The New Norm at Elite Law Firms: Abandoning Ideals

Past commitments to diversity, equity and inclusion are vanishing as Trump’s EEOC bears down

By Lauren Stiller Rikleen

Until a few months ago, the law firm Goodwin Procter had made its commitment to address historic inequalities central to its public branding. Lately, however, it has modeled the obsessive handwashing of Lady Macbeth, scrubbing the damned spot of diversity from its existence.

The behavior exemplifies yet another elite firm deferring to presidential overreach.

Goodwin’s betrayal of its past commitments came in response to a March 17, 2025, letter from the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission designed to implement the administration’s goal of erasing diversity, equity, and inclusion—concepts it condemns without understanding what they mean. The EEOC letter demanded extensive data from twenty of the nation’s top law firms, hunting signs of equality initiatives with a fervor equal to Javert’s hunt for Jean Valjean.

The EEOC has now become an instrument to shore up the same institutional barriers many such initiatives sought to remove. The letter asked firms to report past support of organizations such as the Leadership Council on Legal Diversity and the Sponsors for Educational Opportunity Law Fellowship, which help talented aspiring law students from disadvantaged communities. The EEOC noted reproachfully that the SEO website “encourages applicants from underserved backgrounds…” and pointedly counted the number of women and students of color in the website’s main photo.

According to an EEOC announcement, four elite law firms responded to the March 17 inquiry with surrender. In a press release, the EEOC crowed: “Four of the world’s largest law firms—Kirkland & Ellis LLP, Latham & Watkins LLP, Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP, and A&O Shearman Sterling, LLC—have entered into a settlement agreement” with the EEOC. While Goodwin Proctor was not among those named in the settlement announcement, recent reporting on its response to the EEOC tells a sad tale of abandoned commitments.

Like other prominent law firms with roots in the early 1900s, Goodwin Procter’s prestigious partnership ranks were dominated by white men with ivy-league credentials. But it would become impossible to ignore the growing clamor that began in the 1960s to engage in the struggle for civil rights and social justice.

In a 2012 rendition of the firm’s history, Goodwin described its evolution to address diversity within its ranks and become more engaged in the community around it. It expanded its pro bono work to take on “new kinds of causes—conservation and environmental issues, prisoners’ rights, civil rights and legal assistance to underserved communities—causes that faithfully mirrored important popular concerns.”

In January 2020, the firm announced “bold public retention and advancement goals” for the next five years, committing to the achievement of specific “diversity milestones” for its “senior associate, partner promotion and leadership classes in regard to LGBTQ+, racio-ethnic, gender and demographic representation.” The firm’s website proudly touted diversity, equity, and inclusion as “core values here at Goodwin” and stated: “Our mission is to become the most diverse, equitable, and inclusive firm in the industry.”

Today, this commitment is only available on the Internet Archive Wayback Machine. In a filing that reportedly encompassed more than 200 pages, the firm assured the EEOC that it has ended its relationships with nonprofit organizations that focus on diversity, equity, and inclusion in the legal profession, including programs for aspiring lawyers.

To ensure that the transition from its past commitments were above administration criticism, Goodwin informed the EEOC it would no longer participate in the Mansfield certification program. Modeled after the NFL’s Rooney rule, the Mansfield program aids legal organizations in expanding the pool of interviewees for leadership positions. But the EEOC’s hiring process questions made clear that even broadening the talent pool is a step too far for this government. Goodwin acquiesced, notwithstanding a recent federal court decision stating that the Mansfield Rule is lawful.

Goodwin’s website now offers a sanitized shell of its former proud commitments. Where it once touted the ways it sought “to paint a picture of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) across various facets of our firm, the legal industry, and the communities in which we live,” the firm today drably describes a neutral strategy of “opportunity, inclusion, and belonging.” Inclusion may have survived the messaging purge, but gone is the understanding that true inclusion requires intentional access to a profession—and a legal education—that was historically closed to all but white men.

Goodwin is not the only elite firm to capitulate to the administration. It merely exemplifies how too many of the wealthiest law firms on the planet have refused to stand up for basic principles of equality and justice—principles embedded in our Constitution and laws. This administration has reduced the acronym of DEI to a slur and banished fairness and equality to a history it is scrambling to erase. Firms like Goodwin are enabling its very un-American goal.

Although Goodwin’s capitulation has been reported in the media, the continued silence of other top firms is a troubling omen for a profession that should be providing a full-throated defense of democracy, the rule of law, the justice system, and equality.

Like many of its counterparts, Goodwin’s website no longer showcases diverse faces and examples of inclusive experiences. Instead, it offers a photo of what appears to be the Milky Way that, like the revisions to its site, suggests an expansive void that can be filled by your imagination, but not by your lived experience.

Perhaps that image best highlights the legal profession’s response to this crisis, evoking the abandonment of an ideal for the unknown.

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Lauren Stiller Rikleen is the Executive Director of Lawyers Defending American Democracy and the editor of Her Honor—Stories of Challenge and Triumph from Women Judges.