At a bicameral hearing of Judiciary Committee Democrats on Monday, attorney Rachel Cohen, once who left Skadden Law after the firm struck a deal with President Trump, delivered her opening statement.
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00:00Ms. Cohen, your opening statement, and I should take a second of personal privilege over here in the Senate just to say that Ms. Cohen was very close friends with my son, Tommy, at Harvard Law School, and he always told me that you are a woman of great intelligence and great character. It's good to see you.
00:18Thank you. I'm grateful for the opportunity to speak to the members today. I acknowledge this is not the first Monday of unemployment that I anticipated, but I am appreciative to be here.
00:37On March 20th, I tendered my conditional resignation to Skadden Arps, where I was employed as a finance associate.
00:43I did so because I believe our country is teetering on the brink of authoritarianism, and that many leaders of our most prestigious and profitable law firms recognize this risk and choose to ignore it because they are afraid.
00:57It's likely they're afraid of losing profits, but I think it's also likely that these leaders are afraid because standing up to authoritarianism is scary.
01:06It is easier to ignore what is happening than to acknowledge the fight that lies ahead.
01:11I resigned amidst a series of attacks on the legal profession that began on February 25th, when the Trump administration stripped large law firm Covington & Burling of government contracts for representing Special Counsel Jack Smith during his investigation of the president.
01:28Then, the president entered an executive order against law firm Perkins Coie, not only stripping Perkins of government contracts, but also targeting third-party contractors that retained Perkins as counsel.
01:40Again, the administration named Perkins' past representation of clients and causes the president dislikes as the cause.
01:49Perkins chose to fight back.
01:52It challenged this blatantly unconstitutional order and successfully won a temporary restraining order the next day.
01:59In a normal presidency, this sends a message to the administration, press pause while the Perkins executive order is litigated.
02:07But the president continued to enter executive orders targeting firms based on past representation.
02:14Enter Paul Weiss, the next target of an executive order.
02:18Instead of fighting back, Paul Weiss offered the Trump administration $40 million in pro bono legal services for pet projects and promised to evaluate hiring and retention practices in partnership with the president.
02:30He withdrew the order.
02:34Paul Weiss's decision was a stunning betrayal of the firm's associates and the legal system that made its partnership very, very rich.
02:43Like calling this hearing, resignation was not my first choice.
02:47Throughout this period, associates across the industry were engaged in measured advocacy internally and externally,
02:53hoping to get our firms to band together and stand up to the administration's attacks on the broader legal profession.
03:00Paul Weiss's capitulation made me realize firm leadership was not motivated to act collectively.
03:06I became certain my employer was not going to be brave, and so I resigned.
03:11I was heartbroken to be proven right eight days later on March 28th, when Skadden promised the Trump administration $100 million in pro bono legal services despite no executive order being entered against them.
03:28Other associates resigned in protest, two of them publicly.
03:31They're sitting behind me, and I am so unbelievably grateful.
03:34We did so because our adversarial legal system only functions when parties have representation.
03:41Everyone deserves an advocate.
03:43That principle is invoked by law firm partners to justify high-profit but distasteful representations.
03:49Everyone deserves an advocate.
03:52American justice is not sua sponte.
03:54Without skilled lawyers, meritorious lawsuits may never be brought in the first place.
03:59Public interest attorneys, themselves separately targeted by the administration, are now also scrambling to replace resources and attention these firms historically provide as they challenge unconstitutional actions and provide direct representation to clients in need.
04:16This is intentional.
04:18Courts are perhaps our last line of defense against authoritarianism.
04:21I was raised to advocate and to be aware of the racial, financial, and other privileges I hold that make it more likely that my voice will be heard in halls of power.
04:32I am the daughter of two government attorneys who both served their country in the United States Air Force.
04:37While in high school in Ohio, my best friend was one of the only Latina students in our graduating class and faced overt racism.
04:43And I remember following a particularly egregious incident when we went to the principal together how my outrage was heard as much or more than hers.
04:53After studying political science at the Ohio State University, I spent four years teaching in Providence Public Schools.
04:58And my students, some of whom I know are watching right now, are brave and smart and bold.
05:04But there were many times where, despite the self-evidence of my students' brilliance, people did not believe it existed until a white native English speaker pointed it out.
05:15Acceptance to Harvard Law School and employment at Scadden made my already powerful voice even louder.
05:20The cowardice or apathy in some of these spaces at times caused disillusionment.
05:25But those dear to me, including your son, Congressman Raskin, made sure I remembered that just because such cowardice is common doesn't make it acceptable.
05:34And as you said, courage is a choice.
05:37I was asked here because my voice is loud, but I came here for the same reason I resigned.
05:43It is important for the very real people whose voices are not heard in the same way to have an advocate today and always.
05:50This advocacy cannot be defined by fear of future retribution.
05:55My students and non-white friends and colleagues deserve brave advocates.
06:00Mahmoud Khalil, Rumaisa Ozdark, Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, and Andre Jose Hernandez Romero deserve brave advocates.
06:09People seeking abortion care or birth control or gender-affirming care deserve brave advocates.
06:15And to be clear, everyone else, the law firm partners enabling this slide into autocracy,
06:20the voters who put Trump into office and are waiting and will wait forever for him to care about the difficulties that they face.
06:29Those of us in this room today, we all deserve brave advocates.
06:33The administration cannot pick and choose who gets representation.
06:37It cannot use executive power to scare lawyers out of advocacy.
06:41If we allow any president to dictate who deserves a lawyer, our legal system fails.
06:48Like firm leaders, I am afraid of where this intimidation campaign leads.
06:54But unlike most of them, I will not allow my fear to manifest as silence.
06:59I choose courage.
07:03Thank you for your testimony.