US Federal Trade Commission warns law firms about DEI hiring

Jan 30 (Reuters) – The U.S. Federal Trade Commission said on Friday it had written to 42 law firms warning them about diversity, equity, and inclusion hiring, which it described as potentially unfair and anticompetitive.

President Donald Trump’s administration has eliminated DEI-related programs in the government. Several private firms have also rolled back such initiatives.

The FTC letters were addressed to many of the country’s largest and most profitable firms. Three of them — Paul Weiss, WilmerHale and Perkins Coie — were targeted last year by Trump executive orders that threatened their business practices, citing in part their allegedly discriminatory hiring practices.

Paul Weiss and two other firms named by the FTC on Friday — Skadden Arps and Latham & Watkins — reached deals with the White House to void or sidestep such orders, pledging millions of dollars in free legal work to mutually-supported causes with the administration.

The FTC’s list also includes WilmerHale and Perkins Coie, which filed successful lawsuits challenging the president’s executive orders last year as unconstitutional.

Representatives for the five firms did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The White House deferred comment to the FTC.

The FTC said all 42 firms participated in a program overseen by consultancy Diversity Lab that seeks to establish and boost gender and race employment practices in the legal profession. Diversity Lab did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Since 2017, Diversity Lab has offered a certification for law firms that ensure at least 30% of their candidates for leadership roles are underrepresented lawyers. The group has previously defended the legality of that program, citing a May 2025 ruling in which a federal judge found the certification does not establish hiring quotas or other discriminatory practices.

FTC Chairman Andrew Ferguson in a statement said firms were warned that agreements among firms to meet metrics for diversity, equity and inclusion “can distort competition for labor in legal professions, including along dimensions like hiring decisions, pay, and promotions.”

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission last March demanded detailed hiring data from 20 major firms, including applicant names and whether race or gender influenced decisions.

A Reuters special report in July found that 46 of the 50 highest‑grossing U.S. law firms in the Trump era had scrubbed or altered website references to diversity, equity and inclusion.

(Reporting by Costas Pitas, Mike Scarcella, Karen Sloan and David Thomas. Editing by David Ljunggren, David Bario and Diane Craft)