An open letter to career federal prosecutors
Yesterday, I joined more than 900 former federal prosecutors in signing an open letter meant to express support, as best we can, to the remaining career staff who continue to be under ferocious assault from the new administration (you can read it below).
Nothing remotely like this has ever happened at the Department. Career prosecutors willingly serve under department leadership of all political stripes, but never—until now—under leadership that treats them with contempt and orders them to violate their oaths.
Prosecutors are also accustomed to outside criticism from defendants or even constituencies within the community who are quick to accuse them of bias or improper conduct. That, too, goes with the territory. And it has gotten far worse in the last ten years under the drumbeat of benighted ideologues like Donald Trump.
But within the Department, everyone understands the mission. Everyone understands the privilege of representing the United States. Everyone adopts, as second nature, the tenet of justice without fear or favor. The very, very few who ever depart from these ideals are reviled within their offices.
It is difficult to explain to people who haven’t served within the Department the strength of the prevailing ethos of doing the right thing. It is the North Star of the Department. At the end of the day, the shared satisfaction from that common mission is what drives people and makes them give up financial and other rewards in exchange for the privilege of saying, “I represent the United States.”
And when the time comes for people to leave the Department—perhaps to put their kids through college—almost everyone feels they are leaving behind the greatest professional satisfaction they will ever have as lawyers.
Over the last several days, they’ve had to watch as that connective tissue that gives meaning and purpose to their work has been torn apart from within. New Department leaders are not only bullying the best of them for political ends, but they are also accusing their colleagues of having undertaken for years the very politicization that these officials are now shoving down their throats.
You would be hard-pressed to find a single prosecutor—from the most senior to the most junior, the most conservative to the most liberal—who doesn’t understand that the savagery is all driven by lies, the Alice-in-Wonderland lies of new leadership that insist, for crass political ends, that the prosecutors are the villains.
It’s a deep affront to their professionalism and dedication to the rule of law. It’s also personally alarming. Will they, too, be forced to choose between their oaths and their jobs? Just this morning, one of the most senior members of the career staff of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia resigned in response to the nomination of an election denier and defender of the marauders who stormed the Capitol.
It’s the worst time in memory to have what I and my colleagues have always regarded as the best legal job in the country.
And there’s no clear end in sight—not when their antagonists have presidential commissions on the wall and a zeal to punish career prosecutors for having done their jobs in exemplary fashion.
For alumni of the Department, who know the facts about how career prosecutors go about their jobs, it’s painful to watch and be unable to help. The letter I signed is the best we can do by way of reassurance—that people who know the Department know, to their bones, who is right and who is wrong; who is lying and who is telling the truth; and who is living up to their oaths versus who is insisting those oaths be abandoned.
The letter includes final words of encouragement that can’t neutralize the attacks from within. But at the very least, it may serve to reassure the 10,000+ career prosecutors that the entire world hasn’t gone insane and that there is a large cohort that understands the paramount importance—and now the potentially great professional cost—of doing the right thing.
“We salute and admire the courage many of you have already exhibited and that will guide all of you as you continue to serve the interests of justice. You’ve responded to ethical challenges of a type no public servant should ever be forced to confront, with principle and conviction, in the finest traditions of the Department of Justice.”
Talk to you later.
February 17, 2025
An open letter to career federal prosecutors:
Like you, each of us devoted years of our professional lives to pursuing justice on behalf of the American people. Although we dutifully carried out the lawful enforcement priorities of the Executive Branch irrespective of who headed it, the oath we swore was to the Constitution—not to the President, Attorney General, or any other individual.
Our obligations didn’t stop at the oath we took to support and defend the Constitution. They included upholding a set of values that have guided the United States Department of Justice for decades. These values are ingrained in the Department’s DNA as exemplified by the Principles of Federal Prosecution, which were written to ensure federal prosecutors exercise their tremendous power fairly, without regard to partisan politics, and in furtherance of the rule of law.
As prosecutors, we were rightly prohibited from making criminal charging decisions based on someone’s political association, activities or beliefs, or because of our personal feelings about them. We knew it was impermissible to treat a defendant more leniently just because they were powerful or well-connected, or more harshly because they were not. We were taught to pursue justice without fear or favor, and knew our decisions to investigate and charge should be based only on the facts and the law. We knew these values were more than just requirements in a manual—they were foundational to a fair and just legal system. And we upheld them no matter who was President.
Against this backdrop, we have watched with alarm as these values have been tested by recent actions of the Department’s leadership. Some of you have been ordered to make charging decisions based expressly on considerations other than the facts and the law, including to serve solely political purposes. Some of you have been forced to consider whether your actions will result in the elimination of the Public Integrity Section, created in the wake of the Watergate scandal, and whose vital work is intended to protect the public from government corruption. Several of you have resigned, and others are wondering what will happen to the Department we served and revere.
To all of you, we communicate this: We salute and admire the courage many of you have already exhibited, and that will guide all of you as you continue to serve the interests of justice. You have responded to ethical challenges of a type no public servant should ever be forced to confront with principle and conviction, in the finest traditions of the Department of Justice. We know there will be more challenges ahead, and we have no doubt that those of you who continue to serve will uphold the Department’s values for the sake of the rule of law, just as you have always done. Please know that when you do, generations of former federal prosecutors are watching with pride and admiration and stand ready to support you in this honorable pursuit.
Download the open letter and see the names of more than 900 former federal prosecutors who signed it here:
As a career federal prosecutor (1989-2022) I’d like to add my name to the list of signatories.
Thank you so very much. I needed to have a reason to hope. To know there is a flickering light at the end of this tunnel.