About Above the Law

Above the Law

Above the Law is a news website covering the legal profession, law firms, law schools, and the broader business of law. Founded in August 2006 by legal journalist David Lat, it is based in New York City and published by Breaking Media. Known for its blend of legal news, gossip, commentary, and irreverent humor, Above the Law has become one of the most widely read publications in the legal industry, reaching millions of readers and exercising substantial influence over how the profession discusses itself. Its official website is abovethelaw.com.

Founding

David Lat launched Above the Law in August 2006 after leaving Wonkette, the Washington, D.C. political gossip blog then part of the Gawker Media network, where he had become an editor after leaving the U.S. Attorney's office in January 2006. Lat partnered with Elizabeth Spiers, the founder of Dealbreaker, to create a legal-industry counterpart to the gossip blogs of the mid-2000s. Lat served as the site's sole writer for its first two years. The blog quickly built a devoted readership among lawyers, law students, and legal journalists.

David Lat and Underneath Their Robes

Above the Law was not Lat's first foray into legal blogging. In 2004, while serving as an assistant U.S. attorney in New Jersey under then-U.S. Attorney Chris Christie, Lat anonymously started Underneath Their Robes, a gossipy blog about the federal judiciary written under the pseudonym "Article III Groupie." The blog served as a clearinghouse for news and gossip about Supreme Court clerks, whom Lat called "the Elect." In November 2005, Lat revealed his identity as the author in an interview with Jeffrey Toobin for the New Yorker. A graduate of Harvard College and Yale Law School, where he was vice president of the Federalist Society, Lat had clerked for Judge Diarmuid O'Scannlain of the Ninth Circuit and worked as an associate at the Manhattan firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz before his government service.

Breaking Media

Above the Law is the flagship publication of Breaking Media, a digital media company whose stable has included other professional-industry blogs. In July 2008, Lat became the managing editor of Breaking Media, overseeing its blogs from the New York office; in December 2009, he announced he would return to full-time writing and editing of Above the Law after a new CEO and executive editor joined the company. The site's staff work from the top floor of the Cable Building in New York City, and the publication is funded through advertising and investment rather than subscriptions.

Major Scoops

As Above the Law's readership and network of informants grew, Lat and his staff began to exercise substantial influence on the legal industry. One of the site's biggest scoops came in 2012, when Lat broke the news that Dewey & LeBoeuf, then one of the most prestigious law firms in the world, employing more than 1,300 attorneys in 12 countries, was on the verge of imploding. The firm's subsequent collapse became one of the most dramatic failures in the history of Big Law. Business Insider named Lat one of the 20 biggest legal stars on Twitter, calling his feed a treasure trove of law firm gossip, employment trends, and law student news.

Leadership and Editors

Lat served as managing editor of Above the Law for more than a decade before stepping down in 2017. He was succeeded by Elie Mystal, who had joined the site in 2008 after winning a reader-judged contest to select a new editor. Mystal, a graduate of Harvard University and Harvard Law School who had been a litigator at Debevoise & Plimpton, left Above the Law in 2020 to become justice correspondent at the Nation. Lat left the site in May 2019 to become a managing director of the legal recruiting firm Lateral Link, and later launched the Original Jurisdiction newsletter. The current editors of Above the Law are Staci Zaretsky, Joe Patrice, and Kathryn Rubino, joined by columnists from across the legal landscape. Technology journalist Kashmir Hill, now at the New York Times, began her journalism career at Above the Law.

Coverage, Style, Columns, and Features

Above the Law covers associate compensation and bonuses, lateral moves, law firm financial performance, judicial news, Supreme Court developments, law school rankings and scandals, and legal technology. Its tone mixes serious industry reporting with gossip-column irreverence, reader tips, and reader-driven features such as the "ATL Lawyer of the Year." The Washington Post called the blog a must-read legal blog in 2007, and the ABA Journal listed it among the 100 best websites by lawyers, for lawyers, in 2008. The blog reached the benchmark of one million monthly visitors in June 2013. Beyond its news coverage, the site publishes columns by practicing lawyers and legal commentators, career advice, technology reviews, and features such as The Jabot, a column on women in the legal profession named for the decorative collars worn by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. The site's comment sections have historically been among the most active and freewheeling forums for anonymous lawyer discussion on the internet.

Controversies

The site's provocative style has drawn controversy. In 2011, Above the Law was sued for $50 million over an erroneous story about a rape to which one of its articles linked; the suit was ultimately settled out of court. In 2016, the site received criticism when Mystal wrote an article suggesting jury nullification as a form of protest. The site's willingness to name names and publish unflattering items about powerful firms and individuals has been both its signature and a source of friction with the institutions it covers.

The Trump Era and National Attention

In 2020, Above the Law was the subject of a detailed New York Times article by Elizabeth Williamson. The Times reported that, beginning in March 2025, as Donald Trump began targeting for retribution top law firms whose clients and past work he disfavored, Above the Law had become what the article described as essential reading for lawyers incensed at the firms that accommodated him. The episode reflected the site's evolution from an industry gossip blog into a nationally noticed publication whose reporting on law-firm politics reaches well beyond the legal profession.

Reader Culture and Influence

Above the Law's comment sections and tip lines have given it an outsized role in the internal life of the legal profession. The site's anonymous commenters — many of them lawyers and law students — use it as a forum to discuss compensation, working conditions, and the reputations of firms and judges with a candor rarely found in the profession's official channels. Law firms themselves monitor the site closely, and its reporting on associate bonuses and lateral moves has at times pressured firms to match competitors' compensation or respond publicly to criticism. The site's annual features, reader surveys, and rankings have become rituals of the legal calendar. For many young lawyers, Above the Law functions as a trade publication, a gossip column, and a professional community all at once.

The Lat Legacy

David Lat's career arc mirrors the evolution of legal blogging itself. After founding Underneath Their Robes as an anonymous blogger and then revealing his identity in the New Yorker, he built Above the Law into the leading legal-industry publication of its era. His 2014 novel Supreme Ambitions, published by the American Bar Association's Ankerwycke imprint, drew on his insider knowledge of judicial chambers and became what the New York Times called the most buzzed-about legal novel of its year. After leaving Above the Law in 2019, Lat moved into legal recruiting as a managing director of Lateral Link before returning to full-time writing with his Original Jurisdiction newsletter in 2021, which he monetizes through paid subscriptions and sponsorships and which is accompanied by a podcast of the same name launched in 2022. His trajectory from anonymous blogger to newsletter entrepreneur charts the broader shift in digital media from ad-supported blogs to subscription-based independent publishing.

Official Website

Above the Law's official website is abovethelaw.com, where readers can find its daily coverage of law firms, the legal profession, law schools, and the courts.