How Trump built a legal team that answers only to him — even against his own government

Throughout his second presidency, Donald Trump has made it clear that his top priority isn't experience — it's loyalty. Trump his filled his second administration with ultra-MAGA loyalists who, unlike many of the traditional conservatives he appointed during his first presidency, aren't going to challenge him or clash with him. And according to the Washington Post, that standard is very much at work with Trump's team of personal lawyers.

In the Post, reporters Isaac Arnsdorf and Perry Stein detail the U.S. president's search for personal lawyers who aren't afraid to make his most audacious arguments.

"After burning through a list of big-name attorneys whose advice he often rejected," Arnsdorf and Stein explain, "President Donald Trump has turned to a group of less-known civil litigators as his personal lawyers. In Trump's eyes, they're a team with a crucial strength — the willingness to make arguments other lawyers might balk at, according to a Trump adviser who spoke on the condition of anonymity to speak about internal discussions. The lawyers have taken unusual steps for a sitting president, including suing journalists and litigating against the government he leads."

The Post journalists continue, "At the same time, Trump has asserted greater control over the Justice Department than previous presidents. That has led to highly unusual situations in which proceedings that would typically be adversarial have had lawyers on both sides who are answerable to Trump, many of whom have previously worked together on his behalf."

Trump's current team of personal attorneys, according to Arnsdorf and Stein, "range in experience, temperament and politics." But experience, the journalists emphasize, takes a back seat to loyalty when Trump is searching for attorneys.

"The central figure in the group, according to the Trump adviser and lawyers who have been involved in litigation with them, is Boris Epshteyn, a pugnacious longtime adviser to Trump," Arnsdorf and Stein report. "During the 2024 transition, incoming White House counsel David Warrington recommended the president cut ties with Epshteyn because of allegations that Epshteyn tried to use his closeness to Trump to enrich himself, according to his report, which was reviewed by the Washington Post…. Epshteyn can be at turns charming or bombastic, (a) lawyer who has litigated against him said, and his role is less as a legal expert than as the person who has the direct relationship with the client."

Attorney Ty Cobb, who represented Trump during the Russia probe in 2016 but is now a vehement critic of him, told the Post, "Boris was a nobody when I was there."