The lawyers flanking Christine Blasey Ford—and who would be tasked with paying their fees—were the subject of questioning posed by Rachel Mitchell, the Arizona prosecutor employed by the US Senate judiciary committee’s Republican majority.
Ford, testifying about her accusations of sexual misconduct against Donald Trump’s Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, told senators that one lawyer had been recommended by friends, and the other by Democratic senator Dianne Feinstein’s office. She began to explain the intricacies of how they would be paid, before one of her lawyers jumped in to clarify.
“Both of her counsel are doing this pro bono,” Michael Bromwich said. “We are not being paid. We have no expectation of being paid.”
What he didn’t mention, as Bloomberg reports, is that not only was he doing the work for free, but he had also left his job to do so. Bromwich was formerly senior counsel at the Washington law firm Robbins, Russell, Englert, Orseck, Untereiner & Sauber LLP. When some partners objected to his decision to represent Ford, Bromwich jumped ship—then waived his fee.
Bromwich, a former federal prosecutor who helped investigate the Iran-Contra affair, has spent decades working in the private and public sector. This is not his first brush with the current administration, nor with high-profile political cases—former FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe, who was fired by Trump’s attorney general Jeff Sessions, is another of his clients.