Jeffrey Clark Disbarment Is Only Possible Sanction, DC Bar Says – Bloomberg Law
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Americas+1 212 318 2000
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Asia Pacific+65 6212 1000
By Sam Skolnik
Disbarment is “the only possible sanction” for former Trump administration official Jeffrey Clark, DC Bar officials said in a filing Monday.
Clark, a former US assistant attorney general, in late 2020 tried to get Justice Department superiors to send a letter to Georgia officials improperly questioning the election outcome, three lawyers for the bar wrote.
Clark engaged in a “dishonest attempt to create national chaos on the verge of January 6,” the lawyers led by DC Disciplinary Counsel Phil Fox wrote.
The DC Bar is trying to ascertain how to sanction Clark after a three-person panel earlier this month preliminarily ruled that he broke at least one lawyer ethics rule. A lost law license could hamper Clark’s ability to win a high post in a second Trump administration.
Clark’s lawyers, Harry MacDougald and Charles Burnham, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Clark has said in court filings the disciplinary proceedings are being “weaponized” against allies of former President Donald Trump. His lawyer, Harry MacDougald, said in a closing argument earlier this month the case was “laden with political overtones.”
The three-person panel had asked Fox to address what lesser sanction would be appropriate if the panel rejected disbarment for Clark. In the Monday filing, Fox and the two attorneys said “it would be inconsistent with our duty to the disciplinary system and the profession to even suggest that a sanction other than disbarment should be contemplated.”
By attempting to violate the Rules of Professional Conduct, Clark “betrayed those oaths and, in doing so, his country. Lawyers who betray their country must be disbarred,” they wrote.
Clark’s lawyers are due to file their response May 23.
Once the three-person panel makes its final recommendation, the case moves to the Board on Professional Responsibility and then to the DC Court of Appeals.
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