One of the two designated participants who spearheaded an interlocutory appeal that derailed the cannabis rescheduling process has removed Perkins Coie LLP as its legal counsel for the administrative law judge proceedings.

Perkins Coie—the Seattle-based law firm that President Donald Trump targeted in a March 6 executive order for “dishonest and dangerous activity” over diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) practices—filed a motion after business hours on March 14 to withdraw itself as legal representation for Hemp for Victory, a nonprofit veterans group.

Judge John J. Mulrooney, the Drug Enforcement Administration’s (DEA) chief administrative law judge tasked with presiding over a fair and transparent rescheduling hearing to debate the merits of reclassifying cannabis to a Schedule III drug under the Controlled Substances Act, granted Perkins Coie’s motion on March 17.

“The motion represents that the firm currently representing Designated Participant Hemp for Victory (HFV) seeks to withdraw as counsel for HFV because ‘HFV wishes to retain another law firm to represent its interests in these proceedings,’” Mulrooney wrote in Monday’s order.

The administrative law judge provided Hemp for Victory 30 days—or until the existing stay from the pending interlocutory appeal is terminated, whichever is shorter—to retain new counsel for the rescheduling hearing.

Cannabis Business Times reached out to Hemp for Victory Board Chair Robert Head and Perkins Coie Partner Abdul Kallon, who represented HFV, for comment on March 18, specifically asking if the breakup had anything to do with the executive order and/or former Perkins Coie attorney Andrew Kline, who also represented HFV, leaving the firm to take on a new role as Colorado’s Deputy Secretary of State.

Perkins Coie, which represented presidential candidate Hilary Clinton in 2016, has been dragged through the national spotlight since Trump’s executive order that also accused the law firm of undermining democratic elections. The order aims to incapacitate the law firm.

Perkins Coie filed a legal action on March 11 in response to the executive order.

“The order violates core constitutional rights, including the rights to free speech and due process,” Perkins Coie Managing Partner Bill Malley wrote in a public statement. “At the heart of the order is an unlawful attack on the freedom of all Americans to select counsel of their choice without fear of retribution or punishment from the government.”

As it relates to cannabis rescheduling, Hemp for Victory and fellow pro-rescheduling designated participant Village Farms International filed an initial motion in November claiming the DEA stacked the designated participant deck in favor of anti-rescheduling groups and colluded with prohibitionist group Smart Approaches to Marijuana (SAM) via ex parte communications that violated the Administrative Procedure Act (APA).

In that motion, authored by Village Farms counsel Shane Pennington, a partner at Porter Wright Morris & Arthur LLP, Village Farms and Hemp for Victory asked Mulrooney to disqualify the DEA as the proponent of the proposed rule to reschedule cannabis out of Schedule I, the most restrictive category, where it’s listed alongside heroin, LSD, ecstasy and other substances that the federal government views as having no currently accepted medical use in the U.S.

The proposed rule was issued by the Department of Justice (DOJ) and signed by former Attorney General Merrick Garland under President Joe Biden.

Although Mulrooney denied that initial motion, Village Farms and Hemp for Victory teamed up with the Connecticut Office of Cannabis Ombudsman (OCO) to file a motion to reconsider in January in light of what the pro-rescheduling designated participants viewed as new evidence: claiming the DEA engaged in ex parte communications with another anti-rescheduling participant, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation (TBI).

The motion to reconsider claimed that the DEA helped guide TBI through its request to participate in the formal rulemaking hearing by sending the organization a letter asking it to provide additional information to establish an “interested person” standing under the APA.

This led to Mulrooney granting an interlocutory appeal and issuing a stay on Jan. 13 that indefinitely postponed the rescheduling hearing process that was scheduled to begin on Jan. 21 and run through early March.

Since then, OCO dropped out of the rescheduling process altogether on Feb. 7, and another group that was excluded from the process, Doctors for Drug Policy Reform (D4DPR), filed a lawsuit on Feb. 17 in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit arguing that the selection process in favor of 25 organizations/individuals was arbitrary and capricious and must be redone.

D4DPR’s lawsuit included the identical rejection letters that former DEA Administrator Anne Milgram sent 138 other organizations/individuals, CBT first reported. It also included the cure letters that the DEA sent to several anti-rescheduling entities, which provided them with the opportunity to submit supplemental information.

It’s unclear if the lawsuit will be successful in asking the appellate court to vacate the DEA’s participant selections, or if the pending interlocutory appeal will ever get terminated under the DEA’s new leadership. On Feb. 11, Trump nominated DEA veteran Terry Cole—who has a “just say no” stance on cannabis—to lead the agency.

Should Trump’s DEA elect to return the Biden-era DOJ’s proposed cannabis rescheduling rule to Mulrooney for additional hearing proceedings, Perkins Coie will no longer be involved.