I know. And outside links do not count as views. A lot of the time I just post screenshots and do not post links.
I don't have an explanation. I have never seen this happen with a thread before.
update - Trump withdraws harassment suit against journo to avoid Fed court dismissal order, then immed re files same lawsuit in state court
- Thread starter mandrill
- Start date
I don't have an explanation. I have never seen this happen with a thread before.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court will take up a Republican-led drive, backed by President Donald Trump's administration, to wipe away limits on how much political parties can spend in coordination with candidates for Congress and president.
The justices said Monday they will review an appellate ruling that upheld a provision of federal election law that is more than 50 years old, ignoring pleas from Democrats to leave the law in place. The Supreme Court itself upheld it in 2001.
But since Chief Justice John Roberts joined the court in 2005, a conservative majority has upended a variety of congressionally enacted limits on raising and spending money to influence elections. The court's 2010 Citizens United decision opened the door to unlimited independent spending in federal elections.
FILE - The Supreme Court is seen on Capitol Hill, Feb. 27, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Rod Lamkey, Jr.)© The Associated Press
Without the limits on party spending, large donors would be able to skirt caps on individual contributions to a candidate by directing unlimited sums to the party with the understanding that the money will be spent on behalf of the candidate, supporters of the law say.
Richard Hasen, an election law expert at the University of California at Los Angeles law school, has predicted the court will strike down the limits. “That may even make sense now in light of the prevalence of super PAC spending that has undermined political parties and done nothing to limit (and in fact increased) corruption and inequality,” Hasen wrote on the Election Law blog.
President Donald Trump answers questions from reporters as he meets with Congo's Foreign Minister Therese Kayikwamba Wagner, and Rwanda's Foreign Minister Olivier Nduhungirehe, Friday, June 27, 2025, in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)© The Associated Press
The Justice Department almost always defends federal laws when they are challenged in court. But the Trump administration notified the court that “this is the rare case that warrants an exception to that general approach” because it believes the law violates free-speech protections in the First Amendment.
The Republican committees for House and Senate candidates filed the lawsuit in Ohio in 2022, joined by two Ohio Republicans in Congress, then-Sen. J.D. Vance, who's now vice president, and then-Rep. Steve Chabot.
In 2025, the coordinated party spending for Senate races ranges from $127,200 in several states with small populations to nearly $4 million in California. For House races, the limits are $127,200 in states with only one representative and $63,600 everywhere else.
The court also agreed to referee a fight between internet service provider Cox Communications and record labels over illegal music downloads by Cox customers.
The justices will review a lower-court ruling in a lawsuit led by Sony Music Entertainment that Cox has to cut off customers who downloaded music they didn’t pay for or face liability for any future acts of digital piracy.
Supreme Court takes up a Republican appeal to end limits on party spending in federal elections
The justices said Monday they will review an appellate ruling that upheld a provision of federal election law that is more than 50 years old, ignoring pleas from Democrats to leave the law in place. The Supreme Court itself upheld it in 2001.
But since Chief Justice John Roberts joined the court in 2005, a conservative majority has upended a variety of congressionally enacted limits on raising and spending money to influence elections. The court's 2010 Citizens United decision opened the door to unlimited independent spending in federal elections.
FILE - The Supreme Court is seen on Capitol Hill, Feb. 27, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Rod Lamkey, Jr.)© The Associated Press
Without the limits on party spending, large donors would be able to skirt caps on individual contributions to a candidate by directing unlimited sums to the party with the understanding that the money will be spent on behalf of the candidate, supporters of the law say.
Richard Hasen, an election law expert at the University of California at Los Angeles law school, has predicted the court will strike down the limits. “That may even make sense now in light of the prevalence of super PAC spending that has undermined political parties and done nothing to limit (and in fact increased) corruption and inequality,” Hasen wrote on the Election Law blog.
President Donald Trump answers questions from reporters as he meets with Congo's Foreign Minister Therese Kayikwamba Wagner, and Rwanda's Foreign Minister Olivier Nduhungirehe, Friday, June 27, 2025, in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)© The Associated Press
The Justice Department almost always defends federal laws when they are challenged in court. But the Trump administration notified the court that “this is the rare case that warrants an exception to that general approach” because it believes the law violates free-speech protections in the First Amendment.
The Republican committees for House and Senate candidates filed the lawsuit in Ohio in 2022, joined by two Ohio Republicans in Congress, then-Sen. J.D. Vance, who's now vice president, and then-Rep. Steve Chabot.
In 2025, the coordinated party spending for Senate races ranges from $127,200 in several states with small populations to nearly $4 million in California. For House races, the limits are $127,200 in states with only one representative and $63,600 everywhere else.
The court also agreed to referee a fight between internet service provider Cox Communications and record labels over illegal music downloads by Cox customers.
The justices will review a lower-court ruling in a lawsuit led by Sony Music Entertainment that Cox has to cut off customers who downloaded music they didn’t pay for or face liability for any future acts of digital piracy.
Supreme Court takes up a Republican appeal to end limits on party spending in federal elections
One of my guesses is that the thread comes up in google searches, as it is not in the "members only" part of TERB.
I would like to post more about the Everglades death camp that the GOP proposes for migrants - I call it "Alligator Auschwitz" as the term Alligator Alcatraz doesn't really convey what I think the GOP is trying to do with this facility.
It does come across more as a concentration camp, I agree.
That would 30,000 views a month and 1,000 views a day.
Is mitch back?
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court on Monday threw out appellate rulings in favor of transgender people in four states following the justices' recent decision upholding a Tennessee ban on certain medical treatment for transgender youths.
But the justices took no action in cases from Arizona, Idaho and West Virginia involving the participation of transgender students on school sports teams. The court could say as soon as Thursday whether it will take up the issue in its next term.
The high court ordered appellate judges to reexamine cases from Idaho, North Carolina, Oklahoma and West Virginia involving access to medical care and birth certificates.
The action was unsurprising because the court had set the cases aside until after it decided the Tennessee case, as typically happens when the same legal issue is being considered.
The rulings all included findings that the restrictions on transgender people imposed by the states violate the Constitution's equal protection clause.
In the Tennessee case, the Supreme Court ruled that there was no constitutional violation in a state law prohibiting puberty blockers and hormone therapy to treat gender dysphoria in people younger than 18.
The justices ordered the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Virginia, to review its decision that West Virginia’s and North Carolina’s refusal to cover certain health care for transgender people with government-sponsored insurance is discriminatory.
The San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals will get back a case from Idaho stemming from the state's ban on certain surgical procedures for Medicaid recipients.
Supreme Court throws out appellate rulings in favor of transgender people in 4 states
The 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver will review its ruling blocking an Oklahoma ban on people changing their gender on birth certificates.
In one other case, from Kentucky, the justices rejected the appeal of transgender minors and their families challenging that state’s ban on gender-affirming care.
But the justices took no action in cases from Arizona, Idaho and West Virginia involving the participation of transgender students on school sports teams. The court could say as soon as Thursday whether it will take up the issue in its next term.
The high court ordered appellate judges to reexamine cases from Idaho, North Carolina, Oklahoma and West Virginia involving access to medical care and birth certificates.
The action was unsurprising because the court had set the cases aside until after it decided the Tennessee case, as typically happens when the same legal issue is being considered.
The rulings all included findings that the restrictions on transgender people imposed by the states violate the Constitution's equal protection clause.
In the Tennessee case, the Supreme Court ruled that there was no constitutional violation in a state law prohibiting puberty blockers and hormone therapy to treat gender dysphoria in people younger than 18.
The justices ordered the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Virginia, to review its decision that West Virginia’s and North Carolina’s refusal to cover certain health care for transgender people with government-sponsored insurance is discriminatory.
The San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals will get back a case from Idaho stemming from the state's ban on certain surgical procedures for Medicaid recipients.
Supreme Court throws out appellate rulings in favor of transgender people in 4 states
The 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver will review its ruling blocking an Oklahoma ban on people changing their gender on birth certificates.
In one other case, from Kentucky, the justices rejected the appeal of transgender minors and their families challenging that state’s ban on gender-affirming care.
Liberals love to spend other people's money, except when it comes to enforcing laws.
Not at all.
It's the fact that a law enforcement agency (ICE) which seems to arrest mainly law abiding, harmless long term residents, incl mothers, kids and old men and hold them in oppressive conditions without adequate food and medical care is going to be given more $$$ than the combined budget of the ATF, FBI, DEA and bureau of prisons. All of the latter are far more essential and far more professional agencies.
If the bill proposed to increase funding for the ATF or FBI, no one would complain.
The Justice Department is aggressively prioritizing efforts to strip some Americans of their U.S. citizenship.
Department leadership is directing its attorneys to prioritize denaturalization in cases involving naturalized citizens who commit certain crimes — and giving U.S. attorneys wider discretion on when to pursue this tactic, according to a June 11 memo published online. The move is aimed at U.S. citizens who were not born in the country; according to data from 2023, close to 25 million immigrants were naturalized citizens.
At least one person has already been denaturalized in recent weeks. On June 13, a judge ordered the revocation of the citizenship of Elliott Duke, who uses they/them pronouns. Duke is an American military veteran originally from the U.K. who was convicted for distributing child sexual abuse material — something they later admitted they were doing prior to becoming a U.S. citizen.
Denaturalization is a tactic that was heavily used during the McCarthy era of the late 1940s and the early 1950s and one that was expanded during the Obama administration and grew further during President Trump's first term. It's meant to strip citizenship from those who may have lied about their criminal convictions or membership in illegal groups like the Nazi party, or communists during McCarthyism, on their citizenship applications.
Assistant Attorney General Brett A. Shumate wrote in the memo that pursuing denaturalization will be among the agency's top five enforcement priorities for the civil division.
"The Civil Division shall prioritize and maximally pursue denaturalization proceedings in all cases permitted by law and supported by the evidence," he said.
The focus on denaturalization is just the latest step by the Trump administration to reshape the nation's immigration system across all levels of government, turning it into a major focus across multiple federal agencies. That has come with redefining who is let into the United States or has the right to be an American. Since his return to office, the president has sought to end birthright citizenship and scale back refugee programs.
But immigration law experts expressed serious concerns about the effort's constitutionality, and how this could impact families of naturalized citizens.
The DOJ memo says that the federal government will pursue denaturalization cases via civil litigation — an especially concerning move, said Cassandra Robertson, a law professor at Case Western Reserve University.
In civil proceedings, any individual subject to denaturalization is not entitled to an attorney, Robertson said; there is also a lower burden of proof for the government to reach, and it is far easier and faster to reach a conclusion in these cases.
Robertson says that stripping Americans of citizenship through civil litigation violates due process and infringes on the rights guaranteed by the 14th Amendment.
Hans von Spakovsky, with the conservative Heritage Foundation, supports the DOJ's denaturalization efforts. "I do not understand how anyone could possibly be opposed to the Justice Department taking such action to protect the nation from obvious predators, criminals, and terrorists."
As for the due process concerns, von Spakovsky said, "Nothing prevents that alien from hiring their own lawyer to represent them. They are not entitled to have the government — and thus the American taxpayer — pay for their lawyer."
"That is not a 'due process' violation since all immigration proceedings are civil matters and no individuals— including American citizens — are entitled to government-furnished lawyers in any type of civil matter," he said.
The DOJ and Trump White House declined to comment for this story.
Broad criteria
According to this new memo, the DOJ is expanding its criteria of which crimes put individuals at risk of losing their citizenship. That includes national security violations and committing acts of fraud against individuals or against the government, like Paycheck Protection Program loan fraud or Medicaid or Medicare fraud.
"To see that this administration is plotting out how they're going to expand its use in ways that we have not seen before is very shocking and very concerning," said Sameera Hafiz, policy director of the Immigrant Legal Resource Center, a national advocacy organization providing legal training in immigration law.
"It is kind of, in a way, trying to create a second class of U.S. citizens" — where one set of Americans is safe and those not born in the country are still at risk of losing their hard-fought citizenship, she said.
Other immigration experts point to another part of the guidance, which gives U.S. attorneys broader discretion to determine other eligible denaturalization cases. "These categories do not limit the Civil Division from pursuing any particular case," the memo states, and priorities for denaturalization can include "any other cases referred to the Civil Division that the Division determines to be sufficiently important to pursue."
Steve Lubet, professor emeritus at the Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law, said that language appears to grant the federal government "wide discretion" on deciding whom to target.
"Many of the categories are so vague as to be meaningless. It isn't even clear that they relate to fraudulent procurement, as opposed to post-naturalization conduct," he said.
Von Spakovsky argues, "When we extend the opportunity for naturalization to aliens, we are granting them a great privilege — the privilege of becoming a U.S. citizen. Quite frankly, I don't think it matters whether someone was a human trafficker or a drug smuggler before they entered the country, while they were applying for citizenship, or after their naturalization."
He continued, "Anyone who has abused the privilege of the opportunity of becoming a U.S. citizen should have that citizenship revoked when they engage in such reprehensible behavior."
Lubet, who has written extensively about denaturalization, also raised concerns about the potential impact on families — particularly children whose citizenship was derived through a parent whose naturalization was later revoked.
"What struck me is the ripple effect that this would have on children who were naturalized through their parents," he said. "People who thought they were safely American and had done nothing wrong can suddenly be at risk of losing citizenship."
The DOJ didn't respond to questions about how this could impact children of naturalized parents or what happens in cases where an individual would be left stateless by being denaturalized.
A slippery slope
The order to revoke the citizenship of Elliott Duke, the Army vet originally from the U.K., may be one of the first examples of the Trump administration's aggressive denaturalization efforts in Trump's second term.
In 2012, while serving in Germany, Duke began receiving and distributing child sexual abuse material via email and the internet, according to the DOJ.
In January the following year, Duke became a naturalized American citizen, but revoked their U.K. citizenship to do so.
The DOJ filed a legal case against Duke back in February of this year in Louisiana seeking Duke's denaturalization based both on the conviction for child sexual abuse material and the failure to disclose their crimes during the naturalization process.
In the months it took to get a decision on their case, Duke tried to get a defense attorney to help fight the case — to no avail, they told NPR. Duke was also unable to travel to Louisiana for the court proceedings.
"If you commit serious crimes before you become a U.S. citizen and then lie about them during your naturalization process, the Justice Department will discover the truth and come after you," Shumate, the assistant attorney general, said in a statement.
Duke is still trying to determine what options exist for an appeal and how this impacts their current prison term. But for now, Duke is effectively stateless.
"My heart shattered when I read the lines [of the order]. My world broke apart," Duke said.
Regardless of the crimes Duke committed, the situation sets a dangerous precedent, said Laura Bingham, executive director of the Temple University Institute for Law Innovation and Technology. If the government continues to open the question of citizenship up for people who have already received it, this creates a slippery slope for everyone, she said.
Citizenship "is not supposed to be something that you can continuously open up for some people, and you can't for others," Bingham said.
Denaturalization goes back to McCarthy era
In a 2019 report co-authored by Robertson, Un(Civil) Denaturalization, she writes that denaturalization was wielded frequently as a political tool in the McCarthy era.
"At the height of denaturalization, there were about 22,000 cases a year of denaturalization filed, and this was on a smaller population. It was huge," she told NPR.
The Supreme Court stepped in and issued a ruling in 1967 that said that denaturalization is "inconsistent with the American form of democracy, because it creates two levels of citizenship," Robertson explained.
"So the United States went from having 20,000 some cases of denaturalization a year to having just a handful, like 1, 2, 5, 6, very small numbers for years after 1967," Robertson said.
That is, until the Obama administration, which used new digital tools to find potential cases of naturalization fraud going back decades. Under Operation Janus, an initiative launched by immigration and justice officials in the Obama era, they claimed a national security interest in examining potential cases of immigration fraud that could be tied to terrorism.
Then Trump's first administration sought to significantly expand the government's use of denaturalization and chose to file denaturalization cases against individuals via civil courts rather than criminal.
Despite her concerns about the new criteria, Robertson is skeptical how many cases they would apply to.
"The thing is there just aren't very many cases that fit within [the Trump administration's] framework of priorities [for denaturalization]," Robertson said.
"So if they're really intending maximal enforcement, I think what they're going to end up doing is focusing on people who have not committed any serious infraction, or maybe any infraction at all, but people for whom there is a possibility" that there are grounds to revoke citizenship, Robertson said. "It fits in with the other ways that we've seen immigration enforcement happening" under this administration.
Department leadership is directing its attorneys to prioritize denaturalization in cases involving naturalized citizens who commit certain crimes — and giving U.S. attorneys wider discretion on when to pursue this tactic, according to a June 11 memo published online. The move is aimed at U.S. citizens who were not born in the country; according to data from 2023, close to 25 million immigrants were naturalized citizens.
At least one person has already been denaturalized in recent weeks. On June 13, a judge ordered the revocation of the citizenship of Elliott Duke, who uses they/them pronouns. Duke is an American military veteran originally from the U.K. who was convicted for distributing child sexual abuse material — something they later admitted they were doing prior to becoming a U.S. citizen.
Denaturalization is a tactic that was heavily used during the McCarthy era of the late 1940s and the early 1950s and one that was expanded during the Obama administration and grew further during President Trump's first term. It's meant to strip citizenship from those who may have lied about their criminal convictions or membership in illegal groups like the Nazi party, or communists during McCarthyism, on their citizenship applications.
Assistant Attorney General Brett A. Shumate wrote in the memo that pursuing denaturalization will be among the agency's top five enforcement priorities for the civil division.
"The Civil Division shall prioritize and maximally pursue denaturalization proceedings in all cases permitted by law and supported by the evidence," he said.
The focus on denaturalization is just the latest step by the Trump administration to reshape the nation's immigration system across all levels of government, turning it into a major focus across multiple federal agencies. That has come with redefining who is let into the United States or has the right to be an American. Since his return to office, the president has sought to end birthright citizenship and scale back refugee programs.
But immigration law experts expressed serious concerns about the effort's constitutionality, and how this could impact families of naturalized citizens.
The DOJ memo says that the federal government will pursue denaturalization cases via civil litigation — an especially concerning move, said Cassandra Robertson, a law professor at Case Western Reserve University.
In civil proceedings, any individual subject to denaturalization is not entitled to an attorney, Robertson said; there is also a lower burden of proof for the government to reach, and it is far easier and faster to reach a conclusion in these cases.
Robertson says that stripping Americans of citizenship through civil litigation violates due process and infringes on the rights guaranteed by the 14th Amendment.
Hans von Spakovsky, with the conservative Heritage Foundation, supports the DOJ's denaturalization efforts. "I do not understand how anyone could possibly be opposed to the Justice Department taking such action to protect the nation from obvious predators, criminals, and terrorists."
As for the due process concerns, von Spakovsky said, "Nothing prevents that alien from hiring their own lawyer to represent them. They are not entitled to have the government — and thus the American taxpayer — pay for their lawyer."
"That is not a 'due process' violation since all immigration proceedings are civil matters and no individuals— including American citizens — are entitled to government-furnished lawyers in any type of civil matter," he said.
The DOJ and Trump White House declined to comment for this story.
Broad criteria
According to this new memo, the DOJ is expanding its criteria of which crimes put individuals at risk of losing their citizenship. That includes national security violations and committing acts of fraud against individuals or against the government, like Paycheck Protection Program loan fraud or Medicaid or Medicare fraud.
"To see that this administration is plotting out how they're going to expand its use in ways that we have not seen before is very shocking and very concerning," said Sameera Hafiz, policy director of the Immigrant Legal Resource Center, a national advocacy organization providing legal training in immigration law.
"It is kind of, in a way, trying to create a second class of U.S. citizens" — where one set of Americans is safe and those not born in the country are still at risk of losing their hard-fought citizenship, she said.
Other immigration experts point to another part of the guidance, which gives U.S. attorneys broader discretion to determine other eligible denaturalization cases. "These categories do not limit the Civil Division from pursuing any particular case," the memo states, and priorities for denaturalization can include "any other cases referred to the Civil Division that the Division determines to be sufficiently important to pursue."
Steve Lubet, professor emeritus at the Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law, said that language appears to grant the federal government "wide discretion" on deciding whom to target.
"Many of the categories are so vague as to be meaningless. It isn't even clear that they relate to fraudulent procurement, as opposed to post-naturalization conduct," he said.
Von Spakovsky argues, "When we extend the opportunity for naturalization to aliens, we are granting them a great privilege — the privilege of becoming a U.S. citizen. Quite frankly, I don't think it matters whether someone was a human trafficker or a drug smuggler before they entered the country, while they were applying for citizenship, or after their naturalization."
He continued, "Anyone who has abused the privilege of the opportunity of becoming a U.S. citizen should have that citizenship revoked when they engage in such reprehensible behavior."
Lubet, who has written extensively about denaturalization, also raised concerns about the potential impact on families — particularly children whose citizenship was derived through a parent whose naturalization was later revoked.
"What struck me is the ripple effect that this would have on children who were naturalized through their parents," he said. "People who thought they were safely American and had done nothing wrong can suddenly be at risk of losing citizenship."
The DOJ didn't respond to questions about how this could impact children of naturalized parents or what happens in cases where an individual would be left stateless by being denaturalized.
A slippery slope
The order to revoke the citizenship of Elliott Duke, the Army vet originally from the U.K., may be one of the first examples of the Trump administration's aggressive denaturalization efforts in Trump's second term.
In 2012, while serving in Germany, Duke began receiving and distributing child sexual abuse material via email and the internet, according to the DOJ.
In January the following year, Duke became a naturalized American citizen, but revoked their U.K. citizenship to do so.
The DOJ filed a legal case against Duke back in February of this year in Louisiana seeking Duke's denaturalization based both on the conviction for child sexual abuse material and the failure to disclose their crimes during the naturalization process.
In the months it took to get a decision on their case, Duke tried to get a defense attorney to help fight the case — to no avail, they told NPR. Duke was also unable to travel to Louisiana for the court proceedings.
"If you commit serious crimes before you become a U.S. citizen and then lie about them during your naturalization process, the Justice Department will discover the truth and come after you," Shumate, the assistant attorney general, said in a statement.
Duke is still trying to determine what options exist for an appeal and how this impacts their current prison term. But for now, Duke is effectively stateless.
"My heart shattered when I read the lines [of the order]. My world broke apart," Duke said.
Regardless of the crimes Duke committed, the situation sets a dangerous precedent, said Laura Bingham, executive director of the Temple University Institute for Law Innovation and Technology. If the government continues to open the question of citizenship up for people who have already received it, this creates a slippery slope for everyone, she said.
Citizenship "is not supposed to be something that you can continuously open up for some people, and you can't for others," Bingham said.
Denaturalization goes back to McCarthy era
In a 2019 report co-authored by Robertson, Un(Civil) Denaturalization, she writes that denaturalization was wielded frequently as a political tool in the McCarthy era.
"At the height of denaturalization, there were about 22,000 cases a year of denaturalization filed, and this was on a smaller population. It was huge," she told NPR.
The Supreme Court stepped in and issued a ruling in 1967 that said that denaturalization is "inconsistent with the American form of democracy, because it creates two levels of citizenship," Robertson explained.
"So the United States went from having 20,000 some cases of denaturalization a year to having just a handful, like 1, 2, 5, 6, very small numbers for years after 1967," Robertson said.
That is, until the Obama administration, which used new digital tools to find potential cases of naturalization fraud going back decades. Under Operation Janus, an initiative launched by immigration and justice officials in the Obama era, they claimed a national security interest in examining potential cases of immigration fraud that could be tied to terrorism.
Then Trump's first administration sought to significantly expand the government's use of denaturalization and chose to file denaturalization cases against individuals via civil courts rather than criminal.
Despite her concerns about the new criteria, Robertson is skeptical how many cases they would apply to.
"The thing is there just aren't very many cases that fit within [the Trump administration's] framework of priorities [for denaturalization]," Robertson said.
"So if they're really intending maximal enforcement, I think what they're going to end up doing is focusing on people who have not committed any serious infraction, or maybe any infraction at all, but people for whom there is a possibility" that there are grounds to revoke citizenship, Robertson said. "It fits in with the other ways that we've seen immigration enforcement happening" under this administration.
The Justice Department's Civil Rights Division is in upheaval amid a mass exodus of attorneys as the Trump administration moves to radically reshape the division, shelving its traditional mission and replacing it with one focused on enforcing the president's executive orders.
Some 250 attorneys — or around 70% of the division's lawyers — have left or will have left the department in the time between President Trump's inauguration and the end of May, according to current and former officials.
It marks a dramatic turn for the storied division, which was created during the civil rights movement and the push to end racial segregation. For almost 70 years, it has sought to combat discrimination and to protect the constitutional rights of all Americans in everything from voting and housing to employment, education and policing.
Now, the administration is redirecting the division to enforce Trump's executive orders, including ending the alleged radical indoctrination in schools, defending women from "gender ideology extremism," and combatting antisemitism and purported anti-Christian bias.
Five current or former department officials, most of whom spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of retribution, say the current effort amounts to the dismantling of the division and its traditional mission.
"The Civil Rights Division exists to enforce civil rights laws that protect all Americans," said Stacey Young, a former division attorney who left the department in late January. "It's not an arm of the White House. It doesn't exist to enact the president's own agenda. That's a perversion of the separation of powers and the role of an independent Justice Department."
It is normal for the division's priorities to shift from administration to administration, particularly from one party to another. But the changes underway now are far beyond the normal recalibration, current and former employees and outside observers say.
The changes are being implemented by the division's new head, Harmeet Dhillon, a conservative attorney whom Trump appointed and the Senate confirmed in April.
Speaking at a recent Federalist Society event, Dhillon likened the division's work under Democratic administrations to a speeding train. She said Republican administrations typically try to "just slow the train down."
"There really hasn't been a focus on turning the train around and driving it in the opposite direction. And that's my vision of the DOJ civil rights [division]," she said. "We don't just slow down the woke. We take up the cause to achieve the executive branch's goals. This is the opportunity where we can ensure that our nation's civil rights laws benefit all Americans, not just a select few."
180-degree turn
Already, the administration has started to execute that 180-degree turn. Under the new leadership, the department has dropped investigations, and withdrawn statements of interest or amicus briefs in some 30 cases, according to public court records. Those include cases related to voting rights, alleged racial discrimination in hiring and civil actions against anti-abortion activists.
Dhillon has issued new mission statements for the division's 11 sections that push Trump's priorities and redirect resources to enforcing his executive orders. Those missions include "Protecting Children from Chemical and Surgical Mutilation," "Keeping Men Out of Women's Sports," "Eradicating Anti-Christian Bias" and "Additional Measures to Combat Antisemitism."
Young said the changes amount to the destruction of the division and its traditional work.
"The division right now is being decimated," said Young, who now runs Justice Connection, a group of department alumni that provides support to DOJ employees. "The head of the division and the Justice Department have decided that the division is going to enforce laws only with respect to favored communities of people."
Craig Futterman, a professor at the University of Chicago Law School, said the changes underway "are turning the Civil Rights Division on its head." The Trump administration, he added, "is using a division that has a history of protecting the most vulnerable among us to actually wage an all-out assault on the civil rights of vulnerable people, including Black people, brown people, women, LGBTQIA folk."
"I grew up in the wake of the civil rights movement where we celebrated all the heroes in the progress and the gains, and knowing that there's still so much work that needs to be done in this country. And this is the most dramatic backward turn that I've experienced in my lifetime," Futterman said.
Attorneys quitting en masse
The changes being imposed under the Trump administration have prompted attorneys in the division to leave en masse. Certain sections have been particularly hard hit by departures, including voting, education and special litigation.
Some of those who have left have quit, while others have taken the administration's deferred resignation program or retired early.
The latest round of mass departures occurred in recent weeks as the leadership began reassigning managers — widely seen as a push to have them quit — and forcing attorneys to work on task forces dedicated to certain Trump priorities like antisemitism or transgender issues.
Dhillon, in her remarks at the Federalist Society event, acknowledged the departures.
"We wish them well in their future endeavors and their passions," she said. "They need to pursue them elsewhere. That's not going to be happening at the DOJ."
Different from first Trump term
By and large, attorneys in the division feel like they can no longer do the work they've always been able to do, including during the first Trump administration.
Then, there was no mass exodus, department veterans say. Attorneys stayed put and continued their normal work. The administration scaled back — but did not end — work in a few priority areas, like policing.
But now, current and former officials say, there's a sense that the division is weaponizing the country's civil rights laws against populations it's supposed to be protecting. They say the abandonment of the traditional mission has been devastating. One official recalled attorneys walking around the hallways in tears or sobbing through meetings.
"The division has a few hundred lawyers who were diligent in making sure that people were held accountable for discrimination," Young said. "Without that enforcement, without the knowledge that unlawful discrimination can be tamped down through the division's work, we're going to see, I think, a whole lot more unlawful discrimination."
Some 250 attorneys — or around 70% of the division's lawyers — have left or will have left the department in the time between President Trump's inauguration and the end of May, according to current and former officials.
It marks a dramatic turn for the storied division, which was created during the civil rights movement and the push to end racial segregation. For almost 70 years, it has sought to combat discrimination and to protect the constitutional rights of all Americans in everything from voting and housing to employment, education and policing.
Now, the administration is redirecting the division to enforce Trump's executive orders, including ending the alleged radical indoctrination in schools, defending women from "gender ideology extremism," and combatting antisemitism and purported anti-Christian bias.
Five current or former department officials, most of whom spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of retribution, say the current effort amounts to the dismantling of the division and its traditional mission.
"The Civil Rights Division exists to enforce civil rights laws that protect all Americans," said Stacey Young, a former division attorney who left the department in late January. "It's not an arm of the White House. It doesn't exist to enact the president's own agenda. That's a perversion of the separation of powers and the role of an independent Justice Department."
It is normal for the division's priorities to shift from administration to administration, particularly from one party to another. But the changes underway now are far beyond the normal recalibration, current and former employees and outside observers say.
The changes are being implemented by the division's new head, Harmeet Dhillon, a conservative attorney whom Trump appointed and the Senate confirmed in April.
Speaking at a recent Federalist Society event, Dhillon likened the division's work under Democratic administrations to a speeding train. She said Republican administrations typically try to "just slow the train down."
"There really hasn't been a focus on turning the train around and driving it in the opposite direction. And that's my vision of the DOJ civil rights [division]," she said. "We don't just slow down the woke. We take up the cause to achieve the executive branch's goals. This is the opportunity where we can ensure that our nation's civil rights laws benefit all Americans, not just a select few."
180-degree turn
Already, the administration has started to execute that 180-degree turn. Under the new leadership, the department has dropped investigations, and withdrawn statements of interest or amicus briefs in some 30 cases, according to public court records. Those include cases related to voting rights, alleged racial discrimination in hiring and civil actions against anti-abortion activists.
Dhillon has issued new mission statements for the division's 11 sections that push Trump's priorities and redirect resources to enforcing his executive orders. Those missions include "Protecting Children from Chemical and Surgical Mutilation," "Keeping Men Out of Women's Sports," "Eradicating Anti-Christian Bias" and "Additional Measures to Combat Antisemitism."
Young said the changes amount to the destruction of the division and its traditional work.
"The division right now is being decimated," said Young, who now runs Justice Connection, a group of department alumni that provides support to DOJ employees. "The head of the division and the Justice Department have decided that the division is going to enforce laws only with respect to favored communities of people."
Craig Futterman, a professor at the University of Chicago Law School, said the changes underway "are turning the Civil Rights Division on its head." The Trump administration, he added, "is using a division that has a history of protecting the most vulnerable among us to actually wage an all-out assault on the civil rights of vulnerable people, including Black people, brown people, women, LGBTQIA folk."
"I grew up in the wake of the civil rights movement where we celebrated all the heroes in the progress and the gains, and knowing that there's still so much work that needs to be done in this country. And this is the most dramatic backward turn that I've experienced in my lifetime," Futterman said.
Attorneys quitting en masse
The changes being imposed under the Trump administration have prompted attorneys in the division to leave en masse. Certain sections have been particularly hard hit by departures, including voting, education and special litigation.
Some of those who have left have quit, while others have taken the administration's deferred resignation program or retired early.
The latest round of mass departures occurred in recent weeks as the leadership began reassigning managers — widely seen as a push to have them quit — and forcing attorneys to work on task forces dedicated to certain Trump priorities like antisemitism or transgender issues.
Dhillon, in her remarks at the Federalist Society event, acknowledged the departures.
"We wish them well in their future endeavors and their passions," she said. "They need to pursue them elsewhere. That's not going to be happening at the DOJ."
Different from first Trump term
By and large, attorneys in the division feel like they can no longer do the work they've always been able to do, including during the first Trump administration.
Then, there was no mass exodus, department veterans say. Attorneys stayed put and continued their normal work. The administration scaled back — but did not end — work in a few priority areas, like policing.
But now, current and former officials say, there's a sense that the division is weaponizing the country's civil rights laws against populations it's supposed to be protecting. They say the abandonment of the traditional mission has been devastating. One official recalled attorneys walking around the hallways in tears or sobbing through meetings.
"The division has a few hundred lawyers who were diligent in making sure that people were held accountable for discrimination," Young said. "Without that enforcement, without the knowledge that unlawful discrimination can be tamped down through the division's work, we're going to see, I think, a whole lot more unlawful discrimination."
