On a brisk September weekend in Washington, D.C., President Donald Trump shattered longstanding norms by openly directing the Department of Justice (DOJ) to pursue criminal investigations against some of his most prominent political adversaries. The president’s social media post—issued on Truth Social just hours after the top federal prosecutor in northern Virginia resigned under pressure—sent shockwaves through the DOJ and deepened a sense of unease among career attorneys, political observers, and lawmakers across the country.
"We can't delay any longer, it's killing our reputation and credibility," Trump wrote, demanding that criminal investigations be launched against former FBI Director Jim Comey, New York Attorney General Letitia James, and California Senator Adam Schiff. According to NPR, this message wasn’t just another rhetorical flourish. It was a direct order, and it landed with a thud among government lawyers already on edge.
The president’s public call for retribution came after Erik Siebert, the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, resigned rather than pursue charges against Letitia James as Trump reportedly demanded. Siebert’s departure was soon followed by the swearing-in of Lindsey Halligan, a former special assistant to the president with no prosecutorial experience, to fill the powerful role. Halligan’s most recent assignment had been assisting Trump in removing what he described as "improper ideology" from the Smithsonian museums—a far cry from the courtroom battles that now await her.
Attorney General Pam Bondi, Trump’s hand-picked top law enforcement official, had set the tone on her first day in office by issuing a memo declaring that DOJ lawyers were, in effect, the president’s lawyers. This shift, as reported by NPR and NOTUS, has raised grave concerns about the erosion of the rule of law and the department’s historic independence from the White House. Stacey Young, a former DOJ attorney now leading the advocacy group Justice Connection, told NPR, "This attorney general sent a memo on Day 1 that made it clear that Justice Department lawyers were the president's lawyers, and we are now seeing how that's playing out and how dangerous it is — how it disintegrates the rule of law."
The effect on morale has been dramatic and immediate. Thousands of DOJ employees have left the department in 2025, either dismissed or forced to resign, including nearly the entire public integrity unit and three out of every four lawyers in the civil rights division. The exodus, Young said, is driven by fear: "If the president is willing to fire a prosecutor for not pursuing his enemies, anybody at the department could get fired."
For many seasoned observers, the events unfolding at the DOJ feel unprecedented—even in a country with a long history of political battles. According to George Washington University law professor Stephen Saltzburg, "In this situation you have a president who is openly, brazenly bragging about his ability to seek retribution against his political enemies." Saltzburg added that the White House appears to be pressuring career prosecutors not only to target Trump’s critics but also to drop investigations or pardon allies, including those connected to the January 6 Capitol riot.
Harvard law professor Jack Goldsmith, writing in his newsletter Executive Functions, argued that the ethical obligations of DOJ attorneys are now being put to the test: "The Article II truism about presidential power cannot justify continued service to a president and administration openly indifferent to law. That is an issue of personal and professional ethics and integrity."
Judicial skepticism toward the administration’s prosecutorial demands is also mounting. In recent weeks, federal grand juries in Washington, D.C., have refused to indict in politically charged cases, and magistrate judges have denied requests for search warrants. This, as NPR notes, is a significant departure from the past, when the bar for proving selective or vindictive prosecution was set extremely high. Saltzburg observed, "I think the president's announcement of what he wants the Justice Department to do is so out of line with our history of promoting equal justice under law and fairness that I don't think that any federal judge is going to look at this and be happy about what the president is doing."
Democratic lawmakers have been quick to condemn Trump’s actions as a dangerous misuse of federal power. Rep. Jerry Nadler told NOTUS, "Trump is turning the Justice Department into his personal weapon, not fighting for justice, being impartial, or making decisions based on facts and the law but purely targeting his perceived enemies." Rep. Jason Crow, a former impeachment manager, said, "Donald Trump is attempting to use this moment to seize power and go after his political opponents." Senator Adam Schiff, himself named by Trump as a target, told MSNBC, "The president wants to send a message that anyone who stands up to him on anything, anyone who has the audacity to call out his corruption will be a target, and they will go after you. It’s an effort to try to silence and intimidate people, but I refuse to be silenced or intimidated."
Senator Chris Murphy, speaking to ABC News, framed the situation in stark terms: "There are two standards of justice now in this country. If you are a friend of the president, a loyalist to the president, you can get away with literally anything... But if you are an opponent of the president, you may find yourself in jail. Again, that is Cuba. That’s Iran. That’s Russia. That is not the United States."
The White House, for its part, has doubled down on the president’s approach. Press secretary Karoline Leavitt insisted, "The president is fulfilling his promise to restore a Department of Justice that demands accountability, and it is not weaponizing the Department of Justice to demand accountability for those who weaponize the Department of Justice." Leavitt also told reporters, "The president has every right to express how he feels about these people who literally campaigned on trying to put him in jail, who literally tried to ruin his life and ruin his business. And he wants to see accountability for those who abuse their office and about their power, and Letitia James did that, whether you want to admit it or not."
Meanwhile, Democrats are taking steps to protect themselves from what they see as politically motivated prosecutions. Some have secured liability insurance and established legal defense funds, bracing for what they fear could be a wave of legal reprisals. Rep. Robert Garcia told NOTUS, "We have to be clear that Donald Trump’s going to do whatever he can to go after people that he disagrees with. I think people have to be prepared that he’s going to do anything and everything to go after folks, and we have to be prepared and understand that that’s also part of the job at this moment."
There is also growing scrutiny of the DOJ’s treatment of Trump’s allies. Reports from MSNBC and NOTUS indicate that the department has dropped investigations into figures like border czar Tom Homan, who was allegedly caught accepting a $50,000 bribe, while aggressively pursuing cases against Democrats. Senator Schiff commented, "You have both the dismissal of charges against the president’s allies like Eric Adams, the dismissal of investigations against Tom Homan and pressure to bring meritless investigations against the president’s enemies."
The backdrop to all of this is a Supreme Court decision from the previous year, which granted a former president immunity from criminal prosecution for official acts. This precedent, as House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries told CNN, "basically gave this president blanket presidential immunity in a country where the framers of the Constitution said, ‘We don’t want a king.’ But they’ve effectively enabled Donald Trump at times to behave just like a king."
As the Justice Department’s independence hangs in the balance and the nation’s legal and political systems are tested as never before, the coming months promise to be a defining chapter in the story of American democracy.
