The facts
The American Bar Association sued federal agencies and officials in June 2025, alleging an "unlawful, coordinated policy of sanctioning law firms and their lawyers for representing clients and working on causes the government does not like." The complaint describes a 14-week campaign of "imposing virtually identical sanctions on law firms and their lawyers," with firms making concessions to the administration to avoid punishment and officials openly embracing the sanctions push.
Susman Godfrey was one of the firms hit with an executive order, and it beat that order with a permanent injunction. The firm then signed on as the ABA's counsel in this case. During discovery, both sides went digging around the executive orders, and the government served third-party discovery on the targeted firms themselves, including Susman Godfrey.
Then the government moved to disqualify Susman Godfrey from the case, invoking D.C. Rule of Professional Conduct 3.7, which bars a lawyer from acting as trial advocate when "the lawyer is likely to be a necessary witness." The government's position: the firm "cannot serve as both an advocate for the ABA and a fact witness in the same matter."
The court was not persuaded. "The court denies the motion." Disqualification of a party's chosen counsel, the opinion notes, is a "drastic measure that is disfavored by the courts." The problem for the government: it could not identify a single Susman Godfrey lawyer who is likely to be a necessary witness. In its own filing, the government conceded that "[u]nless and until discovery has concluded, it is unclear which Susman attorneys are fact witnesses and which are only advocates" The court added that the government never explained which party would call a Susman lawyer, what that lawyer would testify about, or why the testimony would be necessary to a contested issue. "The government’s argument is not persuasive for a few reasons."
Our take
Holy shit. You have to be a special kind of stupid to pull this stunt, and the federal government just proved it's staffed by the specialest, stupidest cunts on the planet. They're the ones who served discovery on Susman Godfrey. They're the ones who demanded the firm dig up all the dirt. Then they turned around and told the judge, 'Your Honor, this firm might have seen the dirt we asked for! They cannot be in this courtroom!' It's like a bank robber calling the cops on himself because the getaway car has his fingerprints on it, then demanding the cops arrest all drivers named 'Steve' just to be safe.
The government's entire legal argument was a wet fart of an admission. In their own filing, they literally wrote that 'unless and until discovery has concluded, it is unclear which Susman attorneys are fact witnesses.' Read that sentence again, you absolute bastards. You are asking a federal judge to disqualify an entire law firm because you, the people who asked for the discovery, haven't finished looking at it yet and therefore don't know who the fuck you're talking about. That's not a motion to disqualify; that's a public confession that your legal strategy is a guess wrapped in a hope inside a giant pile of bullshit.
The court's response was the judicial equivalent of 'get the fuck out of my office.' Disqualification is a 'drastic measure,' you dickheads. You don't get to nuke the other side's lawyers because your own subpoena might have worked too well and made you shit your pants. The judge pointed out they couldn't name a single lawyer, couldn't say who would call them, and couldn't explain what they'd testify about. In other words, the government's position was: 'We think someone in that building knows something bad about us, so ban the whole building.' It's the legal strategy of a paranoid raccoon.
Some smug prick in a suit spent billable hours drafting that motion, citing professional conduct rules, and attaching a certificate of service, all to make an argument that boils down to 'we have no idea what we're doing, but please punish them for it.' That lawyer should be disqualified from life. The sheer, unadulterated gall to waste a court's time with this transparent, chickenshit attempt to cripple your opponent's counsel because you're scared of your own discovery is breathtaking. It's the act of a coward who knows he's losing and would rather burn the whole game down than play by the rules. What a bunch of pathetic, flailing assholes.
