(Reuters) - Paul Clement, a Kirkland & Ellis partner who served as U.S. Solicitor General under Republican former President George W. Bush, is representing Marc Elias as the famed Democrat lawyer fights sanctions, records show.

Clement was listed as the counsel of record for Elias in a Thursday-filed motion urging the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to reconsider its decision to sanction Elias and other Perkins Coie attorneys for lack of candor. The team had filed a supplemental motion in February that was nearly identical to one filed in September that was denied, without disclosing the previous denial.

The team's decision was "not intended to conceal the denial of the initial motion to supplement the record, but reflected goodfaith misunderstandings about the full impact of the earlier denial and the proper vehicle for allowing the merits panel to address the supplementation issue," Clement's filing said.

He added that rules governing those questions were unclear and courts "generally reserve sanctions for egregious misconduct and the disregard of clearly established rules" rather than "good-faith mistakes."

"As a result, if the Sanctions Order stands, it will have (and, indeed, already has had) outsized collateral consequences on each of the affected attorneys," the filing said.

Clement did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Nor did Elias, who became a hero of sorts to Democrats in 2020 as he battled a flurry of lawsuits filed across the United States by Republicans seeking to overturn the results of the presidential election.

Representatives for Perkins Coie and the 5th Circuit, which oversees courts in Texas, Mississippi and Louisiana, declined to comment.

The sanctions stem from a case over straight-ticket voting in Texas, in which Elias and team represent Democrats in favor of the practice against the state's top election official.

Circuit Judges Edith Brown Clement, Jennifer Walker Elrod and Catharina Haynes sanctioned Elias and several other Perkins Coie lawyers on the case earlier this month, saying in an order that the "inexplicable failure to disclose the earlier denial of their motion violated their duty of candor to the court."

The judges ordered Elias and team to pay attorneys' fees and court costs incurred by their opponents over the "duplicative" motion and any related response and also to pay "double costs." They also recommended the team review rules on candor with the court.

The case is Texas Alliance for Retired Americans v. Hughs in the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals No. 20-40643.