As Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison ushers in a new leadership era for the first time in nearly two decades, the reality is that the firm’s former leader, Brad Karp, is still a full-time litigator at the firm, with clients who give significant business to the firm. Karp remains a busy partner after stepping down from the chair role amid mounting pressure from his disclosed emails with sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Paul Weiss named corporate leader Scott Barshay as Karp’s successor. Karp, unlike most firm chairs in this day and age, has kept a full client roster in his litigation practice during his tenure. Many of those clients, such as Apollo Global, the NFL and Citi, are longtime clients with a strong relationship with Karp, not just the firm itself. In Big Law, as with most industries, the ideal scenario is about pleasing the client and keeping business, and Law.com interviews with some of Karp’s clients indicate they want him to stay on their matters. Jerry Speyer of real estate giant Tishman Speyer said he “would work with Brad as long as he is practicing law.” “Brad is one of the smartest people I have met in my life,” Speyer said in an interview. “He is a terrific attorney, and that is why I work with him. We have dozens of brilliant lawyers in New York to say nothing of the U.S., and when I think of Brad, I think of him as one of those at the very top of the heap. I think of him as a great professional and a man of great integrity.” Marc Rowan, CEO of Apollo Global Management and a longtime client of Karp, said he brings a unique set of skills to the table that his firm appreciates and that a change was not likely. “He (Karp) is one of the few people in the legal community who is capable of bringing together not only the law, but politics, geopolitics and business," Rowan said. It’s unclear whether Karp will face any long-term backlash from clients over his emails with Epstein. But now that Karp is no longer in the chair role, pressure on him, and the firm, has partly subsided. Sources who know Karp say he has stayed busy in the office since stepping down as chair. “He’s practicing full time. Still has his office and goes in every day,” said one source familiar with Karp. Whether an outgoing chair can reasonably expect to jump back into an individual contributor role is dependent upon whether that chair did in fact keep a practice while serving, said Keith Wetmore, former chair of Morrison & Foerster and current managing director of partner recruitment at Major, Lindsey & Africa. When Karp was serving as chair, he was still going to client meetings and conferences, although some new client matters may have slowed down. An analysis of federal court filings revealed that Karp had one new representation in 2024 and 2025 each, following an eight-year span in which he was involved in an average of just under 11 new matters each year—although many of these were related representations on behalf of a smaller set of defendants. “There has been a modern trend of people evolving away from their practice (when they take the chair role),” Wetmore added. “If you give it up, clients have most likely moved on, either internally or externally. Your partners may think of you fondly, but they may not be so fond as to hand billing responsibly over to clients they have spent a lot of time developing.” However, the fact that more than two-thirds of Paul Weiss lawyers are in New York helped Karp maintain his practice while running the firm. In contrast, when lawyers are more spread out among firm offices, firm leaders need to spend more time traveling and less time on their practice. “When (most) of your lawyers are in one place (such as New York), it is possible to do the job with only super-human effort,” Wetmore quipped. Back to Full-Time Practice David Lat, attorney and journalist formerly of Above the Law and who now writes the legal industry Substack “Original Jurisdiction" column, said we are already starting to see how Karp’s clients will react. “I think a lot of clients who know and like Brad will continue to work with him,” Lat said in an interview on Law.com Legal Speak, noting that Robert Kraft, a longtime client of Karp and the billionaire owner of the New England Patriots, hosted Karp in his owner’s box at the Super Bowl. “And this was after all of this (Epstein’s emails) had come to light.” Both Wetmore and Lat said that Karp’s return to litigation might be a business-friendly development for Paul Weiss. “They (former chairs) are clearly good lawyers,” Wetmore said. “And clients are delighted to have their undivided attention.” Lat had a similar assessment when asked whether Karp would likely be handling prominent cases for his clients, such as the Brian Flores suit against the NFL that was allowed to move to litigation earlier this month. “In some ways, Brad may be able to take an even larger role on cases of this nature,” Lat said. “When you are running a global law firm, it can be hard to participate in a trial or an arbitration because it requires a kind of undivided focus that many managing partners and chairs don't have. And now that he's freed from the duties of chair, he may be able to be more intensely focused on high-profile active matters." Firm Leadership Many questions still remain over Karp and Barshay's new roles. For one, there's market uncertainty over whether Barshay will remain firm chair in the longterm, noted one industry observer. And whether Karp, 66, will want to stay at Paul Weiss is another matter. Paul Weiss’ mandatory retirement age for partners has been 70. Wetmore said that there have been examples of revered chairs moving back into practice, though the list isn’t super long. He mentioned Rodge Cohen at Sullivan & Cromwell, who led Sullivan & Cromwell between 2000 and 2009 and who still practices at the firm, as well as a more recent example in Michael Gerstenzang, who led Cleary, Gottlieb, Steen & Hamilton from 2017 through the beginning of this year. While Karp is something of an anomaly in maintaining a full book of business, Wetmore pointed to several examples of former firm leaders who went back into practice only to decide a short time later it wasn’t for them. “Most long-termers make an exit within a year,” he said, noting the exits Bob Dell at Latham & Watkins, Peter Kalis at K&L Gates, and Ralph Baxter at Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe. Wetmore said that the former leader doesn’t want to be seen as “someone people who are unhappy with new leadership to go to.” He also said that once the tide turns, it is best for the former leader to cede the ground. “That is part of the reason I advocate against long overlaps on leadership transitions,” he said. “The outgoing chair tends to think they need to impart all the knowledge they have gained to the next person. Truth be told, once the new person’s name is up in lights, it is all about the new person.” Karp, Barshay and a Paul Weiss representative did not return messages seeking comment. Dan Packel contributed to this report.