In early August 2025, a federal appeals court docket within the District of Columbia stopped efforts by federal trial choose James Boasberg to think about whether or not to carry Trump administration attorneys in contempt of court docket.
In April, Boasberg had concluded there was possible trigger to carry authorities attorneys in contempt for defying orders he had issued associated to the deportation of migrants to a jail in El Salvador.
The appellate court docket’s ruling discovered that such contempt proceedings couldn’t go ahead on varied technical grounds.
As somebody who teaches and writes on authorized ethics, I imagine the questions surrounding whether or not administration attorneys violated Boasberg’s rulings nonetheless will be answered because of state our bodies that license attorneys to follow regulation.
State self-discipline
Boasberg has beforehand indicated that he would possibly refer attorneys who’ve defied his orders to state authorities.
That is an possibility as a result of the U.S. authorized occupation is basically licensed and controlled on the state stage and, within the case of Washington, D.C., by the native D.C. courts. It’s in proceedings earlier than disciplinary our bodies – equivalent to California’s State Bar Court docket, New York State’s legal professional grievance committees and the Board on Skilled Responsiblity in D.C., for instance – the place attorneys should reply for expenses that they’ve violated their skilled code of ethics. That features attorneys within the federal authorities.
Egregious violations {of professional} obligations, equivalent to fabricating or destroying proof or mendacity to a court docket, can lead to a lawyer being suspended from follow and even disbarred fully.
These methods are a vital part of the checks on the U.S. authorized system. It ensures that attorneys uphold their skilled obligations as they pursue their purchasers’ rights.
The U.S. authorized system is adversarial in nature. Meaning attorneys interact in zealous advocacy after they attempt to advance the pursuits of their purchasers. Legal professionals then resolve their disputes inside that adversarial system, however even the advocates in that system should comply with its guidelines of engagement.
A central tenet of that system is that attorneys could not act unethically by abusing their data of the system to illegally advance their purchasers’ pursuits – and their very own.
One of these abuse of the system occurred when attorneys tried to overturn the outcomes of the 2020 U.S. presidential election, submitting dozens of unsuccessful instances to hunt to vary the election’s final result. They usually made spurious authorized arguments in an try to halt Congress’ certification of the ultimate vote within the Electoral Faculty.
Among the attorneys who took half in these efforts have been punished and disbarred for his or her actions, together with former New York Metropolis Mayor Rudy Giuliani, who misplaced his license to follow regulation in New York and Washington, D.C.
Not too long ago, lesser-known attorneys equivalent to John Eastman and Jeffrey Clark, each concerned within the effort to stop the switch of presidential energy after Trump misplaced his reelection bid, have additionally confronted disciplinary expenses. Whereas these processes haven’t but fully run their course, state our bodies have really helpful that every ought to lose his license to follow regulation.
John Eastman, left, seems at a Washington, D.C., rally with former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, on Jan. 6, 2021.
AP Picture/Jacquelyn Martin, File
Disciplinary our bodies and the rule of regulation
The state our bodies that govern the follow of regulation, and which license attorneys who follow even within the federal courts and the federal authorities, function a vital examine on unprofessional conduct by attorneys.
State proceedings aren’t any panacea, nonetheless. They will take time. That’s evident within the instances towards Eastman and Clark, that are nonetheless working their manner by the methods within the District of Columbia, within the case of Clark, and California, in Eastman’s case, for occasions that occurred in late 2020 and early 2021.
And there may be all the time the chance that adversaries can begin an escalating battle of tit for tat, no matter whether or not such complaints have benefit.
The Trump administration focused personal regulation corporations for punishment by a collection of government orders that, for instance, sought to revoke the corporations’ safety clearances and bar their attorneys from getting into federal buildings. Though all of the personal regulation corporations that challenged the manager orders issued towards them have succeeded in blocking them, the Trump administration has additionally not too long ago filed ethics expenses towards not less than one of many attorneys concerned in a lawsuit towards it.
The Trump administration has additionally instituted a grievance towards Boasberg with a federal physique that oversees judicial ethics. And simply the specter of a grievance, even a baseless one, can actually have a chilling impact on administration critics, making them much less more likely to take motion sooner or later.
Sociologist Eliot Freidson notes that one of many hallmarks of a occupation is that its members care extra in regards to the opinion of their friends than the opinion of most of the people. As a result of professionals ought to all the time care about their skilled popularity, they need to concern taking actions on behalf of a shopper – regardless of who that shopper is – that exceed the principles that govern the occupation. That features defying court docket orders, mendacity on behalf of a shopper, or making baseless authorized arguments.
A airplane carrying Venezuelans who have been detained in El Salvador lands in Caracas, Venezuela, on July 18, 2025. The Venezuelans had been despatched to El Salvador in March after President Donald Trump invoked the 1798 Alien Enemies Act to deport presumed ‘Tren de Aragua’ gang members.
Jesus Vargas/Getty Photographs
If skilled popularity alone isn’t sufficient to stop such misconduct, the specter of dropping the power to follow, and even the concern of coming earlier than an ethics physique, would possibly trigger sufficient attorneys to assume twice earlier than they interact in acts that exceed the bounds of permissible, zealous advocacy.
Whereas courts are generally the place attorneys are sanctioned for improper conduct, together with for contempt of court docket, they aren’t the one web site the place attorneys can face self-discipline for unprofessional conduct.
State ethics our bodies have a vital function to play in preserving the rule of regulation, not less than with respect to the conduct of attorneys they oversee.
And if Boasberg, another choose, or a litigant desires to make referrals to such state establishments when attorneys search to abuse the system, these our bodies actually have an vital function to play in making certain the authorized occupation maintains excessive requirements of professionalism and the correct functioning of that system in a fashion that comports with the rule of regulation.
