Dershowitz on that anti-Trump-lawyer group The 65 Project
There is a nefarious group that calls itself The 65 Project that has as its goal to intimidate lawyers into not representing Trump or anyone associated with him. They have threatened to file bar charges against any such lawyers. When these threats first emerged, I wrote an op-ed offering to defend pro bono any lawyers that The 65 Project goes after. So The 65 Project immediately went after me, and contrived a charge based on a case in which I was a constitutional consultant, but designed to send a message to potential Trump lawyers: if you defend Trump or anyone associated with him, we will target you and find something to charge you with. The lawyers to whom I spoke are fully aware of this threat — and they are taking it seriously.
They don’t call it “Lawfare” for nothing.
More from Dershowitz:
There may be other reasons as well for why lawyers are reluctant to defend Trump. He is not the easiest client, and he has turned against some of his previous lawyers, as some of his previous lawyers have turned against him. This will be a difficult case to defend and an unpopular one with many in the legal profession and in general population.
Good lawyers, however, generally welcome challenges, especially in high-profile cases. This case is different: the threats to the lawyers are greater than at any time since McCarthyism…It may even be worse today, as I can attest from my own personal experiences…
This may be the most important part of Dershowitz’s article:
Our system of justice is based on the John Adams standard: he too was attacked for defending the British soldiers accused of the Boston Massacre, but his representation of these accused killers now serves as a symbol of the 6th Amendment right to counsel. That symbol has now been endangered by The 65 Project and others who are participating in its McCarthyite chilling of lawyers who have been asked to represent Trump and those associated with him.
For decades, the left screeched about McCarthyism. They got a lot of mileage out of that, but in reality their main objection seems to have been that they were the targets rather than the ones behind the threats.
NOTE: I wrote this post about The 65 Project back in August of 2022.
This is how the Left works today. They want to destroy anyone who disagrees with their progressive ideas. My brother was one of the first to start boycotts against any business that advertised on the Rush Limbaugh show. He’s proud of it.
The concern Dersh expresses is real. But its worse than that. Some state bars have enacted speech codes for lawyers. NE’s has been under consideration for over a year. I’d be a target. Routinely Dems on Twitter threaten to report me to the Bar.
I’m with VDH. The Left needs to be defeated so soundly that they know they have been beaten and they change their ways. I doubt that will happen.
Mr. Trump must be considered a very serious, and legitimate threat to the Democrats to generate such hatred. Good, I want the evil of the Left stopped.
Why wouldn’t conspiring to prevent a defendant from obtaining counsel be grounds for disbarment? Indeed, shouldn’t that be an exceptionally serious felony?
somewhat similar to events in Russia, where they are persecuting the strongest and most resolute to Putin, Navalny,
How long until groups pop up to deny legal defenses – criminal or civil – to anyone who is not a member of a protected class? You’re a white heterosexual male accused of a crime? Too bad, public defender for you, even if you can afford a criminal defense attorney. Need a P.I. attorney because you were hurt in an accident, but you’re not, shall we say, a sympathetic plaintiff? Good luck getting a lawyer to take your case without asking for a retainer up front.
Since Palmerism.
Lawfare seems to be expanding in ways and means probably because it has worked and no one has stopped it.
These tactics are those of the Mafia. There is nothing ethical about it at all. This is racketeering posing as legal work. It probably violates the Constitutional guaranines of due process and free association. Congress needs to pass a law or laws that make such unethical conduct by lawyers a crime.
Democrats are really serious about politics. It’s a blood sport for them, or a war. That’s why we can’t just “all get along.”
Isn’t this really the “Big Lie” — that Trump is so dangerous that he is entitled to no legal defenders and that any means used to take him down are justified?
My impression of anti-Trumpers such as those in the 65 Project is that they are ignorant of things like the John Adams precedent, don’t like the Founders anyway, and are too crude to care about such principles. Aggressive toxicity of anti-Trump activists enhances Trump’s popularity.
“How long until groups pop up to deny legal defenses – criminal or civil – to anyone who is not a member of a protected class?”
It’s already started with topics. IIRC, the lawyers who successfully argued the Bruen gun case in front of the US Supreme Court were forced to leave the firm that they were a part of because they wouldn’t drop their gun rights clients (and when they’d joined that firm, the firm was fully aware that they had gun rights clients). We’re not yet seeing protests based on inherent categories of the defendant (aside from Trump, of course). But there are many on the left who are very actively bringing any and all forms of pressure against law firms that are willing to work for clients who are dealing with issues that are important to the conservative side. If you take a client in a prominent case that might advance a conservative cause, be prepared to have the left attempt to drive away your regular clients, and have you disbarred.
“Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure.”
This is a big problem. Another example of it occurred during the Chauvin trial in MN. Chauvin had a single lawyer representing him, who I believe was contractually obligated to defend him because of a relationship with the police union. Chavin’s single lawyer was up against a large team from the MN AG’s office plus a number of very high profile Big Law attorneys who we working for the state “pro bono.”
But don’t discount the “other reasons” though with Trump. You have a client who has a history of listening to every legal crackpot who tells him what he wants to hear, ignoring his lawyers advice, and then throwing the lawyer under the bus. On top of the “65 Project” nonsense, I think it is difficult for a lawyer to come out of a Trump representation with an enhanced professional reputation.
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They’ll make great judges when their names come up, won’t they?
Cornhead: “The Left needs to be defeated so soundly that they know they have been beaten and they change their ways. I doubt that will happen.”
So did the British when the War for Independence started.
So did the North and the South when Lincoln was later too, much too magnanimous.
Can Americans, especially Republicans, take back Lincoln’s late concessions and proclaim that his righteous start to killing Democrats just wasn’t enough?
I do live to see it happen.
Skip notes “Lawfare seems to be expanding in ways and means probably because it has worked and no one has stopped it.”
PRECISELY. All attempts to retrain lawfare have been stymied or reversed, as far as I can see.
The only solution remaining is TO SHRINK GOVERNMENT BIGLY.
The 65 Project has a list of directors on their web site. I guarantee those people all have home addresses, and are not hard to find.
The type of activity in which the 65 Project is engaged should be grounds for disbarment.
Related…
Here’s an interesting one:
“New Zealand ‘Equity Adjustor Score‘ Asks Surgeons To Prioritize Non-White Patients”—
https://blazingcatfur.ca/2023/06/20/new-zealand-equity-adjustor-score-asks-surgeons-to-prioritize-non-white-patients/
This is essentially “REPARATIONS”, NZ style.
But it is ALSO the rationale, in the US and other places, why certain people who are identified as NON-WHITE are allowed—and encouraged—to trash cities, cause mayhem, threaten, maim, murder, intimidate and inflict emotional injury (and worse).
The problem here [insert “OF COURSE”] is that if those deserving people (and their enablers, encouragers, defenders, lovers, etc.) effectively destroy the GOOSE that lays the golden egg, HOW will they then be able to get the REPARATIONS they so deservedly deserve??
The answer? This is precisely the moral/ethical/logical/necessary reason why the Democrats MUST do everything in their power to remain in control of the country. (I.e., MUST DO EVERYTHING and ANYTHING and ALL THINGS to remain in control of the country.)
REPARATIONS is the golden word. The golden mean. The golden rationale. The golden ideology!
And the Democrats MUST ensure that those deserving of REPARATIONS (of whatever variety) GET THOSE REPARATIONS (of whatever variety) BEFORE the country is destroyed as a result of granting those REPARATIONS (of whatever variety).
…because they sure as hell won’t get them AFTER the country is destroyed(!)
File under: Dictatorship of the POC-etariate!”
Neo, you are so right about leftists and McCarthyism! The only problem with it was that it was aimed at them and not at their opponents. And of course, screeching about McCarthyism had other advantages. To this day few people realize that, yes, there were Soviet spies in the Roosevelt White House.
Your worst nightmare has just materialized.
“American Medical Association: Body mass index is ‘racist’;
“The American Medical Association says that the BMI measurement was designed based on white bodies in the 19th century.”—
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/373016
Not only “RACIST” but “Generationalist” and “Historicistist” and “Culturalistist”. For starters.
(Sigh, I guess this means that skinny jeans are also RACIST… Quite possibly, boxer shorts as well… A-cup bras? WHEN will this crap ever end!!!!?)
Why don’t they just ban mirrors?
Of course, they could always broaden the BMI index to accommodate everyone (well, most everyone)…but then they wouldn’t be able to shout “RACIST”.
Hmm. Hey, why not just say that FAT IS BEAUTIFUL?….Hold on a sec, haven’t they already done that?
STOP THE PRESSES: This just in: The US and its Constitution are RACIST because all of the Founding Fathers were WHITE! In fact, everything discovered or invented by a White person is also RACIST, e.g., gravity, geometry, the automobile, etc. (though this may well be old, old news…).
its funny, because the left had no problems with defending actual terrorists, like ksm as part of a joint effort of the levick group with the ccri, co founded by black panther defender kunstler and che fan boi ratner, liberally funded with cash from the gulf states,
of course the rioters (mostly peaceful) had access to top legal talent, even the members of the bar that sought to bomb police cars, this was in part through the kellogg foundation, where susan rosenberg, the godmother of the so called antifa and blm holds court,
Supreme Court Justice Robert H. Jackson, a Nuremberg Trial prosecutor, said the “greatest danger to justice is an unscrupulous prosecutor who targets a person and then scours the law books to find an offense he can pin on that person.”
The whole idea of Debate, where two sides each present their arguments, is under attack in all aspects of our society, from science to the courtroom to high-school debate programs.
See Law Betrayed: Identity’s Triumph Over Argument
https://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/2023/06/mcginnis-law-betrayed-identitys-triumph-over-argument-in-legal-education-undermines-democracy.html
https://thefederalist.com/2023/06/19/how-reddit-radicalizes-the-left-and-encourages-political-violence/
My DH worked for the country’s most liberal university. They had a campus in Seattle and he built a new program there–one that was very popular with the upper management of Boeing, Microsoft, etc. After 12 years a new lesbian president was hired and shortly thereafter she made a public announcement that my DH was resigning. She had never discussed it with him before!
We tried to leave with grace–they had broken his contract and all we asked was to leave on good terms. We asked the academic dean (white woman married to black university administrator at another very liberal college) to suggest an attorney we could all work with–she recommended a black attorney who we hired. But, he never worked for us–another story. All we asked for was the one year salary remaining on contract and a good recommendation. We finally got the money, but they immediately blacklisted him!
I spent the next five years (statute of limitations) trying to find an attorney in WA state who would help us repair the damage. I went to 23 attorneys to ask for help and every single one of them said the same thing: “I CAN”T. I AM AFRAID, THEY WILL DESTROY ME!” That’s quite a chokehold to have on such a large community of attorneys. When you find the answer to that question you will know how serious is the situation this country is in now!
23 ATTORNEYS SAID “I AM AFRAID!” That was 24 years ago! Can you imagine the total chokehold across this country today?
The Chauvin case was mentioned above. That is even worse than the Rodney King cops’ case 30 years ago. Chauvin got no change of venue from a city where juror intimidation was rampant. His appeal found no lawyer to represent him until one decided to do it pro bono. The Rodney King cops were acquitted in the city where the incident happened. The Clinton regime tried them again in LA where the jurors were typical central city Democrats. The CHP officer, Melanie Singer, who was about to shoot King when the LAPD arrived to save his life, testified against them in both trials and then retired on “stress disability.”
https://www.thecollegefix.com/mayo-clinic-professor-suspended-after-saying-testosterone-improves-athletic-performance/
This also needs to be pointed out – the fact that Trump is an impossible client gives cover to the “65 Project” folks and those of their ilk on the left.
Did anyone catch Trump’s interview with Brett Baier last night? I guaranty Jack Smith didn’t. At best, Trump gave Smith a preview of his defense. At worst, he admitted to facts that establish obstruction. Trump is not just a troublesome client, he is an absolute nightmare of a client.
Trump is doing more than half of the 65 Project’s work for them. The 65 Project is just gliding in under the radar to clean up the remnants of the legal profession who aren’t already horrified at the prospect of representing Trump, all the while creating precedent for “de-representing” undesirables. (Their response? I’m sure it will be something about how they’re just political advocates and that reasonable attorneys didnt’ need any persuasion to avoid representing Trump. And you know what, there will be a kernal of truth to that.)
Another relevant point – John Eastman’s bar discipline hearing is beginning this week. He is almost certainly going to be disbarred over the January 6th thing.
That’s nearly as frightening as the 65 Project. John Eastman is going to be disbarred for being wrong on a matter of first impression. That’s extremely chilling. Don’t doubt for a minute that the Eastman precedent is going to act as an implicit threat against any lawyers who are thinking about representing the Republican party in election disputes or that it will be repeatedly cited by Democrats to explicitly make the same threat.
BUT – and this is a big but – Eastman advised Trump based on a theory that even Eastman didn’t believe would prevail in court, and Trump used that theory to try to extra-legally reverse an election. That’s the case regardless of whether you believe the 2020 election was stolen. The idea that the VP had the power to prevent the certification of the election result is (and has always been) bonkers.
So the argument that Eastman should be disbarred under these particular circumstances is non-frivilous. I think that argument is wrong. I think the precedent will be grossly abused. But, in these particular circumstances, the case for disbarring Eastman is not frivilous.
I think it was Lenin who quipped that capitalists would sell the rope used to hang them. The problem with Trumpworld is that they give the rope away for free.
they will defend terrorists and rioters, in fact some of the same made it into the holder justice department, or you haven’t been paying attention,
miguel cervantes – “they will defend terrorists and rioters . . .”
Yes. Yes they will. Yes they do. And they have the power to not only shield those attorneys who represent terrorists and rioters from the consequences that they gleefully impose on conservative lawyers, but they actually celebrate the progressive lawyers as exemplars in the grand tradition of John Adams!
Believe me, the illiberal forces in the legal profession are not the majority. The majority simply wants to make a living and support their families. The cost of speaking up is already high enough. When you force would be dissenters to also answer for Trumpworld nonsense, like Trump’s antics or John Eastman’s crackpot January 6th theories, the chances of any meaningful objection to the left go down even further.
trump was in the right to hold those documents, as eastman was to give legal advice, he know what jack smith, and pat fitzgerald and ronnie earle have done,
regardless of the law ethics, or what have you,
they stole this country, to twist and bend and loot it, of all its treasure, to corrupt children, to torment and even kill christians if need be,
As a couple of people said above: is this not racketeering? And is it not grounds for disbarment? They are all-but-explicitly denying that every accused person should have a fair trial.
Mike K: “The Rodney King cops were acquitted in the city where the incident happened. The Clinton regime tried them again in LA where the jurors were typical central city Democrats.”
The original trial was in Simi Valley, where a lot of LAPD officers lived, and I imagine still do. When the acquittal was read, L.A. blew up, due in no small part to Maxine Waters’ inflammatory rhetoric.
A friend of mine was on the LAPD at the time, and he explained to me that King was uncooperative, belligerent, and showed signs of PCP intoxication. Conventional restraint methods failed to subdue him, so they tuned him up and even then had difficulty getting him under control. Another man who was in the car cooperated with the police and was unharmed.
The second trial set the table for the O.J. Simpson case a few years later, which was a cut-and-dried case of jury nullification.
Simi Valley is in Ventura County, California, not Los Angeles County.
Maxine Waters is from Missouri who deserves deportation from California.
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