Jeanine Pirro, once a top-rated Fox News personality and now the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, has become the subject of intense scrutiny following the public release of internal Fox News communications. The legal documents, made available in August 2025 as part of a defamation lawsuit brought by voting technology company Smartmatic, reveal a trove of candid opinions from Fox News executives about Pirro’s conduct and character—opinions that were, until recently, kept behind closed doors.
According to NPR and Beritaja, senior Fox News figures described Pirro as "insane," a "reckless maniac," and someone with a "tendency to find random conspiracy theories on weird internet sites." One executive confessed, "I don't trust her to be responsible," while another called her public statements "insane." These damning assessments were not idle gossip but rather circulated among Fox’s leadership at a time when Pirro’s on-air persona was at its most bombastic—marked by her fervent support for Donald Trump and her willingness to amplify his unfounded claims of election fraud following the 2020 presidential election.
Pirro’s rise to her current post was itself emblematic of the Trump era’s blurred lines between media and politics. Before her appointment as U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, Pirro had been a prosecutor, judge, and political hopeful, even briefly mounting a campaign against then-Senator Hillary Clinton in 2006 before switching to an unsuccessful run for New York attorney general. Nearly two decades later, she returned to law enforcement with a national spotlight and a controversial reputation.
As U.S. attorney, Pirro’s approach has been anything but understated. She has made headlines for announcing high-profile indictments, such as the case against a Haitian gang leader and the takedown of a fentanyl and PCP drug-trafficking crew in Washington, D.C., in late August 2025. She has also drawn attention to the city’s rising homicide rate, which reached triple digits this year. In her trademark style, Pirro directed prosecutors to pursue the most serious charges available against those arrested during these operations.
Yet, not all of Pirro’s courtroom efforts have borne fruit. Judges have pushed back against what they call "illegally obtained or flimsy evidence" presented by her office. A federal grand jury refused to indict a man who tossed a sandwich at a Customs and Border Protection officer—a case that Pirro had loudly branded as felony assault. ("He thought it was funny. Well, he doesn’t think it’s funny today because we charged him with a felony assault on a police officer, and we’re going to back the police to the hilt. So, there—stick your subway sandwich somewhere else," Pirro declared into her office camera, according to NPR.) Ultimately, the grand jury did not agree, handing Pirro her second defeat in indicting D.C. residents protesting the Trump administration’s deployment of federal agents on local streets.
Another grand jury declined three times to indict a woman accused of assaulting an FBI agent, and most recently, a federal grand jury in D.C. declined to indict a woman accused by Pirro’s office of making threats against Trump. These setbacks have raised questions about Pirro’s prosecutorial judgment and the durability of her charges.
Pirro’s aggressive tactics and her penchant for dramatic statements have not gone unnoticed by her former colleagues in the media world. The Smartmatic lawsuit, which names Pirro as a defendant, has unearthed a series of internal Fox News communications that paint a picture of deep unease among network executives regarding her conduct. On November 6, 2020, as Pirro prepared for her Saturday night show, Fox News’ senior vice president for weekend programming, David Clark, texted a colleague: "Bottom line, I don't trust her to be responsible tomorrow. Her guests are all going to say the election is being stolen and if she pushes back at all it will just be a token." The result? Fox preempted her show, officially citing election coverage, but the real reason, as revealed in court documents, was fear of further amplifying baseless claims about election fraud.
Fox News had previously taken Pirro off the air in 2019 after she attacked U.S. Representative Ilhan Omar for wearing a hijab, suggesting the Muslim congresswoman was not committed to constitutional law. This time, Pirro privately complained to Fox star Sean Hannity of censorship, while conservative news outlets reported that she had been silenced for supporting Trump. Internal exchanges reproduced in court filings show that executives were deeply dismayed by her continued promotion of conspiracy theories.
Despite these internal misgivings, Fox promoted Pirro in 2022 to full-time co-host of The Five, usually the network’s highest-rated show, where she stayed until Trump tapped her for the top federal law enforcement post in the nation’s capital. Lachlan Murdoch, Fox Corp.’s executive chairman and CEO, has told investors that the network will fare better in court against Smartmatic than it did in its 2023 settlement with Dominion Voting Systems, which cost Fox $787.5 million.
Pirro’s on-air advocacy for Trump was relentless. On November 21, 2020, she told her viewers, "The president's lawyers [are] alleging a company called Dominion, which they say started in Venezuela with Cuban money, and with the help of Smartmatic software, a back door could flip votes." These claims, later proven unfounded, were nonetheless broadcast to millions. Pirro insisted, "The president's lawyers offered evidence by way of affidavits, which I told you last Saturday as a judge, from a legal perspective, are sworn statements of individuals signed under penalty of perjury, meaning they know they face the penalty of prosecution and five years if they lie." Under oath in a later deposition, Pirro admitted she did not know the identity of the person making the declaration, as it had been withheld from the public.
As the Smartmatic lawsuit has unfolded, Fox News has argued that its journalists did not know the allegations were false and that reporting on the president’s claims was a protected journalistic activity under the First Amendment. Smartmatic, for its part, maintains that Fox’s actions were reckless and damaging, and that the network’s internal communications show executives privately agreed Trump had lost the election even as they aired contrary claims.
In the wake of these revelations, former Trump Justice Department official Sarah Isgur commented on September 4, 2025, "At some point in the near future, she's going to be really tested—like all U.S. attorneys with these kinds of big posts are. And we'll find out whether those comments were prescient or whether she really does understand the difference between the two hats." Defense attorneys for Sidney Lori Reid, whom Pirro tried to prosecute for allegedly interfering with ICE agents, said they are eager to present the misdemeanor case to a jury and "quickly clear Ms. Reid’s name."
Pirro herself has declined to comment on the controversy, and her Justice Department spokesperson—who previously worked as a Fox News producer on her show—did not respond to written requests for comment, according to Beritaja.
The collision of media spectacle and prosecutorial power embodied by Jeanine Pirro’s career continues to spark debate. As the Smartmatic case moves forward and Pirro’s tenure as U.S. attorney unfolds, all eyes remain fixed on whether her approach will withstand the scrutiny of the courts—and the court of public opinion.
