The Gazetteer SF interviewed Elliot Peters about the remarkable media attention Keker, Van Nest & Peters has received since the firm issued a statement pushing back on President Trump’s executive actions against law firms.
The firm's statement, which called on law firms to support Perkins Coie, one of the first law firms to be targeted by a Trump executive order, triggered a frenzy of media attention. Peters, with partners John Keker and Bob Van Nest, authored a guest essay in The New York Times; Van Nest appeared on CBS News; Peters on CNN with Anderson Cooper; and Keker interviewed with 60 Minutes. The firm’s outspoken stance has been reported in dozens of other media outlets.
Quoting Traci Stuart, president of Blattel Communications, the article stated that the statement tapped into a longing to see attorneys step up for the profession – and themselves – to push back against President Trump’s executive orders. “This was the public wanting to hear what lawyers were going to say about the situation,” Stuart said.
On the question of whether it was easier for Keker as a litigation boutique to speak out because it faced less risk than large law firms with transactional practices, Peters said that any law firm could have fought an executive order and won: “It’s just the shit that they were afraid of was so plainly unconstitutional that they could have gone to court and enjoined it.” Perkins Coie immediately won a federal court ruling temporarily blocking Trump’s order. Two other judges handling similar orders against firms WilmerHale and Jenner & Block did the same.
“What, they’re talking about some guy that maybe makes $15 million, in the next year makes $12 million? Well, I'm sorry, dude, in that case, the rule of law is more important than a couple of million dollars to a guy with a home in the Hamptons and house on Park Avenue,” Peters said. “It’s just, to me, I would gladly make less money and live in a free society than roll over to a wannabe autocrat.”
Peters also said firms that capitulated to Trump “did a lot of harm to our system of government, to the rule of law, to the status of lawyers.”
Read the full article at Gazetteer SF