DC Bar review finds Jeffrey Clark broke ethics rules in helping Trump

The D.C. Bar’s three-member board of responsibility panel found Thursday that former Justice Department official Jeffrey Clark likely violated at least one ethics rule in his efforts to help former President Trump stay in office after losing the 2020 presidential election.

The ruling is preliminary and can be changed, the disciplinary hearing committee made clear Thursday. But after several days of testimony, the panel found that the “disciplinary counsel has proven at least one violation of any of the charged disciplinary rules.”

Clark is accused of attempting to engage in conduct involving dishonesty and attempting to engage in conduct that “would seriously interfere with the administration of justice,” Hamilton Fox III, disciplinary counsel, wrote in the initial charge filing in July 2022.

The preliminary, nonbinding decision now sets off further proceeding to determine what Clark’s sanctions should be. Fox said he would be seeking disbarment for Clark.

The charges centered largely on a “Proof of Concept” draft letter, which Clark had written in the aftermath of the 2020 election and addressed to Georgia public officials.

The letter falsely claimed the Department of Justice “identified significant concerns that may have impacted the outcome of the election in the United States, including the State of Georgia,” and called on the state Legislature to reconvene a special session. It contained numerous other false claims.

At the time, Clark sent the letter to top-ranking Justice Department officials Jeffrey Rosen and Richard Donoghue for their signatures. Rosen and Donoghue refused to authorize the letter, saying it contained falsehoods. They authorized Clark to receive briefings from top officials about the results of the election fraud investigations.

At the initial hearing last week, Clark’s attorney, Harry MacDougald, called the proceedings against Clark unprecedented and said the letter was not supposed to be public and should have fallen under various privilege protections, The Associated Press reported. MacDougald said the letter was part of normal debate between lawyers and that punishing Clark in those circumstances would have a “chilling effect,” according to the AP.