Jenner & Block and WilmerHale filed separate court papers on Tuesday (8 April) seeking to permanently block President Donald Trump’s executive orders targeting them. 

The firms filed motions for summary judgment in the US District Court for the District of Columbia, meaning they are asking the court to decide their cases without a full trial. 

The same day the government countered with motions for dismissal in both Jenner’s and WilmerHale’s cases.

Jenner called the order a “plain violation” of the First Amendment and asked the court to extend a 28 March decision that temporarily blocked aspects of the order to cover the whole of it, and make it permanent. 

WilmerHale similarly argued that the court should find the entire order unconstitutional and permanently enjoin enforcement of it. 

“Retaliatory animus and viewpoint discrimination infect every aspect of this order, severely abridging and chilling constitutionally protected speech, association and petitioning activity,” the firm said. 

The orders, issued last month, restricted Jenner and WilmerHale employees’ access to federal buildings, instructed agencies to terminate contracts with the firms and their clients and stripped their lawyers’ security clearances. 

They formed part of a wider campaign by Trump to target law firms he maintains have supported efforts to unfairly prosecute him or help his opponents, alongside a broader effort by his administration to challenge diversity, equity and inclusion policies. 

In lawsuits filed late last month seeking injunctive relief against the orders, Jenner and WilmerHale claimed they had been targeted for their ties to Robert Mueller, who investigated Russian contacts with Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign while US special counsel, and their pro bono representations. 

On 28 March US District Judge Richard Leon and US District Judge John Bates issued temporary restraining orders (TROs) blocking the parts of the executive orders against WilmerHale and Jenner respectively that related to access to federal buildings and termination of government contracts.

WilmerHale had asked Judge Leon to halt the order’s security clearances provision when seeking the TRO, but he declined to do so. Jenner didn’t initially challenge the order’s suspension of its lawyers’ security clearances, but in its Tuesday court filing joined WilmerHale in seeking to strike down that provision also. 

WilmerHale said in its latest court filing that the executive order was in excess of the president’s authority, and noted that Judge Leon had found the “retaliatory nature” of the order was “clear from its face” when granting the TRO. 

The orders have characterised the targeted law firms as a security risk, though WilmerHale pointed out that the administration had not explained how the security concerns posed by the law firms with which it has cut deals had dissipated. So far Paul Weiss, Skadden Arps, Willkie Farr & Gallagher and Milbank have made deals that will see them provide a combined $340m of pro bono legal services to causes shared with the administration. 

In its Tuesday court filing Jenner said that the firms had settled with the president “on bended knee”, adding that the deals “advance not the interests of their own clients, but instead the government’s chosen agenda”.

“These orders send a clear message to the legal profession: cease certain representations adverse to the government and renounce the administration’s critics – or suffer the consequences,” the firm said. 

WilmerHale is represented by Paul Clement, a highly-respected litigator who was solicitor general in the George W. Bush administration and a team of lawyers from Clement & Murphy.

Jenner is represented by a Cooley team led by partner Michael Attanasio. The firm said it would file a further reply to the government’s filing on 17 April, after which it expects a final decision by Judge Bates.

The New York Times reported that the same federal court has also received at least half a dozen amicus briefs in support of Perkins Coie, the first law firm to sue the Trump administration over the executive order targetting it.

Last week a brief signed by 500 law firms was filed on the matter, while on Monday the latest briefs were filed by the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund and a group of professional bar associations.