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October 27, 2023 04:21 PM UTC

For Jenna Ellis, Dodging Disbarment Is The New Black

  • 14 Comments
  • by: Colorado Pols
Jenna Ellis pleading guilty to a felony for her role in trying to steal the 2020 presidential election.

Colorado Newsline’s Quentin Young delivered an update to the ongoing consequences faced by Colorado’s most infamous traffic court lawyer, Donald Trump “Elite Strike Force” legal team member Jenna Ellis, who pled guilty to a felony count in a plea agreement with Fulton County, Georgia prosecutors for her role in the plot to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election in that state. Since Ellis’ guilty plea Tuesday, there’s been a great deal of speculation about further sanctions that may be imposed upon her, including the disbarment Ellis narrowly avoided in the spring by agreeing to be censured by Colorado attorney regulators for similar false statements:

Jessica Yates, the state’s attorney regulation counsel, confirmed to Newsline on Thursday that an investigation into Ellis has commenced.

“I can disclose that an investigation has been opened and the matter involving Jenna Ellis’s Georgia conviction is pending with our office,” Yates said in an email.

Yates declined to comment further about the case.

On Tuesday, Yates said an investigation of the kind Ellis faces could result in “discipline, an alternative to discipline, or other action” permitted by relevant rules…

Ellis pled guilty in a case whose underlying facts were part of the investigation by the Colorado Supreme Court Office of Attorney Regulation Counsel that resulted in Ellis’ censure agreement last March. Now that Ellis has pled guilty to a felony, the office is obliged to revisit the case, but disbarment is not automatic–and can presumably take into account Ellis’ expressions of remorse, and cooperation with prosecutors in testimony against higher-ranking defendants in the conspiracy like Rudy Giuliani, ex-CU conservative scholar John Eastman, and the Great Combover himself.

The thing to keep in mind is that Ellis’ plea deal depends completely on Fulton County prosecutors remaining satisfied that she has helped them as much as she was able. If prosecutors decide Ellis isn’t being sufficiently cooperative, Ellis could well find herself facing the full original indictment in court. If Ellis becomes a model state’s witness and completes all the obligations imposed by her sentence, as a first-time offender in Georgia her conviction can be sealed. That along with the chance that Ellis could keep her law license and continue to call herself a “constitutional law attorney” on Newsmax should be enough to guarantee Ellis sings like a canary.

Now that Ellis has pled guilty to a felony crime, it’s true that criminal justice reforms Democrats have championed and Republicans complain mightily about apply to her conviction–a fact conservatives are hypocritically citing to downplay the importance of Trump election co-conspirators pleading guilty to felonies.

In the court of public opinion, there’s no such thing as a sealed record.

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14 thoughts on “For Jenna Ellis, Dodging Disbarment Is The New Black”

  1. "Colorado’s most infamous traffic court lawyer"

    Hey, even Kenny Buck knew enough early on to give her the boot when she worked in his office.

  4. The legal profession — battered but still standing

    At a pivotal moment during one of the Watergate hearings in 1973, President Richard Nixon’s counsel, John Dean, asked a question that still resonates: “How in God’s name could so many lawyers get involved in something like this?”

    “Part of the reason Trump had to resort to attorneys to attempt the overthrow of the election was because the military was not available to him,” Norm Eisen, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, told me. Recalling the notorious Dec. 18, 2020, Oval Office meeting, during which the former president openly contemplated ordering the armed forces to seize voting machines, Mr. Eisen said, “It’s a testament to our military leaders, to our military culture, that that door was closed.”

    The same cannot be said, alas, for America’s legal culture. It’s easy enough to understand why Mr. Trump, who was mentored by the ruthless mob lawyer Roy Cohn, would seek out lawyers who were willing to do whatever he asked, legality and ethics be damned. The more troubling question is how he was able to find so many takers.

  5. Her plead was short on personal accountability and long on blaming others.  What I heard her say was she was young and naive.  Seems like a less than compelling case to avoid disbarment.

      1. I thought the presumptive punishment for a felony conviction was disbarment although at some point (far in the future) if she demonstrates rehabilitation, she can re-apply for a license.

        When weighing whether there are mitigating and/or aggravating factors, aren't they supposed to consider whether she had any prior disciplinary sanctions imposed? That weighs against her.

        1. Some attorneys convicted of felonies have only received suspensions, as felonies run the gamut.  (With the stupidity of the fentanyl panic, e.g., simple possession of fentanyl is a felony.  If an attorney has an opioid addiction, they need rehab not loss of livelihood.)  There are both aggravating and mitigating factors in Ellis's case.  Lack of experience cuts in her favor.  Prior discipline cuts against, though the prior discipline is interrelated with this one, so it may not cut against her as much as a completely separate incident/event would.  If she's disbarred she can re-apply for reinstatement after 8 years.   I could see her getting a multi-year suspension short of disbarment, though I see disbarment as a real possibility too.  

    1. Anybody so willing to attempt to demonize and judge innocent victims on one hand, and then cry, whinge and beg for the mercy of the court on the other because she's a "Christian" has massive character deficiencies. She's an awful, pathetic human being. 

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