...because MY industry, BigLaw, showed how quickly they'd bend the knee instead of fighting back. The firms that HAVE resisted in court have, so far, won every. single. challenge. because his behavior towards us is so blatantly unconstitutional.
That didn't stop what I call the "death star" firms (Skadden, Latham, K&E, etc.) from tripping all over themselves to make a deal with the devil. Some of those who capitulated hadn't even gotten notification they'd been targeted by one of his ridiculous EOs that aren't worth the paper they're printed on.
My firm is in the top 25 of the AmLaw 100 and received an EEOC letter but wasn't targeted by an EO. There was a period in March/April that I was majorly freaking out, because we were watching firms make deals left and right. Offering that monster pro bono work would have been a deal-breaker for me.
My family's security at the moment rests solely on me. What the hell was I going to do if we caved??? I kept posting stuff on LinkedIn reminding our leadership about our firm's history - our first case in 1912 was AGAINST the White Star line on behalf of a Titanic survivor. In the 1940s, one of our partners took a sabbatical to be one of the top prosecutors at Nuremberg, and we were the first big firm to have a woman as our managing partner, way back in 1998.
In the end, they sort of mini-caved - we kept our DEI program but renamed it something with bigger words that might confuse these troglodytes. However, almost every other firm that would pay me what I make now DID full-on cave, and none are offering remote jobs anymore, so I unfortunately kind of just have to suck that up. We did have a couple departures over it, including a partner who started a group of biglaw attorneys that are committed to resistance; they file amicus briefs and take other actions in support of the rule of law.
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