Elite litigation firm Susman Godfrey has become the latest law firm to be targeted with an executive order by President Donald Trump.

The order was signed by Trump on Wednesday (9 April) and echoes earlier orders targeting Perkins Coie, Paul Weiss, Jenner & Block and WilmerHale in restricting Susman employees’ access to federal buildings, instructing agencies to terminate contracts with the firm and its clients and revoking its lawyers’ security clearances. 

Like the other orders it also claims Susman has engaged in “unlawful discrimination” on the basis of race, citing the firm’s programme offering “financial awards and employment opportunities only to ‘students of colour’”.

Susman responded quickly, deriding the order as “unconstitutional” in a statement yesterday. 

“Anyone who knows Susman Godfrey knows we believe in the rule of law, and we take seriously our duty to uphold it,” the firm said. “This principle guides us now. There is no question that we will fight this unconstitutional order.”

The order forms part of a wider campaign by Trump targeting 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. 

Trump’s reasoning for taking aim at Susman was not immediately clear, although Bloomberg reported that top White House aide Stephen Miller alleged the firm was “very involved in election misconduct”. 

Susman represented Dominion Voting Systems in its blockbuster defamation lawsuit against Fox, which alleged Fox had broadcast false statements that Dominion’s voting machines had been rigged to steal the 2020 presidential election from Trump and led to Fox agreeing to pay a $787.5m settlement.

Perkins Coie, Jenner & Block and WilmerHale have all filed lawsuits against the orders and been granted preliminary court orders blocking most aspects of them. Earlier this week Jenner and WilmerHale went a step further, filing motions for summary judgment seeking to permanently block the orders in their entirety.

Susman has been active in Perkins Coie’s case against its order, filing an amicus brief earlier this week on behalf of a bipartisan group of former senior government officials supporting the firm’s legal challenge. It was also among the more than 500 law firms that signed an earlier amicus brief backing Perkins Coie, which garnered attention for the paucity of top 100 firms that joined. 

Big Law’s muted response to the orders has been widely criticised, including by junior lawyers at firms that have made deals with the administration to avoid punitive executive action. Paul Weiss cut a deal that saw its order rescinded and Skadden Arps, Milbank and Willkie Farr & Gallagher made pre-emptive settlements that will see them provide a combined $340m of pro bono legal services to causes shared with the administration. 

The cutting of deals with Trump by law firms looks set to continue, with Miller claiming the administration was getting close to $700m in deals, including those that haven’t been announced. “The numbers are adding up,” Miller told Bloomberg. “We’re going to be close to a billion soon.”