At two conferences, associates at Porter Wright instructed the agency’s companions that they objected to the work for the Trump marketing campaign, in accordance with the three present and former workers. They have been instructed that the task was restricted to the election in Pennsylvania. That assurance struck some attendees as hole, for the reason that state may determine the election.

Robert J. Tannous, the agency’s managing companion, declined to remark intimately on the work for Mr. Trump. He mentioned, “Porter Wright has a protracted historical past of representing candidates, political events, curiosity teams and people on the native, state and federal ranges on each side of the aisle, and as a regulation agency will proceed to take action.”

Kitty Bennett contributed analysis.