Trump’s in-fighting legal team mixed with a former president who has never met “a camera he didn’t love” is the recipe for “an epic disaster,” an MSNBC columnist wrote Monday.
The professional standards usually associated with attorney-client relationships have been “sometimes bent to the point of breaking,” wrote Katie S. Phang, host of the Katie Phang Show.
She added: “This kind of havoc does not bode well for Trump’s legal future.”
Trump has surrounded himself with an army of lawyers as he faces a series of trials and investigations including the Stormy Daniels hush money fraud case; a second defamation case from E. Jean Carroll; a $250 million civil lawsuit accusing him, three of his children and the Trump Organization of fraud; special counsel investigations into his keeping of classified documents and allegations that he tried to overturn the 2020 presidential election; and a probe by Georgia District Attorny Fani Willis into more allegations of tampering with election results.
And the lawyers are very publicly fighting, Phang wrote.
Attorney Tim Parlatore recently quit – via testifying to the classified documents investigation – saying he couldn’t give counsel to Trump because of obstacles thrown up by another lawyer, Boris Epshteyn.
He also criticized another lawyer on the team, Joe Tacopina, over a potential conflict of interest because Tacopina had been previously approached to discuss possibly representing Stormy Daniels.
Evan Corcoran, who was Trump’s lead attorney in the classified documents case, resigned after being subpoenaed to testify before a grand jury against his client. And former Trump White House counsel Pat A. Cipollone and deputy counsel Patrick Philbin have also testified to a grand jury about accusations that the former president tried to overturn the 2020 election.
“Several Trump lawyers have had to retain their own lawyers due to their representation of Trump,” wrote Phang.
“The newest iteration of “MAGA” might as well now stand for “Making Attorneys Get Attorneys.”
“Let’s also not forget other former Trump lawyers like Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell, Jenna Ellis, and John Eastman, all of whom are facing ethics complaints affecting their ability to practice law in various jurisdictions, as well as several investigations for their roles as Trump’s counsel,” wrote Phang.
She added: “The public continues, with a combination of fascination and disgust, to watch the train wreck that is Trump Legal World unfold like a political iteration of The Hunger Games. Which attorney will be left standing at the end?”
