The National Rifle Association’s federal lawsuit in Dallas against its former public relations firm has a unique issue to be resolved before the case can move forward.
The issue: Should the NRA’s lawyer in the case, Bill Brewer, be disqualified on grounds that he is a fact witness in the dispute and has a conflict of interest because he has a “personal history of animosity” toward the defendants, who also happen to be owned by his wife’s family?
Lawyers for Akerman McQueen, an Oklahoma City-based advertising agency that represented the NRA for three decades, are asking U.S. District Judge Joe Fish of Dallas to boot Brewer off the case because the Dallas attorney “is a tortfeasor engaging in wrongful conduct as a primary actor in the underlying dispute, including spearheading the termination of the services agreement between the parties.”
In a 48-page motion filed Wednesday, Akerman McQueen attorneys state that “Brewer and his firm are violating several Texas Disciplinary Rules of Professional Conduct and Model Rules of Professional Conduct by directly competing with AMc, leaking false and disparaging information about AMc to the press, side-stepping the attorney-client privilege and communicating with a represented party.”
Mr. Brewer did not respond to a request for an interview, but the Brewer law firm did provide a quote from its client, the NRA.
“This is the same stale and desperate narrative Ackerman has tried to peddle all along,” says Andrew Arulanandam, managing director of NRA Public Affairs. “It does nothing to diminish the confidence the NRA has in Bill or his law firm – or our commitment to hold this former vendor accountable.”
The NRA sued Akerman McQueen in August claiming that the ad agency wrongfully continued to promote its connection to the gun group though the relationship had terminated months earlier.
In October, the NRA filed an amended complaint stating that Ackerman McQueen breached its fiduciary duties, engaged in fraudulent billing and failed to maintain proper accounting documents.
In November, Akerman McQueen countersued, claiming that Brewer and NRA leader Wayne LaPierre are attempting to “destroy AMc’s business in a desperate attempt to deflect attention from the NRA’s gross financial mismanagement.”
In the petition submitted Wednesday, lawyers for Ackerman McQueen argue that Brewer “positioned his law firm as a direct competitor of AMc” and thus has a financial stake in the outcome of the litigation.
“Unlike typical law firms, the Brewer firm actively promotes its ability to offer crisis-management and PR services to clients,” the petition states. “Brewer boasts of his ability to try cases in the press instead of the courtroom and advocates that PR services should be performed by law firms instead of companies like AMc.”
“Since being retained by the NRA in 2018, Brewer and his firm appear to have overtaken all legal and PR decisions within the NRA, allowing the firm to extract exorbitant legal fees along the way,” Ackerman McQueen states.
The legal filing states that the Brewer firm is earning fees of about $100,000 a day from the NRA and has been paid $54 million over the past two years.
Ackerman McQueen is represented by Michael Gruber and Brian Vanderwoude, who are partners in the Dallas office of Dorsey & Whitney, as well as Dorsey of counsel Jay Madrid and associate Brian Mason.