President Donald Trump’s executive order against WilmerHale, signed March 27, 2025 as Executive Order 14250, directed federal agencies to strip the law firm of security clearances, cancel its clients’ government contracts, and bar its lawyers from federal buildings and communications with government employees. WilmerHale sued the next day. On May 27, 2025, a federal judge struck the order down in full as unconstitutional retaliation for the firm’s legal work. The government’s appeal is pending before the D.C. Circuit.
What the Order Did
Executive Order 14250, titled “Addressing Risks from WilmerHale,” instructed agencies across the federal government to impose a stacked set of penalties on the firm. Security clearances for all firm personnel were to be suspended. Access to federal buildings was to be cut off. Government contracts involving the firm were to be terminated, and federal employees were barred from meeting or communicating with anyone at WilmerHale. Agencies were told to refuse to hire former WilmerHale employees without a special waiver, and federal contractors were required to disclose any business relationships with the firm. A separate provision directed the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to investigate the firm’s diversity practices for alleged race and sex discrimination.
The stakes for the firm were concrete. In court, WilmerHale’s lead counsel Paul Clement said 21 of the firm’s 25 largest clients in 2024 held federal contracts, accounting for roughly 30 percent of annual revenue, or about $500 million. Several clients had already terminated or paused their relationships with the firm by the time the court ruled.
Why WilmerHale Was Targeted
The order’s stated justifications ran wide, accusing the firm of “conduct detrimental to critical American interests,” backing “the obstruction of efforts” against illegal immigration, undermining election integrity, and practicing racial discrimination through its diversity initiatives. But its sharpest language singled out three lawyers: Robert Mueller, James Quarles, and Aaron Zebley, all of whom worked at WilmerHale before and after serving on the special counsel investigation into ties between Russia and Trump’s 2016 campaign.
Mueller had been a WilmerHale partner before resigning to lead the special counsel’s office in May 2017. He returned to the firm in October 2019 after the investigation ended and retired in 2021. Quarles and Zebley, also on the Mueller team, returned to WilmerHale when the probe concluded. The order called the Mueller investigation “one of the most partisan investigations in American history” and accused WilmerHale of rewarding Mueller and his colleagues for “weaponiz[ing] the prosecutorial power to upend the democratic process.”
The order reached beyond Mueller. WilmerHale had represented the Democratic National Committee, the presidential campaigns of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, and eight inspectors general whom Trump had fired. The firm described the order as “an undisguised form of retaliation for representing clients and causes he disfavors or employing lawyers he dislikes,” and pointed to its long history of representing clients across administrations of both parties.
The Lawsuit
WilmerHale filed suit on March 28, 2025, the day after the order was signed, in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. The case, Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr LLP v. Executive Office of the President (No. 1:25-cv-00917), was assigned to Senior U.S. District Judge Richard J. Leon. Paul Clement, a former U.S. Solicitor General, represented the firm.
The complaint raised 11 counts alleging violations of the First, Fifth, and Sixth Amendments, the separation of powers, and the Spending Clause. Judge Leon held a hearing the same day the suit was filed and granted a partial temporary restraining order blocking the provisions on contracts, personnel access, and building access. He was openly skeptical of the government’s defense from early on. “It’s pretty clear it’s retaliation,” he said during oral arguments on April 23. “On the face of it.”
The government, represented in part by attorney Richard Lawson, argued the order was a valid exercise of executive discretion over contracts, security clearances, and access to government property, and that the security clearance provisions raised a political question courts should not review. It also argued the firm’s injuries were speculative.
Judge Leon’s Ruling
On May 27, 2025, Judge Leon issued a 73-page opinion granting WilmerHale summary judgment on eight of its eleven claims, declaring Executive Order 14250 unconstitutional, and permanently enjoining its enforcement.
The court held that the order violated the First, Fifth, and Sixth Amendments and was ultra vires, meaning it exceeded the president’s lawful authority. Judge Leon found the firm’s advocacy on behalf of its clients was protected speech and petitioning activity under the First Amendment, and that the sanctions in the order were unconstitutional retaliation against that protected conduct. He rejected the government’s standing and ripeness arguments, finding WilmerHale had shown concrete economic harm.
He described the sanctions as “staggering punishment for the firm’s protected speech” and wrote that “the order shouts through a bullhorn: If you take on causes disfavored by President Trump, you will be punished!” On the constitutional stakes, he wrote that “the cornerstone of the American system of justice is an independent judiciary and an independent bar willing to tackle unpopular cases, however daunting. The Founding Fathers knew this!” He noted that no executive order challenging these fundamental rights had been issued in nearly 250 years of American history.
On June 26, 2025, the court amended its judgment to expand the permanent injunction to cover all federal agencies and officials subject to the order, not just those named in the suit, so no agency could claim it lacked notice that the order had been struck down.
Part of a Broader Campaign Against Law Firms
The WilmerHale order was one of several. Beginning in March 2025, the Trump administration issued executive orders targeting at least half a dozen major law firms, each following a similar template: accusations of conduct adverse to the administration’s interests, followed by sanctions on security clearances, government contracts, and building access.
Four firms sued, and all four won at the district court level:
- Perkins Coie, targeted for its representation of Democrats including Hillary Clinton. Judge Beryl Howell struck down the order on May 2, 2025, in a 102-page opinion calling it “an unprecedented attack” on the judicial system and “a flagrant abuse of executive power.”
- Jenner & Block, targeted in part for hiring Andrew Weissmann, another Mueller team member. Order struck down on May 23, 2025.
- WilmerHale, ruling on May 27, 2025.
- Susman Godfrey, targeted for representing Dominion Voting Systems in 2020 election litigation, supporting LGBTQ legal advocacy groups, and its diversity programs. Judge Loren AliKhan granted summary judgment on June 27, 2025, calling the order a “shocking abuse of power.”
Every court to consider one of these orders found serious constitutional violations, and each issued a permanent injunction striking down the order in full.
Two other firms took a different path. Paul Weiss reached a settlement in which it agreed to provide $40 million in pro bono legal services for causes supported by the administration, acknowledged what the White House characterized as a former partner’s “wrongdoing” in having led the New York state criminal prosecution of Trump, and committed to a “policy of political neutrality.” Skadden Arps committed to $100 million in pro bono work for administration-aligned causes and agreed to eliminate its diversity, equity, and inclusion policies. Former Justice Department official Vanita Gupta said the settling firms “undermined the rule of law and the legal profession.”
Where the Case Stands
The government appealed the district court rulings in all four cases, and the appeals were consolidated before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.
The appeal took an odd turn on the evening of March 2, 2026, when the Department of Justice filed a motion to voluntarily dismiss, which would have left the lower court rulings in place permanently. Less than 24 hours later, DOJ reversed itself, asking to withdraw the dismissal and continue the defense. It offered no explanation. The court let the appeal proceed.
Oral arguments took place on May 14, 2026, before a panel that included Judges Cornelia Pillard and Sri Srinivasan. Clement argued for the firms that the orders “strike at the heart of the First Amendment and the ability of lawyers to zealously represent” their clients. DOJ attorney Abhishek Kambli argued that revocation of security clearances falls under presidential Article II power and is a “political question” beyond judicial review. The government’s brief called the lower court injunctions “judicial second-guessing” of presidential authority over national security.
As of mid-2026, the D.C. Circuit has not ruled. Lauren Stiller Rikleen of Lawyers Defending American Democracy argued the government was using delay to maintain a “chilling effect” across the profession by keeping the orders technically in force while the appeal plays out. UCLA law professor Scott Cummings suggested the continued defense is driven more by “public relations considerations” than by the legal merits.