A new DOJ lawsuit represents a vital step toward ending an un-American war on disfavored attorneys and defenders of disfavored causes — a war that would do irrevocable damage to our justice system and republic. //

With a new landmark lawsuit, the Trump Justice Department is finally fighting this “barfare” —leftist efforts to render the right defenseless by crushing or chilling conservative attorneys via stress-inducing probes, costly trials, and crippling penalties that include disbarment. On May 13, the DOJ filed a complaint against the bar disciplinary authorities of Washington, D.C., in defense of former Trump I DOJ official Jeffrey Clark, the Constitution, and the rule of law itself.

Those authorities investigated, tried, and convicted the accomplished litigator for a novel “thoughtcrime”: preparing a document proposing a legal course of action based on a reading of evidence that his DOJ superiors disagreed with. //

So after the contest he drafted a letter on the department’s behalf to Peach State leaders to address such matters. He designated the letter as “Pre-Decisional & Deliberative/Attorney-Client or Legal Work Product” and “FOR INTERNAL … USE ONLY,” and dubbed it a “Proof of Concept” document. The letter indicated that the DOJ had identified potential election-swinging issues and called on the state to convene a special legislative session to review and remedy such matters.

Clark presented the letter to his bosses, including Acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen, for review. They disagreed with its claims regarding 2020 election integrity issues and Clark’s plan to address them. Ultimately, the document would go unsent, only to leak after President Trump had left office during Democrats’ Jan. 6-related political and legal jihad. //

In July 2022, D.C. bar disciplinary authorities charged Clark with ethical violations, including “conduct involving dishonesty,” over his drafting and defending of the document. The then-Democrat-led Senate Judiciary Committee allegedly spurred the case by lodging an ethics complaint with the D.C. regime. //

What was the tribunal’s reasoning? That Clark’s views did not comport with those of his superiors, his superiors by default represented those of the department, and therefore, by ascribing his conflicting views to the department in his draft, unsent, “pre-decisional” letter, he was somehow being dishonest.

Despite admitting that there were “no factually comparable prior disciplinary cases,” the tribunal recommended that Clark be disbarred.

Clark is appealing the absurd and outrageous case — one that would render it potentially career-ending to provide legal advice that might conflict with that of one’s superiors. The case would also seem to make it fair game for disciplinary authorities to review and potentially render punishment over internal draft documents containing hypothetical legal proposals. //

In addition, the Justice Department notes the D.C. bar disciplinary tribunal’s lenient treatment of leftists in contrast to its treatment of conservatives: When FBI Attorney Kevin Clinesmith was caught doctoring an email to convince the FISA Court to let the feds spy on Trump adviser Carter Page, the D.C. bar gave him a “slap on the wrist” with a retroactive one-year license suspension.

The suit closes with a trio of legal arguments that transcend Clark’s case or claims of a bar disciplinary authority run amok: first, that the Constitution’s Supremacy Clause prohibits state and local bar disciplinary authorities from regulating the work of federal officials like Clark via bar disciplinary proceedings; second, that such authorities engage in unlawful discrimination by subjecting federal lawyers to disciplinary cases never before brought against non-federal lawyers; third, that by targeting federal attorneys over their work, such authorities are unlawfully interfering with presidential power. //

The DOJ’s lawsuit does not directly address lawfare activists’ targeting of non-government lawyers with disbarment and destruction for taking up verboten causes, such as constitutional scholar John Eastman’s work contesting the 2020 presidential election. Still, it may prove far more effective than the Justice Department’s proposed rule giving the agency the right to review (but not to quash) efforts to cripple conservative federal lawyers via the likes of the D.C. bar disciplinary authorities.