Legal powerhouse accused of bailing on panel exposing their 'monopoly' over law school accreditation

At the Thursday event, which was held across the street from where the ABA was holding its spring antitrust conference, America First Legal President Gene Hamilton suggested the ABA no-showed because the group's position on the matter is "indefensible." 

"I don't know all the backstory. I mean, I'm just a moderator, but I think that there's a certain amount - if I was a betting man - my suspicion is that the ABA's status quo and their position and their involvement in the process is indefensible from the perspective of somebody who tries to present themselves as being an unbiased, uninterested party that is just simply involved in accrediting law schools," said Hamilton.

 "When they're confronted with hard facts and evidence and data and actual experiences from real people, multiple people, not just one person, but multiple people, it doesn't make for a great environment if you're trying to maintain an image that does not match reality."

The panelists at Thursday's event pointed to what they described as concrete, firsthand clashes with the ABA and the legal institutions tied to it. First Assistant Attorney General of Texas, Brent Webster, for example, argued that the politicization of the legal establishment became real for him when the State Bar of Texas sought to strip him and Attorney General Ken Paxton of their law licenses over litigation Texas had filed after the 2020 election. 

Webster said that fight, which ended with the Texas Supreme Court vindicating him, helped expose to Texas officials how deeply bar institutions had been "radicalized" and contributed to the state's decision to loosen the ABA's hold over law-school approval. 

Meanwhile, David Dewhirst, Solicitor General for the State of Florida, made a parallel argument through the experience of St. Thomas University's law school in Miami, which he said was left in prolonged uncertainty by the ABA over whether its Catholic identity could coexist with the ABA's nondiscrimination standards, especially on sexual orientation and gender identity. 

Together, those stories were presented as real-world examples of the broader complaint underscored at the Thursday event - that the ABA is no longer acting as a neutral professional body, but as an ideological gatekeeper with the power to shape who gets trained, licensed and recognized in the legal profession.

"From the perspective of the ABA, when they're under significant pressure right now from both the federal administration, the states and a lot of people waking up to their shenanigans - it makes it a tough time to be in an environment that is a little bit more direct and blunt and to the point," Hamilton added about the ABA's absence at the event.