Inside a year of firings that have shaken the Trump Justice Department: ‘A great deal of fear’

Justice Department Exodus: Veteran Prosecutors Fired Under Trump Administration

Veteran federal prosecutor Michael Ben’Ary was checking his work phone at a red light while driving his child to soccer practice when he discovered it had been disabled. Hours later, he found an email informing him he had been terminated without explanation after two decades of service at the Justice Department.

Ben’Ary, who had prosecuted high-profile cases including a deadly attack on American service members in Afghanistan – a case President Trump had highlighted in his State of the Union address – was among hundreds of career Justice Department employees who have been fired or resigned since Trump returned to office.

His dismissal came shortly after a right-wing commentator falsely claimed to hundreds of thousands of followers that Ben’Ary was part of an “internal resistance” to prosecuting former FBI Director James Comey, despite Ben’Ary never being involved in the case.

As Attorney General Pam Bondi approaches her first year in office, the departures of attorneys like Ben’Ary have defined her turbulent tenure. Justice Connection, a network of department alumni, estimates more than 230 lawyers, agents and other employees were fired last year, with more than 6,400 employees leaving a department that had roughly 108,000 at the end of 2025.

“To lose people at that career level, people who otherwise intended to stay and now are either being discharged or themselves are walking away, is immensely damaging to the public interest,” said Stuart Gerson, a senior official in the George H.W. Bush administration and acting attorney general early in the Clinton administration.

The Justice Department counters that it has hired thousands of career attorneys over the last year and has characterized some departures as involving employees out of step with the administration’s agenda.

But former employees and legal experts describe the current purge as unprecedented in American history. Peter Keisler, a senior official in the George W. Bush Justice Department, called it “completely unprecedented in both its scale and scope and underlying motivation.”

The firings began even before Bondi arrived last February. Prosecutors on special counsel Jack Smith’s team that investigated Trump were terminated days after the inauguration, followed by prosecutors hired on temporary assignments for cases resulting from the January 6, 2021 Capitol riot.

“The people working on these cases were not political agents of any kind,” said Aliya Khalidi, a Jan. 6 prosecutor who was fired. “It’s all people who just care about the rule of law.”

The firings have continued throughout the year. Adam Schleifer, a Los Angeles prosecutor targeted in a social media post by far-right activist Laura Loomer, was fired in March. Attorney Erez Reuveni was dismissed in April after he conceded in court that a Salvadoran national was mistakenly deported.

Two weeks after prosecutor Maurene Comey completed a sex trafficking trial against Sean “Diddy” Combs, the daughter of former FBI Director James Comey was fired without explanation. She penned a pointed farewell, telling colleagues that “fear is the tool of a tyrant.”

Among the most affected areas is the Civil Rights Division, where over 200 employees who left in 2025 signed an open letter of protest. The Public Integrity Section, which prosecutes sensitive public corruption cases, has been hollowed out by resignations.

The departures have caused backlogs and staff shortages across the department. They have also affected efforts to fulfill Trump’s desire to prosecute political opponents. After forcing out the veteran U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, the administration replaced him with Lindsey Halligan, a White House aide with no experience as a federal prosecutor.

While Halligan secured indictments against Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James, both cases were later dismissed. One judge identified grave missteps in how Halligan presented the Comey case to a grand jury, while another called Halligan’s appointment unlawful.

For many career employees, the firings came abruptly. Anam Petit, an immigration judge appointed during the Biden administration, was terminated via email while on a break between hearings despite strong performance reviews. Joseph Tirrell, the department’s chief ethics officer, was fired in July just before a FIFA World Cup Final he had advised Bondi she could not ethically accept a free invitation to.

“There’s a great deal of fear there just because I was fired and just because so many others were summarily fired,” Tirrell said. “Are you going to get fired because you provided ethics advice? Are you going to get fired because you have a pride flag on your desk?”

In his farewell note to colleagues, Ben’Ary urged them to continue upholding the department’s principles despite the challenges. “Follow the facts and the law. Stand up for what we all believe in — our Constitution and the rule of law,” he wrote. “Our country depends on you.”