Susman Puts Money Into DEI Scholarships During Trump Battle (1)

Law firm Susman Godfrey is boosting a law student diversity scholarship program that’s under attack by the Trump administration.

The firm increased the award for its annual Susman Godfrey Prize to $4,000 and expanded the group of recipients to 25, Susman said Friday. The scholarship program is open to first- and second-year law students of color.

The prize “continues to champion law students of color who embody values of integrity, leadership, and academic excellence,” Kalpana Srinivasan, Susman’s co-managing partner, said in a statement.

Susman’s move shows the differing approaches some top firms are taking with their diversity, equity and inclusion programs. Some have opted to cease or scale back the programs amid scrutiny from the Trump administration and a series of executive orders aimed at the president’s perceived enemies.

Susman is breaking from the general pattern with DEI, according to David Glasgow, a lawyer who advises firms on diversity. “Every organization has to do its own risk assessment, and it’s not surprising to me that some are more risk averse than others,” he said.

President Donald Trump pointed to the Susman Prize in an April 9 executive order targeting the firm, saying it was engaging in “unlawful discrimination” and “weaponizing” the legal system to “degrade the quality of American elections.”

The directive instructed agency heads to strip lawyers’ security clearances, restrict personnel from accessing federal buildings, and slash federal contracts held by the firm’s clients. A federal judge temporarily froze most the order less than a week after it was issued.

Houston-founded Susman is a litigation powerhouse known for its work in high-stakes trials. The firm’s lawyers represented Dominion Voting Systems Inc. in a defamation lawsuit against Fox Corp. for airing bogus claims that Dominion rigged the 2020 election against Trump. Fox agreed to pay a $787.5 million settlement to end the case.

‘Powerful’ Change

The firm this year added five more recipients of its Susman Godfrey Prize and increased awards by $500 for the scholarship, first launched in 2021. This year’s recipients hail from the country’s top law schools, including Harvard, Yale, and Stanford Law.

“At a time when law firms and organizations are retreating from DEI efforts, it’s really powerful to see Susman Godfrey step up,” said Dru Levasseur, a lawyer who runs the Trans Legal Professionals Networking Program and consults law firm’s on their DEI plans. “This kind of leadership sends a message about the values that will define the future of a legal profession.”

A Justice Department lawyer told a DC federal judge May 8 that Susman saying it wants to recruit lawyers from underrepresented groups is problematic, following a 2023 Supreme Court decision that curbed the consideration of race in college admissions.

“But nothing you have described is unlawful,” Judge Loren AliKahn said in the hearing, saying that she didn’t see “any evidence” to support accusations that Susman was violating federal law with its diversity programs.

The firm previously was threatened over its 1L diversity fellowship, a separate program that hosts first-year law students for two-week stints and gives them $5,000. The firm made changes to the program after a group run by Edward Blum, the activist many credit with the demise of affirmative action, threatened to sue.

Susman axed its description of the program as aimed at “women, people of color, individuals who identify as LGBTQ, or members of other groups underrepresented in today’s legal profession.” The fellowship is now open to “students who have overcome personal or systemic hardships or disadvantages, including experiences of those who self-identify as members of groups underrepresented in today’s legal profession,” the firm now says in its description of the program.

Blum’s American Alliance for Equal Rights dropped lawsuits against two other firms—Perkins Coie and Morrison Foerster—after the firms opened similar fellowship programs to wider groups of students.