President Donald Trump’s long association with deceased sex offender Jeffrey Epstein is a well-documented matter of public record. Less publicly acknowledged, however, are uncorroborated allegations that Trump sexually abused a minor while in Epstein’s orbit, particularly after “more than 50 pages of FBI interviews, as well as notes from conversations,” with a woman who accused Trump of assault “decades ago when she was a minor” were found missing from the Justice Department’s legally mandated Epstein files release, said NPR. As lawmakers work to identify what was redacted and why, the furor over Trump’s Epstein associations seems unlikely to die down anytime soon.

‘Covering up direct evidence’

At the center of the growing scandal are allegations from an unidentified woman who claimed she was forced into a sexual encounter with Trump by Epstein “around 1983, when she was around 13 years old,” said NPR. Congressional investigators determined the tranche of missing documents by “matching public files with case files listed in the evidence manifest” made available to Epstein co-conspirator Ghislaine Maxwell’s legal team, said Politico.

The focus on the missing documents is “misleading the public,” said the Justice Department on X. Democrats are merely “manufacturing outrage” culled from their “radical anti-Trump base,” even though “NOTHING has been deleted.” Just one day later, however, the DOJ said on X that “as with all documents that have been flagged by the public,” it is “currently reviewing files” alleged to have been withheld, and items deemed improperly redacted “will of course” be published.

While it’s “unclear” why the materials were missing in the first place, their absence “deepens questions” about how the Justice Department has “handled” the legally mandated Epstein file releases, said The New York Times. The law directing the publication of Epstein documents allows redactions to protect victims, as well as for depictions of physical and sexual violence, and in instances where it could affect active investigations, but “expressly prohibited” officials from blocking publication “on the basis of embarrassment, reputational harm or political sensitivity to public figures.”

Democrats plan to “open a parallel investigation” into the allegations against Trump and any DOJ redactions thereof, said House Oversight Committee Ranking Member Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Calif.) in a statement. The Justice Department appears to be “covering up direct evidence of a potential assault by the president of the United States.”

Garcia’s Republican counterpart, Committee Chair James Comer (R-Ky.), signaled openness to pursue the matter further. “We know what the administration says,” said Comer to reporters on Thursday. “We are still looking to get a definitive answer on that.”

‘Gaslighting the entire country’

“So far,” Trump has personally “evaded the crosshairs of credible allegations in the Epstein files” in part thanks to “false statements, misdirection, public confusion and excessive redactions from his own DOJ,” said journalist Roger Sollenberger, one of the first reporters to identify the missing material, on Substack. But the allegations allegedly described in the absent documents “contradict the narrative” that Trump has “not been credibly accused of wrongdoing in the Epstein saga.”

While “many documents” have been removed and then re-added to the DOJ’s Epstein trove since their initial release, some Epstein victims say they’ve “scoured the DOJ’s website” for their own interview documents, “only to come up empty-handed,” said CNN. Given the heavy redactions and missing documentation from the government, the implication, said Epstein victim Jess Michaels to the network, is that “this Department of Justice is actually gaslighting the entire country.”

The Trump administration has spent a considerable amount of time and effort actively pursuing an array of the president's purported “enemies,” frequently targeting Democratic notables with histories of clashing with this White House. While the bulk of these actions have come in the form of bombastic Justice Department proclamations and hastily pursued prosecutions, many have failed to gain serious traction, since judges and juries have rejected efforts to criminally convict the president’s political adversaries. As the DOJ stumbles in its pushes for punishment, some Democrats have begun to embrace the attention, leveraging the missteps for their own political purposes.

What did the commentators say?

Democrats notched a “significant legal win” after the Justice Department failed to secure criminal charges against six lawmakers, including Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.), who recorded a video reminding military members of their obligation to reject illegal orders, said Politico. Now those six are “looking to gain political momentum” and “build their campaign war chests” after the experience. Given the “attention-driven political economy” in which Washington now operates, President Donald Trump’s attacks have become a “valuable boost” to Democrats, including some with an “eye toward future leadership positions in the party.”

“Sitting down and taking it and being quiet doesn’t actually make you safer,” said Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.), one of the Democrats targeted over the video, to Roll Call. “Going on offense” seems the “only way to get their attention.” Trump officials who think they’re “going to intimidate us and threaten and bully me into silence, and they’re going to go after political opponents and get us to back down,” have “another thing coming,” Rep. Jason Crow (D-Colo.), who also appeared in the video, said to Punchbowl News. “The tide is turning.”

There has always been a risk that Trump’s “politicized prosecutions will backfire,” both by “empowering the political martyrs they create” and by “exposing their own corruption,” said Emptywheel. A new suite of legal motions from Rep. LaMonica McIver (D-N.J.), charged late last year by the DOJ for allegedly assaulting a federal immigration official during her effort to conduct an oversight visit at a Newark detention facility, suggests such a backfiring “may soon happen.”

The dynamic of Democrats facing overt hostility from Trump’s Justice Department and then seeking to capitalize on it was on display this week during Attorney General Pam Bondi’s testimony to the House Judiciary Committee. Bondi’s “hostile performance” in many ways “played directly into Democrats’ hands,” Politico said. Democrats and “even some Republicans” believe “privately” that Bondi’s appearance will “probably help the Democrats during the fall midterm elections,” said Salon.

What next?

Beyond raising profiles and elevating potential political martyrs, Trump’s attacks on Democrats “often serve as their best fundraising tool,” said Politico. Oftentimes, Democrats’ “largest online fundraising spikes” occurred after a party member “stood up to or was attacked by Trump.” The public, meanwhile, seems to exhibit a “bit more skepticism” about Trump’s retributive prosecutions “than they ever did” the president’s own indictments, said CNN.

Americans believe by a 55%-45% margin that the indictments against Trump had been warranted, while a 58%-42% margin said the “charges against Trump’s foes were not justified,” according to a November Marquette Law School poll. The poll was conducted during the administration’s effort to indict former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James, said CNN.

The White House’s “attempt to strong-arm” Kelly “into silence” with lawsuits and threats of military demotions has prompted the former astronaut and fighter pilot to respond in ways that “looked and sounded downright presidential,” said The Boston Globe. Still, if Kelly has presidential aspirations, he is “unlikely to announce them anytime soon.”

Meanwhile, lawmakers who appeared alongside Kelly have been slightly more forthcoming about their futures. Four House Democrats, including Crow, have “hinted” at plans for a “case of their own” after escaping indictment this week, said Fox News. “We are taking names,” said Crow. “We are creating lists.” His legal team has reached out to the Justice Department, “putting them on notice that there will be costs.”

What happened

Federal prosecutors in Washington, D.C., Tuesday tried and failed to secure indictments against six Democratic lawmakers who appeared in a video reminding military service members they can refuse to obey “illegal orders,” according to several news organizations.

A grand jury’s rejection of charges against Sens. Mark Kelly (Ariz.) and Elissa Slotkin (Mich.) and four House Democrats “marked the latest setback for the Trump-era Justice Department in its bids to prosecute the president’s perceived enemies,” The Wall Street Journal said.

Who said what

It was “remarkable” that U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro “authorized prosecutors to go into a grand jury and ask for an indictment of the six members of Congress,” The New York Times said. “But it was even more remarkable that a group of ordinary citizens” on the grand jury “forcefully rejected” President Donald Trump’s “bid to label their expression of dissent as a criminal act warranting prosecution.”

“Grand jury rejections are extraordinarily unusual,” The Associated Press said, but they have “happened repeatedly in recent months” as citizens presented with “the government’s evidence have come away underwhelmed.” This “latest extraordinary brushback” was especially notable, Politico said, because Trump “repeatedly posted that Kelly and his colleagues had committed sedition,” a crime punishable by death.

Trying to file criminal charges “because of something I said that they didn’t like” is an “outrageous abuse of power by Donald Trump and his lackeys,” Kelly said on X. “That’s not the way things work in America.” Having a “grand jury of anonymous American citizens” reject their charges was “embarrassing” for the Trump administration but also marked “another sad day for our country,” Slotkin said. “Hopefully, this ends this politicized investigation for good.”

What next?

Pirro’s office “could try again to present the cases to grand jurors,” The Washington Post said. “But even if they secure indictments, the cases could face obstacles in court.” This Justice Department has “brought questionable criminal cases” against Trump’s perceived foes “time and again,” the Times said. But “even though many of these cases have been weak,” the DOJ “apparently determined that it may be better to fail in court” than push back against Trump’s “well-known desire for revenge.”

What happened

Lawmakers who viewed the unredacted Jeffrey Epstein files at the Justice Department Monday said the Trump department blacked out the names of several people who should have been identified under the Epstein Transparency Act. Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.), a driving force behind the law, said he and Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) had so far uncovered “at least six men that have been redacted that are likely incriminated by their inclusion in these files.”

Who said what

“It wasn’t just Epstein” and Ghislaine Maxwell involved in sexually abusing underage girls, said Khanna. Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, agreed. “There’s no way you run a billion-dollar international child sex trafficking ring with just two people committing crimes,” he said. The Justice Department “has been in a cover-up mode for many months and has been trying to sweep the entire thing under the rug.”

Members of Congress can make appointments to view the unredacted Epstein files through Friday, with no aides or phones present. A few hours doing so Monday revealed “lots of people” who “were redacted for mysterious or baffling or inscrutable reasons,” Raskin told reporters, per The Guardian. Meanwhile, the DOJ’s failure to shield the survivors is “either spectacular incompetence and sloppiness” or a “deliberate threat to other survivors who are thinking about coming forward.”

What next?

Lawmakers did not name new names, but Massie told reporters that one of the six men was “pretty high up in a foreign government” and Khanna said another was a “pretty prominent individual.” Massie said he would “give the DOJ a chance to say they made a mistake” and “let them un-redact those men’s names,” but if they did not, he might name all six in a speech on the House floor, where speakers are protected from criminal or civil liability.

What happened

The Justice Department has reportedly demoted conservative activist Ed Martin from his role as President Donald Trump’s “weaponization czar,” leading a working group to investigate and punish alleged cases of prosecutorial overreach against Trump and his allies. Martin will remain the DOJ’s pardon attorney but “lost his title as an assistant attorney general” and is being relocated to a different office, “pulling him away” from the “most powerful figures” in the Justice Department, The Washington Post reported Monday.

Who said what

Martin played an “important role in the largely unsuccessful prosecutions of Trump’s political foes,” including New York Attorney General Letitia James and former FBI Director James Comey, said the Post. But he has “at times clashed” with Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche “over his lack of productivity on the working group and his controversial social media posts,” said CBS News. “For his part, Martin felt Justice Department leaders had marginalized him,” The Wall Street Journal said.

Martin “continues to do a great job” as pardon attorney, a Justice Department spokesperson said Monday, declining to comment on the reported demotion. People close to Martin said they believed “Blanche’s move to marginalize him was intended to prompt his resignation,” The New York Times said, and Martin has “told people in his orbit that he is considering leaving, possibly for an as-yet-undetermined position in the White House.”

What next?

It was “not clear what purpose the task force” will have with Martin “out of the picture,” the Times said. But his demotion does not “signal a pullback from the department’s campaign to investigate, humiliate and punish targets singled out” by Trump, “whose thirst to seek revenge against his perceived political enemies remains unslaked after a year in office.”

What happened

President Donald Trump Thursday sued the Internal Revenue Service and Treasury Department, seeking at least $10 billion for “reputational and financial harm” from leaks of his tax information between 2018 and 2020. The lawsuit was filed in federal court in Miami. Charles Littlejohn, a government contractor, was sentenced to five years in prison in 2024 after admitting to leaking tax information from Trump and other wealthy Americans to The New York Times and ProPublica.

Who said what

This is Trump’s third “claim for a large amount of money against the government he oversees,” The Washington Post said, once again putting him “on both sides of the potential negotiating table.” Trump previously “demanded that the Justice Department pay him about $230 million” for two “federal investigations into him, a request that had no parallel in American history,” The New York Times said.

The IRS case “promises to be unusual, controversial and full of ethical conflicts given Trump’s multiple, intertwined roles,” The Wall Street Journal said. “Although he filed the lawsuit in his personal capacity,” he “can fire the people” who would ultimately “formulate legal positions against the president and weigh possible settlement offers with him.” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who is also currently acting IRS commissioner, earlier this week canceled a $21 million contract with Littlejohn’s former employer Booz Allen Hamilton, citing the leak.

What next?

Since the law allows people to sue for damages “only if U.S. employees are at fault,” one “key question” in Trump’s suit “will be whether Littlejohn was an IRS employee or not,” the Journal said. “Another question will be whether the lawsuit is too late,” given the two-year window to sue. The “likely outcome,” the Post said, is a “settlement with a Justice Department that Trump has publicly said works for him.”

What happened

A federal judge in Oregon on Monday rejected a Trump administration lawsuit seeking to compel the state to turn over its unredacted voter files. U.S. District Judge Mustafa Kasubhai dismissed the case after a hearing on “the basis and the purpose” of the Justice Department’s voter data demands in light of a letter from Attorney General Pam Bondi to Minnesota on Saturday linking its voter rolls to bringing “back law and order” and “an end to the chaos in Minnesota.” State officials called the letter, sent to Gov. Tim Walz (D) shortly after Border Patrol agents shot dead Alex Pretti, a “shakedown” and a “ransom note.”

Who said what

The Justice Department sued at least 23 states, including Oregon and Minnesota, last year after they refused to turn over detailed voter data including birth dates, driver’s license numbers and partial Social Security numbers. Earlier this month, a federal judge in Georgia dismissed one such suit on procedural grounds, while a federal judge in California threw out the request as “unprecedented and illegal.”

Almost every state has a “public version of its voter roll,” but traditionally, no one can obtain the “complete, unredacted” version, “not even the Justice Department,” The New York Times said. The Trump administration’s “highly unusual” effort raised alarms “because the Constitution dictates that elections are run mainly by individual states, not the administration in Washington,” and because the effort was “led by Trump allies who long falsely claimed” he won the 2020 election, “raising concerns that the data could be used to cast doubt on future election results.”

What next?

Kasubhai said he had “great concerns” about the administration’s motives regarding raw voter data but was denying its petition because the Justice Department had failed to state an adequate legal rationale.

What happened

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell on Sunday night disclosed that the Justice Department was “threatening a criminal indictment” against him over testimony he gave to the Senate last summer about an over-budget renovation of the Federal Reserve’s headquarters. Powell called the “unprecedented” criminal investigation part of President Donald Trump’s “threats and ongoing pressure” on him to slash interest rates, and many analysts agreed. Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) said he would use his vote on the Banking Committee to oppose any Trump nominees to the central bank until “this legal matter is fully resolved.”

Who said what

“The threat of criminal charges is a consequence of the Federal Reserve setting interest rates based on our best assessment of what will serve the public, rather than following the preferences of the president,” Powell said in a video message. His statement was “notable for its forceful pushback after years of generally avoiding commenting at all on Trump’s repeated attacks on the central bank,” The Washington Post said.

The White House “began highlighting cost overruns” in the Fed renovations “last summer after Trump grew unhappy that Powell wasn’t moving faster to cut interest rates,” The Wall Street Journal said. The “brouhaha” over costs “appeared to be an effort to erode the public’s trust in Powell, build a legal case to force him out, or both.” White House budget director Russell Vought — whose Project 2025 governing blueprint called for “effectively abolishing” the Fed — flagged Powell’s testimony for investigation in July, CNN said.

“I don’t know anything about” the Justice Department’s actions, Trump told NBC News Sunday night, and “I wouldn’t even think of doing it that way” to pressure Powell to lower rates. This investigation removes “any remaining doubt” that Trump’s aides are “actively pushing to end the independence of the Federal Reserve,” Tillis said. “It is now the independence and credibility of the Department of Justice that are in question.”

What next?

Opposition by Tillis to Trump’s Fed picks, including a new chair when Powell’s term ends in May, “wouldn’t doom a confirmation on its own,” Semafor said. But it would leave the committee with an 11-11 split that “would require “extra steps from party leaders to break.” Trump’s unprecedented effort to fire Fed board member Lisa Cook goes before the Supreme Court for arguments Jan. 21.

What happened

The Justice Department yesterday released its second large batch of files related to sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, and unlike the tranche released over the weekend, President Donald Trump is mentioned multiple times. The latest 30,000 pages also reference “10 co-conspirators” the FBI wanted to interview in July 2019, days after Epstein’s arrest and before his death in custody. The only Epstein co-conspirator charged was Ghislaine Maxwell, now serving 20 years in federal prison. 

Who said what

In a January 2020 email, an unidentified federal prosecutor in New York said Trump had flown on Epstein’s private jet at least eight times between 1993 and 1996, “many more times than previously has been reported (or that we were aware).” Two flights carried just Trump, Epstein and two “women who would be possible witnesses in a Maxwell case,” the email said. Last year, Trump claimed on social media he “was never on Epstein’s Plane, or at his ‘stupid’ Island.” 

The newly released files also “include several tips that were collected by the FBI about Trump’s involvement with Epstein,” The Washington Post said, though it’s not clear “whether any of the tips were corroborated.” A limousine driver in Dallas reported that during one ride, “Trump continuously stated the name ‘Jeffrey’ while on the phone, and made references to ‘abusing some girl,’” the FBI said. The driver also claimed that a woman told him Trump and Epstein raped her. The Justice Department said on social media yesterday that some of the documents contain “untrue and sensationalist claims” about Trump that, if credible, would have already been “weaponized” against him.

What next?

The Epstein files release has been “marred by DOJ mishandling, and that’s continuing,” CNN said. The Justice Department sounds like Trump’s “personal lawyer,” and the documents contain “curious and heavy-handed redactions that go beyond the limits of the law.” The files “involving Epstein’s 2007 sweetheart plea deal” are so “heavily redacted,” it’s “almost impossible to understand” how he escaped federal prosecution, the Miami Herald said. 

What happened

The Justice Department released a small portion of its files on sex offender Jeffrey Epstein over the weekend, missing a legal deadline to post its entire collection by Friday. Sixteen of the documents, including a photograph with President Donald Trump, disappeared Saturday without explanation, though the Justice Department later reposted the photo along with some new documents. Many of the files were heavily redacted.

Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche Sunday defended the slow pace of release, saying government lawyers were working diligently to redact “victim information” from the “million or so pages of documents.” Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.), one of the sponsors of the Epstein Files Transparency Act, told CBS’s “Face the Nation” the administration was “flouting the spirit and letter of the law.”

Who said what

“Despite mounting expectations, the released files” were “something of an anticlimax,” The New York Times said. They “added little to the public’s understanding” of Epstein’s conduct or “his connections to wealthy and powerful businessmen and politicians who associated with him.” There were “some photos of celebrities and politicians,” including “never-before-seen photos of former President Bill Clinton,” The Associated Press said, “but fleetingly few of Trump.”

The “temporarily deleted digital image” showed “Trump before he became president posing with bikini-clad women,” The Washington Post said. The “minimal” mentions of Trump included a claim in a lawsuit that he and Epstein “both chuckled” over sexual innuendo about a 14-year-old girl in the 1990s, the BBC said. The Justice Department is “covering up things that, for whatever reason, Donald Trump doesn’t want to go public,” Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) said Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union.” The “short answer is we are not redacting information around President Trump,” Blanche told NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

What next?

Massie and Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) told “Face the Nation” they were considering filing “inherent contempt” charges against Attorney General Pam Bondi for failing to comply with the Epstein law. Khanna said he was worried more about the “selective concealment” of records than the “timeline” of their release. “Our goal is not to take down Bondi,” he said, but to find out “who raped these young girls, who covered it up and why are they getting away with it?”

There is a political storm brewing in the US over the disclosure of the Epstein files and their link to President Donald Trump.

At least 13 files, including a photo containing Trump, were removed by the Department of Justice from the latest release of documents, only to be republished after a review following concerns over victim identification.

The evidence was reinstated without any “alteration or redaction”, said the DoJ, with deputy attorney general Todd Blanche explicitly stating on NBC News that “it has nothing to do with President Trump”.

What did the commentators say?

“The documents produced no major revelations,” said The New York Times. The photos in particular underlined how Jeffrey Epstein, the late convicted sex offender, “attracted a remarkably broad spectrum of famous people into his orbit”, with Michael Jackson, Mick Jagger and Walter Cronkite appearing in the latest batch.

The redactions have caused the most controversy, said The Guardian. Blanche argued that the government “did not have time to review all the files to make redactions needed to protect victims”, with at least one victim claiming that she had been identified in the DoJ dump.

Conversely, in some areas, the redactions were “too aggressive”. For instance, a picture of Clinton, Michael Jackson and Diana Ross was also mistakenly redacted to obscure a child’s face. The child was Jackson’s son, with images “readily available” from commercial photo archives.

There is only one “unequivocal takeaway” from this latest episode, said CNN. The Trump administration’s efforts to “quell the storm have whipped up a new vortex of political energy” that could potentially harm the president.

The most recent release has exposed the “stunning revelation that there are 1,200 people identified as victims or their relatives”, with “materials from dozens of hard drives, old CDs and computers”. Though there is nothing to suggest any direct wrongdoing on Trump’s part, it fuels the “ever-deepening political storm” surrounding him.

There are “several possibilities” explaining the administration’s actions. The “sheer size” of the data could be posing “genuine issues” for officials. The department “may lack the competence” to do such a vast job “comprehensively and quickly”, following “purges of career officials by Trump’s aides”. Lastly, critics of the president “would not be surprised” if the DoJ was trying to brazenly “protect” Trump. Whatever the reason, this will cause a significant “headache” for him.

If Trump has tried to “deflect attention” away from himself, he “may have succeeded”, as the latest tranche of documents “shifted the spotlight” on to former Democrat president Bill Clinton, said the Financial Times. After eventually signing the legislation to release the files, Trump has recognised the “political benefit” of using the files to “tarnish the reputation of a prominent Democrat” and “one of his great ideological foes”.

This speaks to how the files have become a “weapon in America’s escalating ideological war”. On the left, politicians are employing the new information to “discredit” Trump, while the president and his administration are using them to “attack his adversaries”. The conflict continues, as the battles over the files “underscore the claims of Democrats and others that Trump is using the DoJ to pursue his political opponents”: a charge that Trump has “repeatedly levelled at the Biden administration”.

What next?

Representatives Ro Khanna (Democrat) and Thomas Massie (Republican) are seeking to find Attorney General Pam Bondi in contempt of Congress, for not releasing more documents related to Epstein. Both were involved in the original drafting of the Epstein Files Transparency Act, and Khanna now wants to see the “60-count federal indictment of Epstein from 2007 and the accompanying prosecution memo”, said The Washington Post.

In a statement, the justice department said that materials “will continue being reviewed and redacted” in line with legal requirements, exercising an “abundance of caution as we receive additional information”.

What happened

Former special counsel Jack Smith Wednesday told members of the House Judiciary Committee that his investigators had uncovered “proof beyond a reasonable doubt” that President Donald Trump “engaged in a criminal scheme to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election,” according to his prepared remarks for the closed-door deposition.

Smith said his team also found “powerful evidence” that Trump had illegally hoarded classified documents and “repeatedly tried to obstruct justice.” Due to Justice Department policy, both investigations were dropped after Trump won last year’s election.

Who said what

Wednesday’s “day-long deposition” gave lawmakers their “first chance, albeit in private, to question Smith” about his twin criminal investigations of Trump, The Associated Press said. It “unfolded against the backdrop of a broader retribution campaign by the Trump administration against former officials involved in investigating Trump and his allies.”

Smith himself faces a “renewed wave of Republican attacks,” said NBC News. He had repeatedly requested a “public forum for his testimony to set the record straight” about his investigations and their nonpartisan nature, Politico said, but committee Chair Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) “declined that request.” Jordan told reporters after the interview that he had “learned some interesting things,” but declined to elaborate.

What next?

Jordan said “he had not ruled out the possibility of Smith appearing in a public venue,” Politico said, and Democrats supported that idea. Had Smith testified publicly Wednesday, Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) told reporters, “it would have been absolutely devastating to the president.” Trump previously “told reporters that he supported the idea of an open hearing,” the AP said.

For decades, the Justice Department has pursued wide swaths of its civil rights enforcement efforts guided by what’s known as disparate impact standards. These rules regulate the use and withholding of federal funds in cases when a “seemingly neutral policy or action” results in “disproportionate and unjustified negative harm to a group, regardless of intent,” said Congress.gov.

Last week, however, Attorney General Pam Bondi announced that the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division will now focus only on deliberate instances of discrimination moving forward. Accordingly, Justice Department attorneys “will not pursue Title VI disparate-impact liability against its federal-funding recipients,” said the department in a notice posted to the Federal Register.

‘Important tool’ taken ‘off the table’

“For far too long,” the Justice Department has “required recipients of federal funding to make decisions based on race,” said Bondi in a statement announcing the policy change. The previous rules “encouraged” people to challenge “racially neutral policies, without evidence of intentional discrimination,” said Assistant Attorney General Harmeet K. Dhillon in the same release. But those rules also “undergirded” other organizational investigations into police departments of housing providers “accused of engaging in a ‘pattern or practice’ of discrimination,” said Politico.

It is a “sad commentary” that the White House has “chosen” the 68th anniversary of the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division to do away with a rule that “for nearly 60 years has helped root out illegal race and national origin discrimination by recipients of federal funds,” said former DOJ employee Christine Stoneman to Bloomberg Law. The move is “part of a broader policy overhaul” for the department, “in a year of personnel and enforcement upheaval” for the civil rights division, said Bloomberg.

The change allows institutions to “turn a blind eye to troubling statistics” if they “didn’t mean to do it,” said Antonio Ingram II, a senior counsel at the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, to The Chronicle of Higher Education. “This is 2025,” and “examples of discrimination based on race or sex are not going to be what we saw in the Jim Crow South.”

‘Laudable’ decision

Critics’ claims that the new policies “somehow authorize discrimination” are “bogus,” said The Washington Post editorial board. Instead, the revised regulations “do the opposite.” Although some of President Donald Trump’s “anti-woke agenda” has been “irresponsible,” the rule change is a “reasonable correction to past overreach.”

Disparate impact theory was “imposed undemocratically and conflicts with the Constitution,” said The Wall Street Journal. Despite having sent “mixed signals over the years,” the Supreme Court should “eventually reject it” altogether. While the administration’s push to rescind disparate impact regulations is “laudable,” it won’t “solve the constitutional problem” at the heart of the issue. The “best thing that could happen,” said Hans von Spakovsky, a senior legal fellow at The Heritage Foundation, to The Daily Signal, would be for Congress to “pass a bill making it clear that only intentional discrimination is covered by the Civil Rights Act.”

The new DOJ rules will likely face legal challenges, said Newsweek, and will “shape debates” in both the judicial and legislative branches “regarding the role of statistical evidence in civil rights law.”

What happened

U.S. District Judge Paul Engelmayer Tuesday cleared the way for the release of potentially hundreds of thousands of documents from the sex trafficking case against Jeffrey Epstein associate Ghislaine Maxwell.

The recently passed Epstein Files Transparency Act “unambiguously applies” to the Maxwell grand jury testimony and “voluminous” other records from the case, Engelmayer ruled, including evidence not used in the 2021 trial that resulted in Maxwell’s 20-year prison sentence.

Who said what

Engelmayer said he was approving the Justice Department’s request to unseal the files, but “cautioned that people shouldn’t expect to learn much new information from them,” The Associated Press said. They “do not identify any person other than Epstein and Maxwell as having had sexual contact with a minor,” he wrote, nor do they “discuss or identify any client of Epstein’s or Maxwell’s.”

The Justice Department also has a “pending” request before a second federal judge in New York to “unseal records from the grand jury that indicted Epstein on sex-trafficking charges in 2019,” before his suicide in jail, The Washington Post said. “A third federal judge, in Miami, last week ordered the release of transcripts from the grand jury that investigated Epstein from 2005 to 2007.”

What next?

Before the government releases any of the material, Manhattan U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton must “personally certify, in a sworn declaration,” that the records have been “vigorously reviewed” and “found to be in compliance” with the law’s requirements on protecting victims’ identities, Engelmayer wrote in his ruling. Previously, “although paying lip service to Maxwell’s and Epstein’s victims,” the Justice Department “has not treated them with the solicitude they deserve.”

What happened

A federal judge in Washington, D.C., ruled Saturday that prosecutors seeking to reindict former FBI Director James Comey cannot use key evidence, striking a blow to President Donald Trump’s effort to prosecute his perceived enemies. U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly temporarily barred the Justice Department from accessing or utilizing information seized from the computer of Comey’s friend Dan Richman in 2017.

Who said what

Kollar-Kotelly said Richman was likely to succeed in proving that the Justice Department should have deleted his files after it closed the earlier Comey case in 2021 and had accessed prohibited data without a warrant. Her ruling “does not preclude the department from trying again soon to indict Comey,” The Associated Press said, but prosecutors would have to do so without “using evidence they had relied on” when Lindsey Halligan, Trump’s handpicked prosecutor in Virginia, “initially secured criminal charges” in September.

A different federal judge threw out the cases against Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James last month, ruling that Halligan had been unlawfully appointed. The Justice Department said it would push on, but Comey’s lawyers argued “he cannot be recharged now because the five-year deadline to bring a case against him expired” in September, The Washington Post said, and the judge “appeared to endorse that view.” The administration’s attempt to secure a new indictment against James, another perceived Trump adversary, was thwarted last week when a grand jury refused to sign off on charges.

What next?

Kollar-Kotelly put the dispute over Richman’s data “on a fast track,” Politico said, ordering the Justice Department to confirm by today that it had “complied with her order and to respond to Richman’s legal arguments” by tomorrow.

What happened

U.S. District Judge Cameron Currie on Monday threw out the Trump administration’s criminal cases against former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James. Currie ruled that Lindsey Halligan, the insurance lawyer and White House aide hand-picked by President Donald Trump to prosecute both cases, had been “unlawfully” installed as U.S. Attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia, rendering both indictments void. But the judge dismissed both cases “without prejudice,” giving the Justice Department a chance to attempt a do-over.

Who said what

Currie’s twin rulings are the most “significant setback yet” for Trump’s ongoing effort to “force the criminal justice system to punish his perceived foes,” said The New York Times. The judge’s disqualification of Halligan also “added to a string of successful challenges” of Trump’s efforts to appoint U.S. attorneys outside the “customary Senate confirmation process,” The Wall Street Journal said.

Attorney General Pam Bondi had “defended Halligan’s appointment” but also named her a “‘Special Attorney,’ presumably as a way to protect the indictments from the possibility of collapse,” The Associated Press said. Currie rejected that attempt at retroactive validation, saying it would allow the government to “send any private citizen off the street — attorney or not — into the grand jury room to secure an indictment so long as the attorney general gives her approval after the fact. That cannot be the law.”

Disqualifying Halligan was “arguably the least painful way for the Justice Department to lose the Comey and James cases,” Politico said, because it left “unresolved the most explosive question in each: whether the indictments were the product of Trump’s personal animus.” Comey said on social media that “Trump will probably come after me again,” but “my attitude is going to be the same: I’m innocent. I am not afraid. And I believe in an independent federal judiciary.”

What next?

Bondi said the Justice Department would pursue an “immediate appeal” of the cases. Lawfully appointed prosecutors could try to revive the cases, though they would “face complications” with the Comey charges, as the five-year statute of limitations ended in September, the Journal said.

What happened

A federal judge Monday said the Justice Department had engaged in a “disturbing pattern of profound investigative missteps” in securing its indictment of former FBI Director James Comey and ordered federal prosecutors to release the normally secret grand jury records to his defense team. That “extraordinary remedy” was merited, Magistrate Judge William Fitzpatrick said in his 24-page opinion, because the potential “government misconduct may have tainted the grand jury proceedings” and the broader case.

Who said what

Fitzpatrick’s opinion was a “remarkable rebuke” of acting U.S. Attorney Lindsey Halligan, The New York Times said. An “inexperienced prosecutor,” she had “never worked on a criminal case until she was thrust into the Comey prosecution” after her predecessor was fired for declining to charge Comey and other targets of President Donald Trump’s ire.

Halligan made at least two “fundamental and highly prejudicial” misstatements of the law to the grand jury, Fitzpatrick said, and appeared to have submitted a rewritten indictment she had not presented to the jurors, which would put the case in “uncharted legal territory.” The judge also said the sole witness before the grand jury, an FBI agent “exposed to potentially privileged information,” may have inadvertently shared legally shielded details.

What next?

Fitzpatrick’s assessment “adds to the mounting possibility that Comey’s case will be dismissed before it goes to trial,” Politico said. In addition to the “procedural flaws” the judge flagged, “Halligan is facing a challenge to the validity of her appointment altogether and could be disqualified from the case.” U.S. District Judge Michael Nachmanoff, who appointed Fitzpatrick to examine the procedural issues, will decide if the Comey case can proceed, and a separate federal judge was expected to rule on the legitimacy of Halligan’s appointment in the coming week.

What happened

The Justice Department Thursday joined a federal lawsuit seeking to block California’s new congressional map, drawn by state Democrats to flip as many as five Republican-held House seats to counteract a gerrymander in Texas.

The lawsuit “sets the stage for a high-stakes legal and political fight” between President Donald Trump, who sparked the unusual redistricting battle, and California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D), a “likely 2028 presidential contender,” said The Associated Press.

Who said what

Federal courts are “prohibited from policing partisan gerrymandering following a sweeping 2019 Supreme Court ruling,” Politico said, so DOJ officials argued that California’s map “violates the 14th Amendment’s equal protection clause and the Voting Rights Act by factoring in racial demographics,” specifically Latino voters. No GOP-led state has yet “faced federal legal action after revamping district lines following Trump’s call for new maps to expand GOP numbers in the House,” the AP said. A Democratic takeover of the chamber next year would “imperil Trump’s agenda.”

California’s new congressional map was approved by nearly 65% of state voters last week. Newsom’s “redistricting scheme is a brazen power grab that tramples on civil rights and mocks the democratic process,” Attorney General Pam Bondi said in a statement. “These losers lost at the ballot box,” countered Newsom spokesperson Brandon Richards, “and soon they will also lose in court.”

What next?

A DOJ victory in the suit would “scramble Democrats’ plan to push back” against the GOP’s “rare, mid-decade redistricting ploys,” CNN said. Missouri, North Carolina and Ohio have already followed Texas in drawing new GOP-friendly maps, and another handful of red, blue and purple states are considering joining the gerrymander race.

What happened

President Donald Trump is demanding that the Justice Department pay him about $230 million in compensation for previous federal investigations, The New York Times reported Tuesday.

Trump’s “potential windfall,” funded by “U.S. taxpayers,” would need approval from a “Justice Department he has publicly said works for him,” The Washington Post said, and specifically from top DOJ officials “who represented Trump in the investigations at the center of his claims.” Asked about the reports, Trump said Tuesday that the government owed him “a lot of money” and any payout decision “would have to go across my desk.”

Who said what

Trump filed claims with the Justice Department in 2023 and 2024 for alleged damages he suffered from investigations into his 2016 campaign’s ties to Russia and his retention of classified documents. His compensation demand was “going nowhere” until he “blurted out a vague reference to it last week,” Axios said.

“When I became president, I said, I’m sort of suing myself,” Trump said during an Oct. 15 appearance with Attorney General Pam Bondi, FBI Director Kash Patel and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche. “It sort of looks bad, I’m suing myself, right?” Blanche was Trump’s lead defense lawyer in the classified documents case and is now one of two DOJ officials eligible to approve a payout.

This “travesty” is “bizarre and almost too outlandish to believe,” Pace University ethics professor Bennett Gershman told the Times. “The ethical conflict is just so basic and fundamental, you don’t need a law professor to explain it.” Trump said Tuesday he didn’t know “the numbers” for a settlement, but “I’m not looking for money. I’d give it to charity or something.” The charities Trump designated in recent settlements were foundations supporting his presidential library.

What next?

The Justice Department declined to comment on whether Blanche would recuse himself, but said all DOJ officials “follow the guidance of career ethics officials.” Bondi “fired the agency’s top ethics adviser” in July, the Times said. And because the DOJ “does not specifically require” it, there may be no official announcement “if or when the Trump administration pays the president what could be hundreds of millions of dollars.”

What happened

Federal prosecutors in Maryland Thursday charged John Bolton, the longtime Republican national security official who worked for and then became a critic of President Donald Trump, with mishandling classified information. The 18-count indictment alleges that Bolton emailed more than 1,000 pages of “diary-like entries” to his wife and daughter while working as Trump’s national security adviser in 2018 and 2019.

Who said what

The prosecution of Bolton, the third Trump “adversary” charged in the last month, will “unfold against the backdrop of concerns that the Justice Department is pursuing the president’s political enemies while at the same time sparing his allies from scrutiny,” The Associated Press said. But this indictment is “significantly more detailed in its allegations than earlier cases against former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James.”

Bolton “insists on his innocence,” The Washington Post said in an editorial. But “even if the case was as strong as the 26-page indictment suggests,” Trump’s conduct “inevitably casts a cloud over the charges.” There is “little doubt that the underlying motivation for this prosecution is retribution,” The Wall Street Journal said in an editorial. If Bolton had “praised” Trump, “it’s safe to say he wouldn’t have been indicted.”

What next?

Bolton was expected to make an initial court appearance today. Meanwhile, Trump’s “unprecedented effort to pressure the Justice Department into prosecuting his perceived enemies” continues apace, the Post said, with prosecutors “pursuing investigations into a sitting U.S. senator, former top leaders of the FBI and CIA and the Georgia prosecutor who charged Trump in a massive 2020 election conspiracy case.”

What happened

President Donald Trump’s acting U.S. attorney in Virginia Thursday secured a grand jury indictment against New York Attorney General Letitia James (D) on felony bank fraud and false statement charges.

The indictment came two weeks after the same prosecutor, Lindsey Halligan, indicted former FBI Director James Comey and three weeks after Trump publicly urged U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi to prosecute James and Comey and fired Halligan’s predecessor for declining to pursue charges.

Who said what

The five-page indictment accused James of “falsely claiming in loan documents that she would use a home she purchased” in Norfolk, Virginia, in 2020 “as a secondary residence,” The New York Times said, “and using it instead as a rental investment property, allowing her to receive favorable terms that would save her close to $19,000” over the life of the loan. Halligan “presented the case” to the grand jury herself, The Washington Post said, an “unusual” move “suggesting that the office struggled to find a career attorney willing to take on the assignment.”

James, who secured a civil fraud judgment against Trump in 2023, said in a statement that the charges against her were “baseless” and Trump’s “own public statements make clear that his only goal is political retribution at any cost.” Halligan said the charges “represent intentional, criminal acts and tremendous breaches of the public’s trust.” Lawyer and podcast host Ken “Popehat” White said on social media he had “never seen anything remotely this petty charged as bank fraud.”

What next?

James was not arrested but has been summoned to appear in federal court in Norfolk on Oct. 24. Her case was randomly assigned to U.S. District Judge Jamar Walker, a Joe Biden appointee.

What happened

Attorney General Pam Bondi Tuesday made her first appearance before the Senate Judiciary Committee since her confirmation hearing in January. During nearly five hours of testimony, she evaded questions from Democrats about her controversial tenure, responding with personal insults while denying their charges that she was destroying the Justice Department’s independence to serve President Donald Trump’s personal revenge agenda.

Who said what

Bondi “repeatedly dodged” questions on “pressing issues” like her department’s prosecution of former FBI Director James Comey, closure of a bribery investigation of Trump’s border czar Tom Homan and her handling of the Jeffrey Epstein case files, The Washington Post said. As she “lashed out” at her Democratic questioners, Bondi’s “personalized, non sequitur attacks” were “excerpted and shared on social media in real time by administration officials.” A Reuters photographer “captured some of Bondi’s preplanned attacks on the inside of a manila folder,” USA Today said.

Bondi’s stonewalling “meant little if any fresh insight was offered about her actions and decisions” in office, The Associated Press said. Republicans generally “did not press her to provide answers,” The New York Times said, and “largely seemed unconcerned” about Trump’s “efforts to erode the department’s independence,” claiming it was politicized under President Joe Biden.

Yet one of Bondi’s “most difficult moments,” the Times said, came when GOP Sen. John Kennedy (La.) “gently asked” about Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick’s recent comments that Epstein, his former neighbor, was “the greatest blackmailer ever.” Top Trump administration officials are “apoplectic” that Lutnick “undermined the government’s entire story” that Trump’s former friend “did not run a secret sexual-blackmail operation targeting wealthy, powerful elites,” Asawin Suebsaeng said at Zeteo. Bondi told Kennedy that nobody from the DOJ or FBI had contacted Lutnick. When Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) asked if the FBI had found reputed Epstein photos showing “Trump with half-naked young women,” she declined to answer, instead accusing him of accepting campaign donations from an alleged Epstein associate.

What next?

Kennedy told Bondi the Senate might call Lutnick to testify about Epstein. House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) said Tuesday that his delay in seating incoming Rep. Adelita Grijalva (D-Ariz.) had “nothing to do with” her promise to provide the final signature to force a House vote to compel the DOJ to release its Epstein files.

What happened

The Justice Department Thursday secured a two-count indictment against former FBI Director James Comey, days after President Donald Trump publicly told Attorney General Pam Bondi he wanted Comey and other perceived enemies prosecuted.

Trump separately signed a memo Thursday ordering the FBI to lead a multiagency effort to “identify and disrupt financial networks that fund domestic terrorism and political violence,” though the order and Trump’s subsequent comments in the Oval Office made clear he was focused only on left-leaning organizations. He offered top Democratic donors George Soros and Reid Hoffman as potential targets.

Who said what

A federal grand jury in Virginia approved counts against Comey of making false statements and obstruction of Congress, but rejected a third charge. The charges, related to statements Comey made in a 2020 Senate hearing, “represent a breach of the public trust at an extraordinary level,” said newly appointed U.S. Attorney Lindsey Halligan, a former defense lawyer for Trump with no prosecutorial experience. “JUSTICE IN AMERICA!” Trump said on social media.

In an unusual move, Halligan “presented the case herself and was the only prosecutor to sign the indictment,” The Wall Street Journal said. Her Trump-appointed predecessor and career prosecutors in her office opposed bringing charges, citing insufficient evidence.

The Comey indictment “marks the most significant step to date in Trump’s campaign to deploy the Justice Department to avenge personal grievances and prosecute those he perceives as his enemies,” The Washington Post said. It could “well go down as a moment,” The New York Times said, “when a fundamental democratic norm — that justice is dispensed without regard to political or personal agendas — was cast aside in a dangerous way.”

What next?

“My heart is broken for the Department of Justice, but I have great confidence in the federal judicial system,” Comey said in a video statement Thursday night. “And I’m innocent, so let’s have a trial.” His lawyer, former federal prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald, said Comey denies the charges “in their entirety” and “we look forward to vindicating him in the courtroom.” His arraignment is set for Oct. 9. The charges carry a maximum sentence of five years.

What happened

The Justice Department is preparing to seek an indictment against former FBI Director James Comey as early as today, multiple news organizations reported last night. President Donald Trump’s newly installed acting U.S. attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia, former White House aide Lindsey Halligan, was reportedly racing to secure criminal charges against Comey, for allegedly lying to Congress, before a key statute of limitations runs out next Tuesday. The previous U.S. attorney, Erik Siebert, resigned under pressure last week after declining to charge Comey or another Trump target, New York Attorney General Letitia James.

Who said what

Halligan — “who has never prosecuted a criminal case in her career as an insurance lawyer — plans to present evidence to a grand jury,” ABC News said, even after prosecutors presented her with a “detailed memo recommending that she decline” to charge Comey due to “insufficient evidence.”

Comey oversaw the initial 2016 investigation into ties between the Trump campaign and Russia, and Trump has “long viewed him as a nemesis and urged aides to find ways to extract payback,” The Wall Street Journal said. The president’s recent “unabashed demand” that Attorney General Pam Bondi bring charges against Comey, “even as she has expressed reservations about the case,” has “put her in a bind” and “alarmed” current and former DOJ officials who worried that Trump’s fundamental transformation of the department “into an arm of his agenda” will damage its “credibility in ways that will be difficult to repair.”

What next?

A grand jury in Virginia “would have to approve any indictment,” a typically “low bar” the Trump Justice Department has failed to clear several times in recent months, The Associated Press said. There is “no guarantee the grand jury will determine that the government has met the evidentiary threshold” to indict Comey, The New York Times said, or even that “a career prosecutor would be willing to present the case to the grand jury,” leaving it to Halligan or another DOJ official.

President Donald Trump once promised to “drain the swamp” — a metaphor for cleansing Washington, D.C., of corruption. Instead, the Justice Department is being drained of corruption fighters amid evidence of malfeasance in his own administration.

The Justice Department had 36 attorneys working full-time on corruption cases when Trump returned to office in January. “Today it has two,” said NOTUS. The lawyers who worked for the department’s Public Integrity Section have “either quit under pressure, resigned in protest or been detailed to other matters across the nation.” The loss of personnel “screams that public corruption cases are no longer a priority” under Trump, said former prosecutor Andrew Tessman.

What did the commentators say?

The news comes amid reports that Trump border czar Tom Homan last fall “accepted a bag of cash from undercover FBI agents” in a sting operation, said CNN. That bribery investigation was shut down after Trump returned to power, and White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said the sting was an example of the “weaponization” of the Justice Department by the Biden administration. Trump, meanwhile, is publicly pressuring the Justice Department to go after his enemies, said The Washington Post. In a Truth Social post, the president last week ordered Attorney General Pam Bondi to quickly prosecute his “political rivals and back U.S. attorneys willing to get that job done.”

“Pam Bondi isn’t the president’s enforcer,” former federal prosecutor Barbara McQuade said at Bloomberg. The Justice Department has “abided by norms and policies to protect its independence from political influence” since the Watergate era. Now Trump is “blasting through those norms.” The rule of law requires that “each person be treated equally in our legal system.” U.S. attorneys around the country must now decide “whether they are willing to become just another instrument of political power.”

There are “two different rules of law in Trump’s America,” said Albany Law School professor Ray Brescia at MSNBC. The president has sent National Guard troops into Democratic cities while pardoning Jan. 6 rioters. His administration has pursued allegations of mortgage fraud “only against adversaries of the president.” And it has forced out both prosecutors who either decline to go after Trump’s enemies and those who have made cases against his allies. Bottom line: “There’s the rule of law for Trump’s foes, but the rule of law is optional for his allies.”

What next?

Trump’s public pressure on Bondi to prosecute “political foes” like former FBI director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James “could backfire if any cases get to court,” said NBC News. The posts on Truth Social will make it easier for defense attorneys to argue their clients were “targets of selective prosecution.”

Trump’s Justice Department can still “punish” his critics without bringing charges, said The Washington Post. Those investigations cause Trump’s targets to hire defense lawyers at “hefty rates” and cause them “reputational damage” regardless of the outcome. For the president, that “might be part of the point.”

What happened

The Justice Department suspended and then closed a bribery investigation into President Donald Trump’s border czar, Tom Homan, that was launched after undercover FBI agents recorded him accepting a $50,000 bag of cash while promising future immigration-related contracts, The Washington Post, Reuters and MSNBC reported over the weekend.

Trump, meanwhile, “all but ordered” Attorney General Pam Bondi to “prosecute his political foes in a series of weekend posts,” The Wall Street Journal said.

Who said what

The FBI set up the September 2024 sting after the target of an unrelated investigation “repeatedly brought up Homan, saying he was collecting bribes in exchange for future government contracts,” Reuters said. With video of Homan taking the cash, “several FBI and Justice officials” believed they had a “strong criminal case” for “conspiracy to commit bribery,” which only requires proving intent, MSNBC said, citing four sources.

FBI Director Kash Patel and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche Sunday said the investigation was shuttered after a “full review by FBI agents” and prosecutors “found no credible evidence of any criminal wrongdoing.” The White House said Homan did not handle contracts.

What next?

Trump said Saturday on social media he was appointing White House adviser Lindsey Halligan, a former personal lawyer, to be U.S. attorney in Virginia, after forcing out his previous appointee, Erik Siebert, on Friday. Trump criticized “woke RINO” Siebert for declining to file charges against New York Attorney General Letitia James and former FBI Director James Comey. James, Comey and Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) are “all guilty as hell,” and “we can’t delay any longer, it’s killing our reputation and credibility,” Trump wrote in a post Saturday directed to “Pam.” “JUSTICE MUST BE SERVED, NOW!!!”

What happened

A federal judge Thursday indefinitely barred the Trump administration from deporting hundreds of Guatemalan children, some of whom endured a failed bid to fly them out of the country in the middle of the night over Labor Day weekend. U.S. District Judge Timothy Kelly said the Justice Department had made false claims in court to justify its “hasty operation,” and the timing of the attempt raised doubts about whether officials were acting in “good faith.”

Who said what

After a different federal judge temporarily blocked the early-morning deportations on Aug. 31, the administration said it had “rousted 76 children from their beds at federal shelters and foster homes and loaded them onto airplanes because they and their parents wanted to reunite,” The Washington Post said. “But that explanation crumbled like a house of cards,” said Kelly, appointed by President Donald Trump. “There is no evidence before the court that the parents of these children sought their return,” and significant evidence “to the contrary.”

A Justice Department lawyer conceded to Kelly in an earlier hearing that the Trump administration couldn’t back up its initial claim. Kelly also pointed to a whistleblower report shared with Congress on Tuesday that showed dozens of the children cleared for deportation had been flagged in a government database as likely victims of child abuse, death threats, gang violence or human trafficking. Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said Thursday that Kelly was “blocking efforts to REUNIFY CHILDREN with their families” in a “disgraceful and immoral” ruling “just to ‘get Trump.’”

What next?

Kelly said his preliminary injunction blocked the Trump administration from sending minors to Guatemala unless an immigration judge ordered the deportation or they petition to leave voluntarily.

What happened

A federal judge Tuesday dismissed President Donald Trump's controversial lawsuit against all 15 U.S. district judges in Maryland, calling the White House's legal maneuver "potentially calamitous" and its broader "concerted effort" to "smear and impugn" federal judges "both unprecedented and unfortunate." Judge Thomas Cullen said the administration's lawsuit was legally defective and the wrong tool to challenge the Maryland district's standing order to pause all contested deportations for two business days.

Who said what

In his 39-page ruling, Cullen, a Trump appointee, said the executive branch had no authority to sue the judges and its "novel" attempt to do so threatened a "constitutional free-for-all" that could upset the balance of powers between the co-equal branches of government. The Justice Department filed its "remarkable" suit in June after growing "increasingly frustrated by rulings blocking Trump's agenda," The Associated Press said, and after "repeatedly accusing federal judges of improperly impeding his powers," especially on immigration.

Many legal experts had predicted the lawsuit "would be thrown out," Politico said, but Cullen's "decision to use the ruling to challenge Trump officials' vitriol against the judiciary" was "more surprising." Cullen "went out of his way to describe the complaint as extremely unusual," pointing to "his own role in the case as a prime example," The New York Times said. He was pulled into the suit from his courthouse in Virginia after the entire Maryland federal bench was "forced to recuse themselves" as parties to the suit.

What next?

The White House isn't "without any recourse" in its effort to litigate its "grievance with the judges," Cullen wrote, and if it "truly believes" that their "standing orders violate the law, it should avail itself of the tried-and-true recourse available to all federal litigants: It should appeal." The Justice Department said in a subsequent court filing that it would do so.

What happened

A federal judge in Pennsylvania ruled Thursday that the Trump administration's appointment of Alina Habba as acting U.S. attorney in New Jersey was "unlawful" and all her actions since July 1, when he said her 120-day interim appointment expired, "may be declared void." Habba also "must be disqualified from participating in any ongoing cases," said the judge, Matthew Brann, though he paused his decision pending a Justice Department appeal.

Who said what

Brann's ruling "delivered a resounding rebuke to both Habba," a "partisan lightning rod" who previously served as President Donald Trump's personal defense lawyer, and the "Justice Department, which went to extraordinary lengths to keep her in the U.S. attorney job after New Jersey's federal judges last month voted not to retain her," The Washington Post said. The decision could also "reverberate across the country" because the DOJ has "used the same complex maneuvers to extend the tenures of other loyalists Trump has installed as interim U.S. attorneys in California, Arizona, New Mexico and New York."

"At its core," The Associated Press said, Thursday's ruling "took aim at the administration's strategy of using a string of temporary appointments" to bypass Senate confirmation. "Taken to the extreme," Brann said, the president could use a similar "novel series of legal and personnel moves" to seat U.S. attorneys "of his personal choice for an entire term without seeking the Senate's advice and consent."

The "fallout" from Brann's opinion "could be a staggering mess across the executive branch," and it's also "unclear from the ruling who should be in charge of the New Jersey U.S. Attorney's Office," Politico said. After the New Jersey federal judges replaced Habba with Desiree Grace, a "respected Republican career prosecutor" who was serving as her deputy, Attorney General Pam Bondi "quickly fired" Grace and appointed Habba to the No. 2 slot.

What next?

Bondi said the Justice Department would "immediately appeal" Brann's ruling, calling the former Republican politico and Federalist Society member an "activist" judge.

What happened

New York U.S. District Judge Richard Berman Wednesday rejected a Justice Department motion to release grand jury transcripts from Jeffrey Epstein's sex trafficking case, describing the request as a "'diversion' from the breadth and scope of the Epstein files in the government's possession." Berman was the third and final federal judge to reject nearly identical DOJ petitions to unseal Epstein-related grand jury material.

Who said what

President Donald Trump, a former longtime friend of Epstein, directed the DOJ to seek the grand jury material in mid-July, amid a "fierce backlash" from supporters and critics alike over his administration's "refusal to release" the "massive trove" of Epstein documents in its possession, The Associated Press said.

The grand jury testimony is "merely a hearsay snippet" of Epstein's alleged crimes and "pales in comparison" to the DOJ's Epstein investigation information, Berman wrote. With some 100,000 pages of material and no grand jury secrecy constraints, the "government is the logical party to make comprehensive disclosure to the public of the Epstein Files."

What next?

The administration could appeal Berman's rejection, "though it has not done so in the other two rulings," The Washington Post said. The DOJ is separately "being forced to disclose the Epstein files" to the GOP-led House Oversight Committee, Politico said. The committee said earlier this week it "plans to publicly release" some of the files after the DOJ starts handing them over Friday, The Wall Street Journal said.

What happened

The Justice Department said Monday that Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey, an ardent backer of President Donald Trump, had been appointed FBI co-deputy director. Bailey said he would resign as Missouri's top prosecutor to join conservative podcaster Dan Bongino in the bureau's No. 2 spot.

Who said what

Bailey's appointment is the "latest unusual personnel move at the FBI as the Trump administration aims to dramatically reshape the bureau" under Director Kash Patel, The Washington Post said. The deputy director is usually a "respected veteran with deep experience at the FBI" who can run day-to-day operations. Neither Bailey nor Bongino had any experience at the bureau.

The decision "bewildered many current and former FBI agents, who said they had never heard of a co-deputy director," The New York Times said. But Bongino has "vocally complained about the toll the job has taken on him," and his "future has appeared tenuous after a furious fight" with Attorney General Pam Bondi over the Justice Department's decision not to release the Jeffrey Epstein files.

What next?

Bailey said he will resign as Missouri attorney general on Sept. 8. It was "unclear how Bongino and Bailey will split the responsibilities of the job," which doesn't require Senate confirmation, the Post said. It's also "unclear whether Bongino plans to remain at the FBI" once he has to share the No. 2 position with another person, Semafor said.

What happened

The House Oversight Committee Tuesday issued subpoenas to the Justice Department for documents related to its investigation of Jeffrey Epstein. The Republican-led committee also demanded testimony or files from six former attorneys general, two former FBI directors, former President Bill Clinton and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

The Justice Department's decision last month to withhold much of the subpoenaed information has caused an enduring political headache for President Donald Trump, a former friend of Epstein.

Who said what

The subpoenas showed that "interest in the Epstein files is still running high," even with Congress "on a monthlong break," The Associated Press said. If the Justice Department fails to comply by an Aug. 19 deadline, it could "set up a high-profile clash" between the Trump administration and the GOP-led House over an "issue that has sharply divided Republicans," The New York Times said.

What next?

Oversight Committee Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) was "required" to issue Tuesday's subpoenas following a bipartisan vote in a subcommittee last month, prompted by Democrats, Politico said. But the Bill Clinton summons "in particular seems more symbolic than substantive," as no former president has ever "testified to Congress under the compulsion of a subpoena."

What happened

The Senate Tuesday night confirmed Emil Bove, the controversial Justice Department official who previously served as one of President Donald Trump's criminal defense lawyers, to a lifetime seat on the U.S. 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals.

The 50-49 vote followed allegations from three whistleblowers that Bove lied in his Senate hearing and told Justice Department officials they might need to ignore court orders in immigration cases.

Who said what

Trump has "indicated he expects" a "degree of loyalty" from "his judges," Politico said, and "Bove's allegiance to Trump goes deeper than those of Trump's previous judicial picks." Bove denied being Trump's DOJ "enforcer" or "henchman," but his confirmation "provided at least a tacit Senate endorsement of the president's efforts to bend the justice system to his will," The New York Times said.

Most Republicans — including Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), a longtime whistleblower defender — "dismissed" the whistleblower complaints about Bove's "conduct at the Justice Department," The Associated Press said. But Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) said his actions at the DOJ led her to conclude he "would not serve as an impartial jurist." Sen Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) said she voted against Bove because nobody who "counseled other attorneys that you should ignore the law" should get a "lifetime seat on the bench."

What next?

Bove will serve as one of the 14 judges on the 3rd Circuit court, hearing cases from New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware and the U.S. Virgin Islands.

While not President Donald Trump's first choice to lead his Justice Department, Attorney General Pam Bondi nevertheless spent the first few months of her tenure establishing herself as a MAGA true believer. Even so, Bondi's short time atop the DOJ has been marred by scandal and controversy. As lingering questions about the relationship between the president and deceased sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein threaten to swamp this administration, the attorney general now finds herself in omnidirectional crosshairs, with Democrats and Republicans alike calling for accountability — and consequences.

Headed toward a 'rough September'

Bondi is "stuck between a rock and a hard place" as she struggles to "satisfy MAGA's thirst" for Epstein investigation details "without implicating her boss in the scandal," said The Daily Beast. As such, the AG has become the "poster child for MAGA anger" for failing thus far to provide new revelations into the case. Bondi was already being "criticized" in various conservative corners in March for releasing Epstein-related documents to a small group of right-wing influencers and operatives in what critics dismissed as a "rehash of old news," Slate said.

Bondi is now in the "eye of a storm" that is "siphoning oxygen from Trump's policy priorities" and for which the "endgame remains a blur," Politico said. The furor doesn't appear to be dying down anytime soon, either. If the situation hasn't resolved by the time Congress is back in session, Bondi is "in for a rough September at the very least," one GOP lawmaker told the outlet. Despite support from both the White House and Justice Department officials, the swirling scandal has placed Bondi at the "mercy of forces beyond her control."

By playing a "short-term political game at longer-term cost," Bondi now "shares responsibility" for "stoking" the ongoing scandal and "failing to deliver" on her initial promise of Epstein transparency, said former Obama White House Counsel Bob Bauer on Substack. Bondi has shown "no compunctions" about mixing her official portfolio with "political theater," said columnist Jason Willick at The Washington Post. While an attorney general with "independent judgment and gravitas" can "frustrate" presidents, they are also "less likely to personally torque up voters over fantasy documents because it's politically convenient."

A key line is 'very definitely gone'

Bondi's challenges extend beyond the Epstein scandal. Last week, three former Justice Department officials "handed another headache" to their onetime boss, alleging they'd been "improperly fired" from the DOJ in a lawsuit filed against Bondi, Newsweek said. Plaintiffs Michael Gordon (who prosecuted Jan. 6 rioters), Patricia Hartman and Joseph Tirrell, the former head of the DOJ's Ethics Department, all allege their dismissals "violated federal civil service protections," Reuters said. They are demanding to be reinstated "immediately" and have also requested back pay "as needed," said CBS News.

"There used to be a line, used to be a very distinct separation" between the White House and the DOJ, Hartman said to CBS News. "That line is very definitely gone."

Despite the growing furor over Bondi's handling of the Epstein case and her tenure leading the DOJ at large, those who know the AG say she's unlikely to be "cowed by the criticism," said Politico. Bondi "doesn't rattle" and isn't the type that when "stress happens she lashes out," said former colleague and DC lobbyist Brian Ballard to Politico. "She is very calm and deliberate and stays the course."

What happened

A federal judge in Florida Wednesday denied the Trump administration's request to release grand jury transcripts from that state's investigation into deceased sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein. The denial came on the same day The Wall Street Journal reported that the Department of Justice notified President Donald Trump in a May meeting that his name appears in the Epstein files. Also on Wednesday, a House Oversight subcommittee voted to subpoena the DOJ to turn over additional files related to Epstein's conviction.

Who said what

The court's "hands are tied" when it comes to the administration's request to publish grand jury transcripts, said Judge Robin Rosenberg. The decision was based on "longstanding grand jury secrecy rules" that include "only a few narrow exceptions" unmet by the DOJ's request, said Politico.

The White House has come under "increasing pressure" from Trump's "political base" over its handling of the Epstein investigation, said The Washington Post. And the mystery around it grew Wednesday, with the information about the president's name appearing "multiple times" across the documents in question, said the Journal. But Trump's appearance "isn't a sign of wrongdoing," it said, noting that his Epstein connection "wasn't the focus" of the meeting.

What next?

Despite the court's denial, the Justice Department has "another opportunity" to obtain Epstein documents from two judges based in New York, where there's generally a "less stringent approach to grand jury secrecy," said Politico. But those requests aren't expected to be resolved for several weeks. House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Rep. Clay Higgins of Louisiana said he "did not know when the subpoenas would be issued," CNN said.

President Trump "is coming for your citizenship," said Jonathan V. Last in The Bulwark. The Department of Justice recently issued a memo telling its lawyers that the president has ordered them to "maximally pursue denaturalization proceedings" against foreign-born U.S. citizens accused of crimes. Republican U.S. Rep. Andy Ogles publicly called for the administration to deport New York City Democratic mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani, a Muslim immigrant and naturalized citizen, calling him a "communist" and terrorist sympathizer; Trump spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt said that these allegations "should be investigated." Revoking citizenship "sounds like crazy talk," but federal law allows the government to denaturalize anyone who lied when applying for citizenship. The DOJ is now expanding that category to include citizens who are gang members and national security threats. In defiance of the 14th Amendment, Trump has already issued an executive order revoking birthright citizenship, and says he will seek to deport "bad people" who were born in the U.S. "We ought to get them the hell out of here, too," he said.

From 1967 to the 2010s, denaturalization proceedings were usually reserved for a handful of "naturalized Americans with undisclosed Nazi pasts," said Chad de Guzman in Time. That changed under the first Trump administration, which scrutinized the applications of 700,000 naturalized citizens and opened denaturalization proceedings against 168—more than any other modern president. In his second term, Trump is turning denaturalization into a "political weapon," said Gil Guerra in The Dispatch. The "broad enforcement language" in the DOJ memo "raises the possibility that a traffic stop, an arrest during a protest, or a social media post" could get one of America's 24.5 million naturalized citizens shipped to South Sudan. Trump has even said he would "take a look at" deporting ally turned enemy Elon Musk.

Native-born citizens should be worried, too, said Greg Grandin in The New York Times. Trump and top adviser Stephen Miller have made it very clear they believe "real Americans" are descendants of white Europeans born on U.S. soil. "America," Miller says, "is for Americans only." In response to Miller's dictates, non-white citizens are being grabbed and roughed up by federal agents demanding that they provide their papers. "What does it mean to be an American if armed, masked men can sweep anybody, citizen or not, off the street, forcing people into unmarked SUVs?"

President Donald Trump this week is scrambling to contain fallout from perhaps the biggest intra-administration rift of his second term: an increasingly public fight between FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino and Attorney General Pam Bondi. The squabble is over the handling of a White House investigation into sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, his alleged list of high-profile clients and jailhouse suicide in 2019. Friction between the two officials came to a head last week during an explosive White House meeting in which Bondi, who last week downplayed the more salacious rumors surrounding Epstein that she once promoted, accused Bongino of planting negative news stories about her oversight of the investigation.

A 'political crisis' that could 'splinter' the MAGA base

"What's going on with my 'boys' and, in some cases, 'gals?'" Trump said in a rambling post on Truth Social that called for his supporters to "LET PAM BONDI DO HER JOB." Trump's "full-throated defense" of Bondi has shocked the MAGA faithful, Fox News said. Many of the president's most staunch supporters insisted the scandal "will not simply dissipate," given how many Trump insiders ("including Bondi, Bongino and FBI Director Kash Patel") had previously vowed to "expose the corruption surrounding Epstein."

The renewed furor over Epstein and his administration's investigation thereof is a "political crisis" for Trump that has threatened to "splinter his far-right political base," said The New York Times. The "blowback" has "raged unabated for nearly a week" since the DOJ and FBI closed their investigation by "affirming previous findings that Epstein's death had been a suicide." MAGA backers both "inside and outside government" have gone "completely bananas," said Charles Pierce at Esquire, and the "upper echelons of the FBI might come tumbling down" as a result. Bongino reportedly considered leaving the administration entirely over the scandal, but is "in good shape," Trump said to reporters after talking to the deputy director over the weekend.

Despite his all-caps exhortation and expressions of equanimity, it's "not clear" whether Trump's post will be enough to "quell the furor," said NBC News. "I support Pam as AG but think a Special Counsel has to be named to take the Epstein case over," said longtime Trump ally and former White House strategist Steve Bannon in a statement to the network. But "audience sentiment" at a recent event hosted by the conservative group Turning Point USA was "running 100% against Bondi remaining as AG."

Defying the 'patterns of previous Trump controversies'

The White House has worked to "minimize any tensions" stemming from the growing friction between Bondi, Bongino and their respective bases, said The Associated Press. Attempts to "sow division" within Trump's Justice Department are "baseless," said spokesman Harrison Fields to the wire service. Trump throwing his support behind Bondi suggests a "dramatic shake-up" at the attorney general's office is "not imminent," said Steve Benin at MSNBC.

Nevertheless, the intra-DOJ discord has "defied the patterns of previous Trump controversies," said the Times, thanks to an increasing willingness among some MAGA adherents to "cast doubt on Trump's actions and motives." Bongino's threat to leave the FBI has "infuriated Trump," CNN said, while Vice President J.D. Vance has spent the past few days "attempting to mediate" between the various parties. Bongino's relationship with the White House has nevertheless become "basically untenable," sources said to CNN. Even if Bongino remains for now, "some inside the administration believe he will not stay in the job long-term."

What happened

Emil Bove, a top Justice Department official and President Donald Trump's former criminal defense attorney, actively encouraged government lawyers to mislead the courts and defy judicial orders, recently dismissed DOJ immigration litigator Erez Reuveni alleged Tuesday in a whistleblower complaint to lawmakers. Trump has nominated Bove for a lifetime seat on the U.S. 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals.

Who said what

According to Reuveni's complaint, Bove told federal lawyers in a March 14 meeting that if the courts threw up roadblocks to Trump's plan to rapidly deport migrants using the Alien Enemies Act, the DOJ "would need to consider telling the courts 'f---- you'" and "ignore any such order." That episode was followed by a "series of attempts by DOJ officials to thwart court orders in at least three immigration-related cases," said Politico.

Bove's boss, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, called Reuveni's allegations "falsehoods purportedly made by a disgruntled former employee." But Reuveni's filing "suggests a copious trail of emails, texts and phone records that would support" his claims, The New York Times said.

What next?

As "Trump's enforcer" at the DOJ, Bove "has repeatedly rankled and alarmed many career prosecutors," Politico said, and Reuveni's account "seems certain to roil" his Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearing today. Still, said CNN, it "would be difficult at this time" to coordinate "enough political support among Republicans to block his nomination."

During his first term, President Donald Trump peppered his tenure with controversial pardons for friends and notables whose freedom was as much a byproduct of their personal proximity to the Oval Office as anything else. Now, Trump's penchant for politically motivated pardons has pushed well beyond the expansive precedent he set for himself. His latest tranche of pardons and commutations reflects both a personal antipathy toward the Justice Department and a wider effort to reframe the nation's sense of criminality.

A 'new pipeline' for Trump's political allies

Trump's decision this week to pardon Scott Jenkins, a former Virginia sheriff sentenced to 10 years in prison for what the acting U.S. attorney at the time called a "cash-for-badges scheme," is part of a "broader pattern" for the White House, said NBC News. By focusing his pardons on "former public officials who were convicted of financial improprieties," Trump's Justice Department is "de-emphasizing public corruption cases," especially those connected to the DOJ's Public Integrity Section.

Under the leadership of newly installed DOJ Pardon Attorney Ed Martin, formerly Trump's interim U.S. attorney for Washington D.C., the pardon office has been turned into a "new pipeline for political allies to get their cases in front of Trump," said The Wall Street Journal. Martin is also using the role to "target Biden-era prosecutions that rankled conservatives," and "correct" the alleged "weaponization of the Justice Department against conservatives" often touted by the president.

While this pattern "began in the first Trump administration," said former Pardon Attorney Liz Oyer to PBS "Newshour," it has "gotten worse under the new administration for two reasons." First, many of the pardons are "happening in secret." Second, these pardons are "really different" from those in Trump's first term, which included several "truly deserving individuals who were more along the lines of ordinary Americans who did benefit from pardons." This time, Oyer said, Trump seems to be extending them "just for wealthy, well-connected people."

'No MAGA left behind'

Explaining his decision to pardon reality TV stars Todd and Julie Chrisley, convicted in 2022 for their role in a multimillion-dollar fraud and tax evasion scheme, Trump stressed that the pair "don't look like terrorists," said Savannah Chrisley, the couple's daughter and speaker at the 2024 Republican National Convention, to NewsNation on Tuesday. The overall pattern of Trump's latest clemency spree is "pretty clear," CNN said: It focuses on people who "support Trump or have ties to him," those who have attacked people who Trump considers enemies, and those for whom the pardons "send messages to key constituencies." Or, as Martin himself put it in a post on X after arranging Jenkins' pardon: "No MAGA left behind."

The latest crop of pardon recipients shows that Trump is attempting to "redefine" presidential amnesty powers, said The New York Times. Eschewing the "normal and often lengthy" vetting process typically associated with pardons, Trump is instead handing them out to "reward his supporters, incentivize loyalty to his administration or bolster supporters."

While presidents enjoy largely unfettered clemency powers, they typically rely on non-political counsel to determine eligibility so that "individuals who do not have political connections can still have their applications considered," said Oyer to PBS. Trump's rejection of that traditional process means there is "no path forward that we know of right now for ordinary people to be considered for clemency."

What happened

President Donald Trump said Wednesday he will nominate his former criminal defense attorney Emil Bove for a vacant seat on the Philadelphia-based U.S. 3rd District Court of Appeals. Bove, now a senior Trump Justice Department official, represented the president in his New York hush-money case and the two federal cases charging Trump with mishandling classified documents and working to overturn the 2020 election.

Who said what

"Emil is smart, tough" and "will end the weaponization of justice," Trump said on social media. Bove has "been at the center" of some of the Trump Justice Department's "most scrutinized actions," The Associated Press said, including sacking senior FBI officials, ordering the "firings of a group of prosecutors involved in the Jan. 6 criminal cases" and moving "aggressively" to execute Trump's "agenda around immigration."

One of Trump's "closest and most truculent legal allies," Bove has "earned a reputation as an aggressive and often indelicate manager," Politico said, "most notably for his dismantling of the criminal case against New York City Mayor Eric Adams." That "unusual move" led to a "spate of resignations" of senior career prosecutors, The Wall Street Journal said, including the acting U.S. attorney in New York, who "accused Bove of brokering an improper quid pro quo to secure Adams' help with immigration enforcement."

What next?

Bove "could face a bruising confirmation fight" in the Senate, the Journal said. The 3rd Circuit covers New Jersey, Delaware and Pennsylvania, and New Jersey's two senators, Democrats Cory Booker and Andy Kim, called Bove's nomination "deeply troubling."

What happened

A federal judge in New Jersey Wednesday approved interim U.S. Attorney Alina Habba's request to drop trespassing charges against Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, then spent several minutes criticizing her office's "hasty arrest" and "embarrassing retraction of charges." Baraka was arrested during a May 9 surprise visit to a migrant detention facility with three House Democrats from New Jersey.

Habba earlier this week charged one of the Democrats, Rep. LaMonica McIver, with assault for allegedly elbowing two ICE agents in a scuffle, a charge she denies.

Who said what

Baraka's arrest "suggests a worrisome misstep by your office," U.S. Magistrate Judge André Espinosa told Assistant U.S. Attorney Stephen Demanovich. "An arrest, particularly of a public figure, is not a preliminary investigative tool. It is a severe action" that "should only be undertaken after a thorough, dispassionate evaluation of credible evidence" and never "to advance political agendas." The "reprimands did not go unnoticed," the New Jersey Globe said, quoting Baraka commenting into a hot mic: "Jesus, he tore these people a new a--hole."

It is "highly unusual for the Justice Department to charge a sitting member of Congress with crimes outside of fraud or corruption," The Washington Post said. But the Trump administration has "decimated units responsible for prosecuting white-collar and public corruption cases," The New York Times, and "blurred, and at times obliterated, the line between personal score-settling and running a country."

What next?

Habba did not attend the Baraka hearing but did call into McIver's virtual initial court appearance a few hours earlier, where a different magistrate judge released McIver on her own recognizance. Her next court appearance is June 11. She faces up to eight years in prison for each of the two charges.

What happened

The Trump administration has agreed to pay nearly $5 million to settle a wrongful death lawsuit filed by the family of Ashli Babbitt, a 35-year-old woman fatally shot by a U.S. Capitol Police officer as she tried to breach an entrance to the House chamber during the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot, several news organizations said Monday. Babbitt's family had sought $30 million.

Who said what

The reported settlement reverses the Justice Department's "earlier opposition in the case" and averts a trial slated for July 2026, The Washington Post said. President Donald Trump returned to office "casting Babbitt as a martyr and seeking to rewrite the history of the assault on the Capitol as a heroic act of collective patriotism, not a violent effort to overturn an election" by his supporters. Four other people also died in and directly after the violence.

Trump pardoned or commuted the sentences of all of the nearly 1,600 people charged with participating in the riot, including at least 379 charged with assaulting 140 police officers or reporters. "I am extremely disappointed and disagree with this settlement," which "sends a chilling message to law enforcement nationwide," U.S. Capitol Police Chief Tom Manger said in a statement to Politico.

What next?

The details of the settlement have not been made public, but U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes ordered the government and the Babbitt family's lawyers to update the court on Thursday.

When Democratic politicians need campaign cash, they turn to ActBlue, the party's leading fundraising website. However, the platform may be at risk now that President Donald Trump is using the Justice Department to target it.

Last week, Trump instructed Attorney General Pam Bondi to "investigate allegations" of improper fundraising by online platforms, said NBC News, in a memorandum that "specifically names ActBlue" as a website used to "improperly influence American elections." Democrats said Trump is trying to weaponize the government against his political rivals by cutting their fundraising off at the knees. The investigation is a "brazen attack on democracy in America," said an ActBlue spokesperson.

The president has "harnessed the power of the federal government to punish his enemies," said The Associated Press. The ActBlue investigation comes on the heels of White House efforts to "target law firms, media outlets and individuals with whom he disagrees." It also puts Democrats at risk of "financial death," said The Bulwark. Candidates need to be "prepared for an alternative," said Rufus Gifford, who was the finance chair for the Kamala Harris presidential campaign.

What did the commentators say?

The investigation of ActBlue is "overdue," said The Washington Examiner. Investigations by House Republicans found "anomalies" like "sudden and frequent donations from elderly citizens" as well as money from "voters registered for one party but voting for another." Following those allegations, the union representing ActBlue workers sent out a letter warning of a "pattern of volatility and toxicity stemming from current leadership" and asked the board to hire an outside investigator. Democrats may say Bondi's investigation is "baseless," but the "public deserves to know what happened at ActBlue."

Trump is "taking a page from authoritarians around the world," said Paul Blumenthal at HuffPost. While the president has gone after "law firms, nonprofits and former government officials," this is the first time he has targeted the "machinery of the Democratic Party." Trump's memorandum does not contain specific allegations of wrongdoing but relies instead on fraud discovered and reported by ActBlue. WinRed, the GOP counterpart, has faced no inquiries "despite reports showing it faces similar issues with fraud detection." The investigation is Trump's "clearest effort" to use the presidency to "destabilize and hobble his political opposition."

What next?

ActBlue is a "key link" in the Democratic Party's fundraising system, said New York magazine. It makes donating to Democrats an easy one-click job. That's why hobbling the system will hurt. Replacing it "will take years to rebuild and will cost us some money," one consultant said. But if ActBlue is "muzzled," other platforms will step up to take its place. Democratic fundraising will "not stop altogether," said New York.

Indeed, the investigation appears to have sparked a surge. ActBlue had its "biggest fundraising day of the year" after Trump's order became public, said The New Republic. Some political action committees that use the platform "more than quadrupled their fundraising within 24 hours" of the announcement. Party strategists say it is still time for Democrats to start building alternatives. "Democrats need to democratize their campaign tech," said Cory Archibald, the communications director at Turn Left PAC, "and they need to do it yesterday."

What happened

A federal judge yesterday ruled that Google's online ad technology unit constitutes an illegal monopoly, raising the possibility that the search giant may be forced to divest itself of a lucrative pillar of its business. The decision gave the Justice Department its second major antitrust victory against Google in eight months.

Who said what

U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema said Google had "willfully engaged in a series of anticompetitive acts to acquire and maintain monopoly power" in the online exchanges that match ad buyers and sellers and the tools web publishers use to sell ad space, "substantially" harming publishers and, "ultimately, consumers of information on the open web." She said the Justice Department had "failed to show," however, that Google's purchases of DoubleClick and Admeld, two of the backbones of its ad-sales dominance, "were anticompetitive." 

"We won half of this case and we will appeal the other half," Google's Lee-Anne Mulholland said on X. Attorney General Pam Bondi hailed the ruling as a "landmark victory in the ongoing fight to stop Google from monopolizing the digital public square."

What next?

A second federal judge, Amit Mehta, has a hearing on Monday to start deciding the consequences of August's finding that Google's search engine was an illegal monopoly. Possible sanctions include splitting off its Chrome browser. The penalty hearings for Brinkema's ruling will "likely begin late this year or early next year," The Associated Press said. Google's appeals of both rulings "could take years," The Wall Street Journal said.

'We face a looming rice crisis'

Anjana Ahuja at the Financial Times

There is "more to rice than meets the fork," but in a "world already beset by food insecurity, climate change, water scarcity and conflict, the future of one of its most important foodstuffs is mired in a heady stew of science, politics and economics," says Anjana Ahuja. Breeding "rice varieties to match local environments is one way to increase yields," and "optimizing crop management, through irrigation and fertilizer use, can also close the so-called yield gap."

Read more

'The crisis in North Macedonia runs deep'

Manja Petrovska at Al Jazeera

Tragedies in North Macedonia are "frequent, systemic, and inevitable — the result of governance that prioritizes the interests of the powerful over the safety and well-being of the general population," says Manja Petrovska. It's "easy to blame this flawed governance on a corrupt local elite, but what is happening in North Macedonia and other Balkan countries goes far beyond that." Corruption is "not only deeply embedded in Macedonian institutions, but also in North Macedonia's relationship with the EU."

Read more

'Trump's US attorney in DC lacks experience but loves revenge. Perfect, right?'

Chris Brennan at USA Today

With President Donald Trump's "obsession with weaponizing every aspect of the executive branch to satisfy his rapacious grasp for retribution, Ed Martin feels no need to avoid controversy," says Chris Brennan. U.S. attorneys are "not supposed to chase attention. And they're certainly not supposed to act as goonish groupies trying to intimidate critics of any politician." But "that's the before-times way of thinking about federal prosecutors." In the "time of Trump, ethical behavior and actual experience count for nothing."

Read more

'An "America First" plan to prevent Haiti's collapse'

Austin Holmes at the Miami Herald

The Trump administration "clearly understands that U.S. interests — including border security — depend on what happens in our backyard," says Austin Holmes. Haiti is "no longer just an unfortunate humanitarian crisis — it is a rapidly escalating regional security threat." On the "current path, murders and kidnappings will rise. Gang territory will expand. Phony elections will be staged." Haiti needs "U.S. support for credible Haitian and Haitian American partners to prepare to fight for their country's freedom."

Read more

What happened

U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis said Sunday she had ordered the Trump administration to retrieve one of the migrants it had sent to a prison in El Salvador because the "grievous error" to deport him appeared to be "wholly lawless." The Justice Department had conceded that deporting Kilmar Abrego Garcia was an "administrative error" but said the judge had no jurisdiction in the case and it had no power to bring him back to Maryland — claims Xinis called "eye-popping."

Who said what

Sunday's "strongly worded order" from Xinis "served two purposes," The New York Times said. It "offered a more detailed explanation" of her bench order Friday, and it "rejected a request by the Justice Department to pause the order as a federal appeals court considered its validity."

Attorney General Pam Bondi confirmed Sunday that the Justice Department had put Erez Reuveni — the veteran government lawyer who appeared before Xinis on Friday and expressed frustration with the DOJ's lack of forthcomingness — on administrative leave for not having argued the government's case "zealously" enough.

What next?

Xinis ordered the Trump administration to bring Abrego Garcia home by Monday night. It's not clear if the U.S. 4th Circuit Court of Appeals will step in before then.

What happened

U.S. District Judge Dale Ho Wednesday dismissed federal corruption charges against New York City Mayor Eric Adams, as requested by President Donald Trump's Justice Department. But Ho said he found the Trump administration's decision "troubling" and dropped the case "with prejudice," rejecting DOJ efforts to retain the ability to reintroduce the charges.

Who said what

Emil Bove, a Trump DOJ appointee, had ordered prosecutors to drop the charges "without prejudice" because prosecuting Adams would hamper his ability to aid Trump's immigration crackdown. Several top prosecutors in New York and Washington quit rather than carry out the order.

Judge Ho wrote that he couldn't force the government to pursue the charges, but "everything here smacks of a bargain: dismissal of the indictment in exchange for immigration policy concessions." Keeping the case open, he said, would "create the unavoidable perception" that Adams was "more beholden" to Trump than to "his own constituents." Adams celebrated the ruling, saying he "did nothing wrong" and was "gonna win" reelection in November.

What next?

Ho's ruling was the "best-case scenario" for Adams, but "how it played out did him no favors with voters," The New York Times said. The "sordid soap opera" has "perhaps irreparably damaged" his already weak standing with New Yorkers.

What happened

U.S. District Judge James Boasberg Monday reaffirmed his order barring President Donald Trump from deporting alleged Venezuelan gang members without a hearing, under a controversial interpretation of the 1798 Alien Enemies Act.

Justice Department lawyers, invoking the state secrets privilege, refused to provide Boasberg any more information on dozens of Venezuelans flown to an El Salvador prison on March 15, after he had ordered the flights aborted. A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C., appeared split Monday on whether to lift Boasberg's order.

Who said what

"Nazis got better treatment under the Alien Enemies Act" in World War II, appellate Judge Patricia Millett said to government lawyer Drew Ensign. "We certainly dispute the Nazi analogy," Ensign said, arguing that Boasberg's ruling was an "unprecedented and enormous intrusion" on the president's foreign policy decisions.

The Justice Department's unusual invocation of the state secrets privilege was a "patent act of defiance" to Boasberg that "sharply escalated the growing conflict between the administration and the judge — and, by extension, the federal judiciary — in a case that legal experts fear is precipitating a constitutional crisis," The New York Times said.

What next?

The appellate panel did not issue an opinion, but its eventual ruling "probably will shape how the Trump administration uses the Alien Enemies Act going forward," The Washington Post said, at least until the Supreme Court weighs in.

President Donald Trump campaigned on ending the "weaponization" of the Justice Department. The early going suggests that the Trump White House may instead use federal prosecutors to reward friends with dismissed prosecutions while subjecting the president's political enemies to heightened scrutiny. One such prosecutor — Ed Martin, the interim U.S. attorney for Washington, D.C. — already stands out.

Martin last week sent a letter to the dean of Georgetown University Law Center threatening not to hire the law school's grads as long as professors there to "promote and teach DEI," said CNN. The dean rebuffed Martin's threat: The prosecutor's letter is a "constitutional violation" that attacks the "University's mission as a Jesuit and Catholic institution," William Treanor said in his response. The exchange highlighted how Martin has used his newfound prosecutorial powers to "aggressively push Trump's retribution agenda," said CNN.

A firebrand eyeing Democrats

Martin is a "firebrand" conservative radio host who was an "active figure in Missouri politics for decades" before ascending to his current post, said The Washington Examiner. During Trump's time out of office, Martin was an "advocate for Jan. 6 Capitol rioters," said Bloomberg. After becoming the D.C. prosecutor, he oversaw the dismissal of "hundreds of criminal cases" against those same insurrection participants," while also demoting "multiple senior supervisors" who participated in the prosecutions during the Biden Administration. Such moves have "provoked the anger of Democrats," said the Examiner.

Apart from Jan. 6, Martin has "made his priorities unmistakable," said Vox. His office dismissed a campaign finance case against former Rep. Jeff Fortenberry (R-Neb.) while refusing to bring domestic violence charges against Rep. Cory Mills (R-Fla.). He has also signaled a desire to go after "Democratic politicians, the media, progressive groups" and other Trump rivals. In one incident, he responded to the controversy over the Associated Press' refusal to use the label "Gulf of America" by saying on X that as "President Trumps' lawyers [sic]" his office would be "vigilant in standing against entities like the AP that refuse to put America first." A community note appended to the post noted that the Justice Department is "not the personal law firm of the president."

Trump clearly likes what he sees. The president in February nominated Martin to take the federal prosecutor job on a permanent basis, said NBC News. The announcement came three days after Martin posted on X that he would investigate Jack Smith, the Biden-era special counsel who prosecuted Trump for trying to overturn the 2020 election. "We'll be in touch soon," Martin said in the post.

A 'real challenge' for confirmation

Democrats are also taking notice of Martin. Members of the Senate Judiciary Committee have filed a formal complaint accusing the prosecutor of "professional misconduct," said The Hill. Martin's behavior "undermines the integrity of our justice system and erodes public confidence in it," said the 10 Democrats who serve on the committee. It is also not clear whether Senate Republicans will back confirming Martin to keep the job permanently. That will be a "real challenge," said Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.).