So, What Do We All Think About the 65 Project?

This week, we learned about a new group, the 65 Project, dedicated to seeking professional discipline for lawyers involved in President Trump’s post-election litigation. Already, complaints have been filed with several states’ regulators. The “65” refers to the number of post-election lawsuits that were filed, that, in the group’s words, were “based on lies to overturn the election and give Trump a second term.”

Here in Wisconsin, the group has filed a grievance against GOP attorneys James Troupis and Andrew Hitt.  I would expect to see more. (Though, 65 Project, if you’re reading—thank you for addressing this to the OLR that handles discipline and not to the State Bar that does not, but Keith Sellen retired as OLR director in August 2021. Address your concerns to Director Timothy Samuelson, though in reality one of the intake investigators will be the one looking at it.)

Please note: Although this blog is not about politics and I maintain a general policy of not commenting on Wisconsin attorneys’ pending disciplinary cases so as to not reveal who my clients are and who they are not, and I’m not going to discuss the substance here, by now everyone knows it would defy credulity as well as, at the very least, SCR 20:1.7(a)(2) for me to represent Hitt, Troupis, or anyone else similarly situated under these circumstances.

Anyway, I’ve been chewing on the idea of this effort for a few days, and I think I’m still conflicted about it. My main beef with the idea is that it seems a little too close to discipline-by-Change.org-petition—“everyone flood the State Bar with calls and they’ll have to do something!”—and I am not a fan of that tactic.  I would imagine it overwhelms the intake staff (staff I would prefer not to be grouchy when I have to talk to them about unrelated matters) and at the end of the day, it doesn’t matter whether the OLR gets one complaint or 100 alleging the same thing. They are tasked with looking at it and decide what to do independent of public pressure.

Also, I understand that in some ways, this project is less about seeking professional discipline and more about publicizing alleged professional failings. Grievants (at least in Wisconsin) are not obligated to complain confidentially—I sometimes tell my clients that the only thing stopping a grievant from airing their complaint on a billboard is that billboards cost money. And Rule 3.6’s guidance (Wisconsin here) on trial publicity likely does not apply here—if and when a grievance hits an adjudicative stage, there is no jury and the likelihood of this specific bit of publicity (when there has already been publicity in abundance) prejudicing a referee or ultimately the Supreme Court is small.

In any case, despite my discomfort with the process, am interested to see how this plays out. Stay tuned.