Tag: doj

‘Loyal Public Servants’: Whistleblowers Punished for Exposing Hunter Biden Protection Scheme Reach Settlement

Compensation being paid, and DOJ using ‘this example’ to train federal prosecutors.

Two former FBI officials who were punished under the Biden administration for their efforts to expose a protection scheme for first son Hunter Biden now have reached settlements in their lawsuits.

Hunter Biden, of course, faced both gun and tax charge convictions, cases that could have left him behind bars for years.

Then his daddy gave him a get-out-of-jail free card through a presidential pardon that Joe Biden actually signed, unlike many of his pardons that were issued through autopen signatures.

The settlements were reached for former Supervisory Special Agent Gary Shapley and Special Agent Joe Ziegler who had charged illegal retaliation against them.

The settlements with the IRS and Justice Department (DOJ) “included significant compensation for damages and a requirement for new training for federal prosecutors to deter future whistleblower retaliation.”

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Bondi DOJ Backs Warrantless Invasion Of Gun Owners’ Homes

The Department of Justice under Attorney General Pam Bondi is advancing an argument that threatens to hollow out the Fourth Amendment’s core protection: that Americans may be secure in their homes against warrantless searches.

The lawsuit is Case v. Montana. After a difficult breakup, William Trevor Case was at home alone when police arrived for a so-called “welfare check.” They spent nearly an hour outside his house. Officers walked around the property, shined flashlights through windows, and even discussed calling his relatives or reaching him directly. They never did. Instead, they retrieved rifles and a ballistic shield, broke down his door without a warrant, and shot him. 

The Montana Supreme Court upheld the police’s warrantless entry. Apparently, the government’s “reasonable suspicion” that Treavor Case might need “help” was sufficient to justify an armed warrantless intrusion into his home. That standard is alarmingly low. The Fourth Amendment requires probable cause and judicial approval before government agents may enter a home. It does not permit entry based on a hunch.

And it was not as if obtaining a warrant would have been difficult. A recent Harvard Law Review study found that 93 percent of warrants are approved on first submission, often in less than three minutes. With modern technology, police can draft and submit warrant requests directly from their phones. The officers in Montana had nearly an hour to seek judicial approval. They chose not to.

The U.S. Supreme Court addressed a similar issue in Caniglia v. Strom in 2021. In that case, officers entered a man’s home without a warrant after a domestic dispute, claiming they were acting as “community caretakers.” The Court unanimously rejected that argument. Justice Clarence Thomas wrote that the Fourth Amendment’s protections do not vanish just because police say they are trying to help. The Court allowed for true emergencies—cases of imminent harm or death—but drew a clear line against open-ended “caretaking” exceptions.

The facts in Montana look nothing like an emergency. Body camera transcripts reveal that officers themselves doubted that Case required immediate aid. One noted that “chances are pretty slim” he needed urgent medical attention. They discussed staging medical personnel outside but decided against it. After forty minutes of hesitation, they declared the situation an “emergency” and broke in anyway.

In any other context, an armed entry without a warrant would be understood as unlawful. The Constitution does not stop at the property line of a gun owner. If a homeowner responds defensively to armed intruders, the law recognizes the basic right of self-defense. What transforms that same scenario into a police action is supposed to be the warrant requirement. Strip that away, and the police have no more right to enter than anyone else.

Pam Bondi’s Department of Justice, however, has sided with Montana. 

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DOJ Brings Terrorism Charges Against ‘Militant’ Antifa Cell That Attacked ICE Facility

A federal grand jury indicted two alleged Antifa members on counts of “providing material support to terrorists,” the “attempted murder of officers and employees of the United States,” and “discharging firearms during, in relation to, and in furtherance of a crime of violence,” according to the indictment.

These are reportedly the first terrorism charges associated with Antifa.

The charges originate from a July 4 attack on the Prairieland Detention Center in Alvarado, Texas, allegedly by Cameron Arnold, Zachary Evetts, indicted, and several co-conspirators, as previously reported by The Federalist. The Department of Homeland Security was using the facility to house illegal migrants ahead of their deportation.

According to the indictment, attackers “began by shooting fireworks toward the facility and vandalizing vehicles and a guard shed.” DHS personnel contacted local law enforcement for support.

The indictment says Arnold yelled “get to the rifles,” and fired on the officers. He hit an Alvarado police officer, who returned fire, the document says. The attackers left after Arnold’s rifle jammed. Police arrested “most of the Antifa cell shortly after the attack,” and arrested Arnold the next day, according to the indictment.

The indictment describes Antifa as a “militant enterprise made up of networks of individuals and small groups, primarily ascribing to a revolutionary anarchist or autonomous Marxist ideology, which explicitly calls for the overthrow of the United States Government, law enforcement authorities, and the system of law.”

The document acknowledged a pattern “beginning in 2025” of “Antifa adherents” targeting ICE facilities and agents, in protest of “policy on the removal of illegal aliens.” It cites one Antifa member in an encrypted chat saying, “I’m done with peaceful protests” and “Blue lives don’t matter.”

President Trump officially designated Antifa as a domestic terrorist organization last month.

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Deep State Prosecutors Attack DOJ’s Investigation Into Whether Biden’s FBI Secretly Destroyed Classified Documents in “Burn Bags” to Protect Comey

Deep State ‘career’ prosecutors in the Western District of Virginia are attacking the DOJ’s investigation into whether Biden’s FBI secretly destroyed classified documents in ‘burn bags’ to protect James Comey with leaks to the New York Times.

As previously reported, the DOJ is investigating whether the FBI, during Joe Biden’s presidency, secretly destroyed documents to protect James Comey and John Brennan.

James Comey served as the Director of the FBI from 2013 to May 2017, when Trump fired him.

John Brennan served as the Director of the CIA from 2013 to 2017.

According to The Times, the investigation is related to a report that revealed that Kash Patel found thousands of Russia Hoax documents in “burn bags” in a secret room at the FBI.

Over the summer, Fox News reported that FBI Director Kash Patel found thousands of Russia collusion hoax documents in “burn bags” in a secret room at the FBI.

One of the documents in the burn bags included the classified annex to the John Durham report that includes the underlying intelligence he investigated.

CIA Director John Ratcliffe recently declassified the annex to Durham’s final report and sent it to Senator Grassley, who released it to the public.

Fox News also reported that Kash Patel and his team of investigators discovered a “previously undisclosed” SCIF at the FBI headquarters.

The Times reported that senior FBI officials who worked at the headquarters are also being investigated.

In August, Trump-appointed Interim US Attorney Todd Gilbert, who was overseeing the ‘burn bags’ case in the Western District of Virginia, was forced out after he reportedly refused to remove a high-ranking prosecutor who claimed the evidence in the case was flimsy, according to The Times.

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Rabid Leftist Who Spat on Ed Martin and Kicked US Marshals Will Avoid Prison Time After Biden Judge Sentences Her to ‘Time Served’

The rabid leftist who spat on DOJ official Ed Martin and kicked US Marshals will avoid prison time after a Biden-appointed federal judge sentenced her to ‘time served.’

The Justice Department sought 18 months in prison for Emily Sommer, the unhinged leftist who spat on Ed Martin and kicked US Marshals earlier this year.

Judge Jia Cobb, a Biden appointee, sentenced Sommer to four months time served. Sommer was sentenced to fourth months time served, home confinement and probation, rather than prison time.

In May, the Justice Department charged Emily Gabriella Sommer for assaulting Ed Martin.

Sommer was charged with violation of 18 U.S.C. § 111 (Assaulting, resisting, or impeding certain officers and employees of the United States).

In June, the DOJ asked the Court to detain Emily Sommer pending trial because she threatened Ed Martin and Jeannine Pirro in a series of X posts.

Emily Sommer was put in a DC jail after threatening a neighbor with a crowbar. She also physically attacked US Marshals after being removed from the courtroom in May.

“Sommer became agitated during her initial appearance in court on May 22 upon learning the prosecutor’s office intended to seek a more serious version of the assault charge that requires forcible contact and carries a maximum sentence of up to 8 years in prison. While in holding after being removed from the courtroom, Sommer allegedly spit and kicked on two U.S. Marshals. A second superseding indictment was filed in June with two additional assault counts for the incident,” WUSA 9 reported.

Sommer pleaded guilty to three counts of assault for spitting on Ed Martin and assaulting US Marshals.

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Fired Eastern District of Virginia Prosecutor Michael Ben’Ary Denies Alleged Texts Claiming He Dreams of Trump’s Death

The Justice Department last Wednesday fired the top national security prosecutor in the Eastern District of Virginia.

Michael Ben’Ary was fired after investigative reporter Julie Kelly publicly called him out as a top advisor to Lisa Monaco.

Lisa Monaco was an Obama-Biden partisan hack who targeted Trump and threatened to indict top Republicans for January 6.

Monaco was part of Obama’s secret team that met in the White House basement in 2016 to discuss how to set up Donald Trump in their Trump-Russia collusion sham.

Last week Michael Ben’Ary whined in a letter to colleagues after he was fired and encouraged them to continue to defy Trump appointees.

“I am even more disappointed to see what has happened to this office and the Department of Justice in just a few short months. The decisions to remove experienced career officials from US Attorneys Offices, the FBI, and other critical parts of DOJ undermines our country’s ability to counter terrorist organizations, malign nation-state actors, and countless others that seek to harm our nation and its citizens.”

“While I am no longer your colleague, I ask that each of you continue to do the right thing, in the right way, for the right reasons. Follow the fact and the law. Stand up for what we all believe in – our Constitution and the rule of law. Our country depends on you,” he wrote.

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Trump Calls Off Diplomacy With Maduro As Secret DOJ-Approved Kill List Revealed

Several significant developments this week have paved the way for more likely US military escalation off the coast of and in Venezuela, at a moment of unprecedented numbers of Pentagon assets parked in the Caribbean.

First, President Trump has called off diplomatic efforts to reach an agreement with Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, The New York Times reported Monday. The president called his special envoy, Richard Grenell, who had been leading the efforts to negotiate with Maduro, informing him the US halting all diplomatic outreach with the Venezuelan government.

As of about two weeks ago, Grenell confirmed that contacts with the Maduro government had been ongoing, however, this statement caught other top members of the administration – especially Secretary Marco Rubio – off guard.

Another big development, following the Pentagon’s at least four strikes thus far on boats believed involved in drug smuggling operations, is the revelation of a classified legal opinion from the DOJ providing cover to use military force against an expanding list of cartels and suspected drug traffickers.

“The opinion, which was produced by the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel and has not been previously reported, argues that the president is allowed to authorize deadly force against a broad range of cartels because they pose an imminent threat to Americans,” CNN reports. “The list of cartels goes beyond those the administration has publicly designated as terrorist organizations, the people familiar with the opinion said.”

It essentially gives the US carte blanche for an open-ended war against these groups on the secret list, which hearkens back in parallel to the Obama years of secret drone wars in the Middle East, particularly Yemen.

Indeed analysts cited in the CNN report which broke the story compared the classified list to similar ones in the immediate yeas after 9/11.

“If the OLC opinion authorizing strikes on cartels is as broad as it seems, it would mean DOJ has interpreted the president to have such extraordinary powers that he alone can decide to prosecute a war far broader than what Congress authorized after the attacks on 9/11,” Sarah Harrison, a senior analyst at the Crisis Group, told the outlet.

“By this logic, any small, medium or big group that is trafficking drugs into the US – the administration could claim it amounts to an attack against the United States and respond with lethal force,” added Harrison. So far the US has been engaged in shoot to kill actions of the Venezuelan coast targeting ‘narco-terrorists’ and traffickers.

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FBI: Jack Smith, Biden DOJ Tracked Phone Calls of GOP Senators, Congressman

Nearly ten Republican senators and a representative had their private communications allegedly tracked by former Special Counsel Jack Smith under the Biden administration, FBI Director Kash Patel revealed Monday.

Files obtained by Fox News show that Smith, in his official capacity at the Department of Justice (DOJ) as he investigated President Donald Trump and the events of January 6, 2021, was allegedly tracking the phone calls of Republican Sens. Lindsey Graham (SC), Marsha Blackburn (TN), Ron Johnson (WI), Josh Hawley (MO), Cynthia Lummis (WY), Bill Hagerty (TN), Dan Sullivan (AK), Tommy Tuberville (AL), and Republican Rep. Mike Kelly (PA).

The alarming document, revealing that Smith and his “Arctic Frost” team had subpoenaed telephone providers for the lawmakers’ records in 2023, was “recently discovered” by Patel, according to Fox News.

Patel confirmed the legitimacy of the findings in an X post, writing, “We recently uncovered proof that phone records of U.S. lawmakers were seized for political purposes.”

“That abuse of power ends now,” the FBI director continued. “Under my leadership, the FBI will deliver truth and accountability, and never again be weaponized against the American people.”

An FBI official told the outlet that Smith and his team, which was opened in the bureau in 2022, were able to see which numbers the politicians contacted, the locations from where the calls originated, and the locations where they were received. 

Officials also explained that the records were investigated pursuant to an oversight request from Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA), which Patel and FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino personally directed in response. 

A source added that the calls were “likely in reference to the vote to certify the 2020 election,” Fox News reported.

Bongino briefed the impacted lawmakers on Monday afternoon and told the publication it is a “disgrace” that he had to reveal those findings. 

“It is a disgrace that I have to stand on Capitol Hill and reveal this — that the FBI was once weaponized to track the private communications of U.S. lawmakers for political purposes,” Bongino said. “That era is over.”

He added, “Under our leadership, the FBI will never again be used as a political weapon against the American people.”

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Why Isn’t the Department of Justice Prosecuting Letitia James for Mortgage Fraud?

Republican strategist Roger Stone asked bluntly on Twitter on Saturday, “Who at the DOJ is blocking the prosecution of the entire Russian Collusion cabal as well as crooks like Letitia James and Adam Schiff?”

President Donald Trump has echoed similar frustrations on Truth Social, demanding action against New York Attorney General Letitia James, who pursued the civil fraud case against himself and his organization in New York.

The question now reverberating through conservative circles is clear: why is the Department of Justice refusing to act?

One of Donald Trump’s most consequential missteps during his first term was his refusal to take control of the Department of Justice, the very branch he led as the nation’s chief law enforcement officer.

Trump seemed to be intimidated by the media and Democrats who screamed for the DOJ to remain “independent.”

As a result, the DOJ launched investigations and prosecutions targeting Trump and his allies, from Paul Manafort to Roger Stone, while ignoring mounting evidence of misconduct by government officials involved in the Russia hoax.

When Joe Biden took over, the DOJ became even more partisan, prosecuting January 6 protesters and Donald Trump himself.

For his second term, Trump vowed reform. His initial choice for Attorney General, Congressman Matt Gaetz, withdrew amid congressional backlash, leading to the appointment of former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi.

But Bondi’s record of capitulating to the mob was largely unknown. In 2012 in Florida, she bowed to media and protesters led by Al Sharpton and Ben Crump by appointing a special prosecutor in the George Zimmerman case, despite the police having already ruled the shooting of Trayvon Martin as self-defense.

My 2019 film, The Trayvon Hoax, exposed the entire prosecution as a hoax based on a fake witness. Zimmerman’s acquittal was the reason for the founding of the Black Lives Matter group.

Bondi’s caving in was thus responsible for BLM’s formation and the mayhem that followed, including “hands up don’t shoot” and the George Floyd riots.

When questioned about decision-making for today’s DOJ, Trump has repeatedly said, “it’s up to Pam.” But this “hands off” deference may once again prove costly.

As documented in my investigative reports in The Gateway Pundit beginning in March 2025, Letitia James engaged in 24 years of mortgage fraud and housing regulation violations in connection with her 5-unit Brooklyn apartment building.

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DOJ Opens Investigation Into Antifa-Indulging Portland Police

Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon sent a message Friday to the anarchist-abetting Portland Police Bureau (PPB) and Portland’s leftist city attorney: unlawful policing will not be tolerated.

Dhillon, who heads up the Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division, said her office has launched an investigation into Portland law enforcement after Antifa thugs allegedly attacked independent reporters during increasingly violent riots at the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Facility in South Portland.

Police arrested Nick Sortor on Thursday on disorderly conduct charges following an altercation with the leftist protesters. Earlier this week, Post Millennial reporter Katie Daviscourt said she was assaulted with a flagpole while covering the nightly mayhem at the ICE building.

In her letter to Portland Police Chief Bob Day and City Attorney Robert Taylor, Dhillon demands answers about the Portland Police Bureau’s handling of the incidents, specifically the “use of its policing powers in a manner that may be based on viewpoint discrimination.” It also suggests that the city may not be living up to its agreement with the Justice Department to cease activity that “deprives individuals of rights, privileges, or immunities secured by the Constitution or federal law.”

On Friday afternoon, Dhillon posted on X that the Civil Rights Division, at the direction of Attorney General Pam Bondi, launched the probe into Portland’s “highly questionable police practices.” 

“We will not leave the people of Portland at the whims of criminals and woke cops. Govern yourselves accordingly!” the assistant AG vowed.

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