On Monday, Axios reported that a leftist dark money group is looking to target Republican lawyers that were involved in litigation surrounding the 2020 election:
A dark money group with ties to Democratic Party heavyweights will spend millions this year to expose and try to disbar more than 100 lawyers who worked on Donald Trump’s post-election lawsuits, people involved with the effort tell Axios. . .
The 65 Project is targeting 111 attorneys in 26 states who were involved to some degree in efforts to challenge or reverse 2020 election results. They include lawyers at large national law firms with many partners and clients and lawyers at smaller, regional firms.
The group is also hoping to "[starve] any future efforts of legal talent."
RNLA made the following statement in response to the creation of The 65 Project:
No lawyer should face adverse action for zealously advocating for their client within the bounds of their state’s Rules of Professional Conduct and the high ethical standards of the legal profession. To suggest otherwise is un-American. The right to representation is a fundamental part of our adversarial legal system that protects the rule of law, and efforts to intimidate attorneys from representing clients in the election law context should be widely condemned.
RNLA statement on "The 65 Project" 2/2: The right to representation is a fundamental part of our adversarial legal system that protects the rule of law, and efforts to intimidate attorneys from representing clients in the election law context should be widely condemned.
— RNLA ⚖️ (@TheRepLawyer) March 7, 2022
Unsurprisingly, The 65 Project is not going after Democrat attorneys like "dark money" Marc Elias who are notorious for attempts to overturn elections.
Any organization doing this kind of initiative loses any credibility if they aren’t also going after @marceelias, who literally tried to steal a congressional seat in Iowa from a member who was duly certified. https://t.co/y2qJD2mhnS
— House Admin. Committee GOP (@HouseAdmnGOP) March 7, 2022
It is always important for lawyers to uphold their ethical duties while zealously advocating for their clients. However, the new left's McCarthyism has taken things a step too far by smearing their political opponents for representing individuals that they do not agree with.
The stated goal of The 65 Project is to prevent Republicans from representation in election cases in the future. This will have the effect of infringing on the liberties of Republicans in election law disputes. As Justice John Paul Stevens noted in his dissent in Walters v. National Ass’n of Radiation Survivors:
[T]he citizen's right to consult an independent lawyer and to retain that lawyer to speak on his or her behalf is an aspect of liberty that is priceless.