Lawmaker blasts House’s hefty DOMA legal defense tab
Most BigLaw clients would not be surprised by a $1.5 million legal tab. But when that tab is incurred by the House’s defense of the Defense of Marriage Act – and is thus charged to taxpayers – people take notice.
Rep. Honda
As did Rep. Mike Honda, who called the legal bill a “irresponsible, backdoor use of taxpayer money” according to U.S. News and World Report (HT: WSJ’s Law Blog). The California Democrat is calling for a hearing on the issue after House Republicans agreed to increase the pay cap for Bancroft partner Paul Clement’s work on the case.
As a quick recap, after the Attorney General Eric Holder announced that the Justice Department would no longer defend the law, House Speaker John Boehner announced that the House would send its own counsel to defend the law in federal court.
Clement
And not just any counsel. House GOP lawmakers tapped former U.S. Solicitor General Paul Clement – at the time a partner at King & Spalding – to defend the constitutionality of the law.
But then King & Spalding pulled out, causing Clement to abruptly resign the firm in protest and continue the defense of the law with Bancroft.
Now, U.S. News reports, the firm’s legal fees were initially capped at $500,000, but that amount was increased to $750,000. But that “cap may be raised from time to time up to, but not exceeding $1.5 million, upon written notice of the General Counsel to the Contractor.”
That does not make Honda happy. “How long are we going to let this Republican political exercise go on, and at what cost to the American tax payers?” he told U.S. News.
But Michael Steel, spokesman for House Speaker John Boehner, defended House Republicans’ actions, saying they are defending the law is because “the Justice Department chose to shirk its constitutional duty to do so.”
