Brad Bondi, brother of U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi and longtime Trump ally, lost his bid for D.C. Bar president in a landslide. Diane Seltzer secured more than 90% of the vote in an election that shattered turnout records, with over 38,000 attorneys casting ballots.
Bar associations are increasingly caught in the crosshairs of ideological conflict, with national political actors leveraging accreditation, licensing and membership structures to pursue partisan objectives.
Did D.C. Bar members vote to protect institutional neutrality, or was this a broader rejection of a political movement seeking to consolidate influence within legal institutions?
Who Is Brad Bondi?
Bondi is no outsider to the legal establishment. A veteran securities litigator and co-chair of the Investigations and White Collar Defense practice at Paul Hastings, Bondi has built a national profile representing high-profile clients including Elon Musk and Trump Media & Technology Group.
His resume is stacked with Big Law credibility and government service, including stints at the SEC and as counsel to the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission. But it’s his political proximity that defined his campaign for D.C. Bar president.
Bondi entered the race touting a platform focused on member services: expanding free CLE programs, reducing administrative fees and increasing pro bono opportunities. He emphasized a desire to keep the D.C. Bar nonpartisan and committed to its professional mission. On paper, his proposals aligned with the type of routine bar reform efforts familiar to any practicing attorney.
By the time Bondi announced his candidacy, his sister, Pam Bondi, had become a central figure in the Trump administration’s legal strategy. As attorney gweneral, she led efforts to pressure the ABA on its diversity standards, threatened accreditation authority and echoed administration attacks on firms representing political adversaries. Brad Bondi, a major donor to Republican candidates and a visible Trump defender, entered the bar race amid these escalating moves to reshape the legal profession’s institutional infrastructure.
Little Power, Big Influence
Those connections immediately drew scrutiny. Critics pointed to the administration’s executive orders revoking security clearances from select law firms and opening investigations into DEI hiring practices.
Many saw Bondi’s campaign not as a bid to improve bar administration, but as part of a coordinated strategy to influence or control legal gatekeeping institutions from the inside. That suspicion wasn’t abstract. Within weeks of Bondi’s announcement, Ed Martin—another Trump loyalist and Bondi ally—was publicly attacking D.C. Bar disciplinary officials, accusing them of political retaliation and demanding their suspension.
The Office of Disciplinary Counsel (ODC), an independent body created by the District of Columbia Court of Appeals, holds the authority to investigate attorney misconduct and recommend suspending or disbarring lawyers. This body had, in fact, pursued several cases against attorneys involved in efforts to overturn Trump's defeat to Democrat Joe Biden during the 2020 U.S. presidential election.
Though the D.C. Bar president has limited formal power over ethics enforcement or licensing policy, the role carries visibility and agenda-setting influence. Bondi’s assurances of neutrality did little to convince a membership already wary of the administration’s hostile posture toward legal independence.
The Seltzer Win: A Statement on the Rule of Law?
Diane Seltzer entered the race for D.C. Bar president with a message tailored for a profession under pressure: defend the rule of law, safeguard the independence of attorneys and ensure that lawyers can represent clients without political retaliation. Her campaign didn’t center on administrative reforms or member perks. It focused on preserving the core values of the profession amid rising political hostility.
At a candidate forum in May, Seltzer stated bluntly, “We’re literally afraid of terrible consequences just for doing our jobs.” Her message resonated with lawyers feeling the weight of external pressure from the Trump administration—an environment where discipline threats, executive orders targeting firms and loyalty tests were becoming part of the landscape.
Further underscoring the perceived external pressure on the legal system, the Trump administration took direct action within the federal government. This included instances where the Justice Department fired prosecutors who had previously investigated President Trump. This move was part of a broader aggressive push against the legal system, which also saw the White House targeting law firms with punitive executive orders based on their lawyers and clients.
Though the D.C. Bar president has no direct authority over disciplinary investigations, the role isn’t ceremonial. The president helps set the tone for the institution and shapes public messaging at a time when neutrality and independence are being tested.
More Than an Election Result
Seltzer’s platform served as a counterweight to the perception that the bar could become a vehicle for political influence. Her vision leaned into values the legal profession holds as foundational: independence, access to justice and adherence to professional duty without fear of government reprisal.
Her decisive win suggests that D.C. lawyers weren’t merely choosing between two leadership styles. They were choosing a statement. Against the backdrop of Trump-era attacks on legal institutions and a Justice Department more focused on loyalty than law, Seltzer’s campaign positioned itself as a bulwark. Her margin of victory reflects a membership aligning behind that defense.
Seltzer didn’t run on neutrality. She ran on principle. While Bondi called for keeping politics out of the bar, Seltzer acknowledged the profession was already under political threat. The difference wasn’t in tone, but in framing: one candidate sought to depoliticize the conversation; the other confronted the politicization head-on.
Seltzer’s victory was more than an election result. It was a professional declaration—a reaffirmation that the legal community in the nation’s capital would not allow partisan agendas to dictate how, or for whom, lawyers practice.
Can Bar Associations Remain Apolitical?
The D.C. Bar presidency is not a position of unchecked authority.
The president serves alongside the Board of Governors, and under bar bylaws, cannot speak on behalf of the organization without board approval. Ethics enforcement, licensing decisions and disciplinary actions are handled independently by the Office of Disciplinary Counsel, not by bar leadership. Structural guardrails are in place to insulate the bar from overt politicization.
Still, symbolic leadership matters. Candidates shape public perception, set priorities and guide how the bar responds to external threats. That’s where the tension lies. Bondi argued that the process itself had become partisan. In his post-election statement, he condemned the race as hijacked by “rabid partisans,” framing his loss as the result of political bias rather than professional judgment.
Redefining Neutrality
But many attorneys saw the inverse. They believed Bondi’s campaign posed the genuine risk of politicizing the institution. His critics didn’t object to his resume. They objected to what they viewed as an orchestrated effort to insert loyalists into legal power structures already under siege.
Robert Spagnoletti, a former bar president and the current CEO, rejected the notion that any candidate could weaponize the institution. He emphasized that disciplinary matters are “utterly and completely independent” from the bar’s elected leadership. That structural fact reassured some, but it didn’t blunt the urgency others felt about protecting the profession’s cultural and ethical integrity.
Whether bar associations can remain apolitical may no longer be the right question. The act of defending neutrality has become political. Elections that once focused on member benefits now operate within a national climate where legal independence is contested. The D.C. Bar may be structurally insulated, but perception and participation is now shaped by broader political currents.
What This Means for the Legal Profession
The D.C. Bar election has reshaped expectations for how lawyers engage with institutional governance. A race that once would’ve drawn little notice mobilized tens of thousands and sent a clear signal: the legal profession is watching, and it will act when it perceives a threat to its independence. That precedent won’t go unnoticed.
Bar associations across the country may see higher participation in future elections, particularly when candidates hold overt political ties. This cycle showed that lawyers—especially those in federal practice—view bar leadership as more than procedural. They see it as a frontline defense of professional autonomy. In that sense, the D.C. result may encourage vigilance, not apathy.
Whether the vote represents a broader rejection of politicization or just a repudiation of one political faction is less certain. Seltzer won by running on values associated with institutional integrity, but her victory doesn’t necessarily mean lawyers want their bars devoid of any public stance. Many in the profession expect their institutions to stand up for the rule of law when it’s under attack. That expectation may look political to outsiders—but within the profession, it reads as ethical necessity.
The D.C. Bar members didn’t reject engagement. They rejected alignment. For federal lawyers in particular who operate in politically charged environments and are often subject to shifting agency agendas, the message is clear: leadership matters, and silence isn’t neutrality. This election affirmed that bar associations are not above the political climate, but they can still serve as stabilizing forces within it.
