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In the year since President Trump returned to the White House, there's been a mass exodus at the Justice Department. New leaders at the top of the DOJ fired dozens of people, hundreds more quit. Now some of those lawyers are charting a new course by starting their own businesses. NPR's Carrie Johnson reports.
CARRIE JOHNSON, BYLINE: On a chilly morning last week, Tim Heaphy opened his brand-new law office to a visitor.
TIM HEAPHY: Thank you for coming over.
JOHNSON: Happy to do it.
HEAPHY: Yeah.
JOHNSON: There's a paint can in the sink. Partner David Harbach has been moonlighting.
DAVID HARBACH: I painted one wall in our lobby where our logo is going to go eventually.
JOHNSON: That's life in a startup. There's something all four partners at this firm have in common - they played a role investigating the president. Harbach helped indict Trump for allegedly hiding classified documents at his Florida resort. Heaphy worked for the Congressional committee that examined the Capitol riot on January 6. A third partner, Thomas Windom, was part of the team moving to take Trump to trial for trying to overturn the 2020 election. And then there's former special counsel Jack Smith, who managed both criminal cases against Trump. Smith is not in the office today. He's out preparing for testimony this week before the House Judiciary Committee. But Heaphy says it would be a mistake to think the new law firm is part of the resistance.
HEAPHY: I think the perception when people see the four of us come together is that this is an anti-Trump effort. And that's just not the animating principle. We are not going into business to sue the administration.
JOHNSON: Instead, they're aiming to defend individuals and educational institutions, provide litigation and trial counsel to businesses and help witnesses called to testify in congressional hearings.
HEAPHY: So far, so good. A lot of well-wishes. A lot of excitement.
JOHNSON: Two more young lawyers are starting this week, and there's space for more. Partner Thomas Windom.
THOMAS WINDOM: The desk to your left is a daily reminder of our ambition to grow in personnel as our work grows. That's not an extra desk.
JOHNSON: The exodus from the Department of Justice over the past year has upended the job market for lawyers in Washington.
LAUREN DRAKE: We wound up with a real supply-demand mismatch.
JOHNSON: That's Lauren Drake. She's a managing partner at Macrae, a top legal search firm in D.C.
DRAKE: Firms generally are very happy to hire these senior government lawyers, but there were just so many of them.
JOHNSON: Government attorneys who might have got offers from four different law firms in the past maybe got one last year. The White House issued punitive executive orders and targeted firms that employed people who investigated Trump. While some firms challenge those orders and have won in court so far, there's still a chill in the air.
DRAKE: They had some hesitancy around hiring very senior people from the Biden administration or anybody who might be considered controversial, and there were lots of them.
JOHNSON: There's an opening in the market now for boutique firms, where lawyers can charge lower rates and have more control over the clients they choose. One of those firms is run by Molly Gaston and J.P. Cooney. Both worked for special counsel Jack Smith. They were fired from their career prosecutor jobs last January. A few months ago, they started their own small firm. Molly Gaston.
MOLLY GASTON: Public corruption and rooting it out of our government is really our passion.
JOHNSON: The Justice Department has all but abolished its public corruption unit, and partner J.P. Cooney says that presents an opportunity.
JP COONEY: Our belief is that state and local governments that historically have not had to enter that space really should and have a need to, but they need support and expertise.
JOHNSON: Gaston and Cooney once trained lawyers and agents on how to build cases against crooked government officials. Now they hope to translate that experience to clients outside the Justice Department.
Carrie Johnson, NPR News, Washington.
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