Summary
Federal Judge Amir Ali sharply criticized the Trump administration during a Tuesday hearing for failing to comply with his 12-day-old restraining order to unfreeze USAID contract funding.
“I don’t know why I can’t get a straight answer from you,” the judge demanded, asking if funds had been unfrozen. The government lawyer responded: “I’m not in a position to answer that.”
Ali ordered USAID to pay all invoices for work performed before February 13 by midnight tomorrow and required the administration to identify officials who can testify under oath about compliance disputes.
How does the lawyers bar status tied to a client’s compliance with a spurt order?
Essentially, if a client doesn’t follow a judges orders (the client is the US gov,) and the lawyer can’t get them to comply, they’re supposed to drop the case (and probably the client,)(in this case, that would likely mean a resignation.)
If the lawyer doesn’t…. They’re on the hook and the first step is their license to practice (yeeting that is called “disbarring”).
The reputation harm from this saga is huge- I wouldn’t want to hire a guy so blithely and publicly pissing off a judge.
The reality is he’s likely found himself between a rock and a hard place and is stuck. But lawyers who help their clients break the law …. Don’t stay lawyers. Look at nearly every lawyer who has worked for trump.