Tag: doj

Here’s All The Key Figures Who Have Resigned Over The Epstein Files…So Far

We are starting to finally see the beginning of a series of high-profile resignations following the Justice Department’s latest release of millions of pages tied to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

The documents—emails, financial records, and photographs—name figures from politics, finance, diplomacy, academia, and the arts. Although inclusion in the files is not evidence of wrongdoing, the renewed scrutiny has prompted several prominent leaders to step down, as was documented by Time yesterday. 

As we’ve covered individually, those who have resigned include Thomas Pritzker, Kathy Ruemmler, Sultan Ahmed bin Sulayem, Brad Karp, Mona Juul, Peter Mandelson, Miroslav Lajcak, Jack Lang, and David A. Ross. In many instances, the records describe years of contact with Epstein, sometimes extending beyond his 2008 guilty plea for soliciting prostitution from a minor, intensifying public and political pressure.

Thomas Pritzker resigned as executive chairman of Hyatt Hotels after emails showed he remained in contact with Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell beyond Epstein’s conviction.

Some messages referenced plans to meet, including for dinners. Pritzker said he exercised “terrible judgment” in maintaining the relationships and expressed deep regret, while authorities have not accused him of misconduct.

Kathy Ruemmler stepped down as chief legal officer of Goldman Sachs after emails suggested a friendly relationship with Epstein years after his plea deal, including correspondence referencing gifts.

Ruemmler, who previously served as White House counsel under President Barack Obama, has said she never represented Epstein and was unaware of his crimes. She later described him as a “monster” and said she regretted ever knowing him.

Sultan Ahmed bin Sulayem resigned as chairman and CEO of DP World after correspondence indicated a lengthy friendship with Epstein that continued for years.

Some emails released by the Justice Department included personal exchanges that drew scrutiny. Authorities have not accused him of wrongdoing, and the company did not cite Epstein in announcing his departure.

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Trump DOJ Axes NY Immigration Judge Who Rubber-Stamped an Absurd 97 Percent of Asylum Claims

The Trump administration has fired New York immigration Judge Vivienne Gordon-Uruakpa, who boasted the highest asylum approval rate in the state at a staggering 97%.

The 66-year-old judge, known for her soft-on-asylum rulings, was terminated in September without fanfare, as part of a broader purge of lenient judges under Attorney General Pam Bondi.

Gordon-Uruakpa’s ousting came to light after she vanished from the downtown Manhattan courthouse website, where she had presided over cases.

A Justice Department spokesperson confirmed the site is up to date but declined to elaborate on the specific reasons for her firing, though an unnamed government official speaking to the New York Post pointed to her prolific record of granting asylum as the key factor.

Unlike lifetime-appointed federal judges, immigration court judges serve at the pleasure of the Attorney General and can be hired or fired, a power the Trump team is using as another tool to restore order.

Gordon-Uruakpa graduated from Fordham University and Howard University School of Law. Her courtroom became a virtual rubber stamp for asylum seekers, approving claims at a rate far exceeding her colleagues and contributing to the backlog of cases that critics say enabled illegal immigration under previous administrations.

This firing is not an isolated incident.

The Trump administration has axed more than 100 overly permissive immigration judges during his term.

Meanwhile, tougher judges like John Burns, known for denying asylum at high rates, have been promoted. He was named Acting Assistant Chief Judge in January.

The results are undeniable. Deportation rates are soaring, with nearly 80% of migrants seeking asylum being deported in the last quarter, according to Syracuse University’s TRAC program.

Illegal border crossings have also plummeted under Trump’s renewed enforcement policies.

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DOJ Moves to Strip U.S. Citizenship From Former North Miami Mayor Over Immigration Fraud

The U.S. Department of Justice and the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Florida have filed a civil denaturalization complaint in the U.S. District Court in Miami, against Phillipe Bien-Amie, also known as Jean Philippe Janvier, a native of Haiti who used two identities to procure immigration benefits — and eventually acquire U.S. citizenship — after illegally entering the U.S.

Before he became a U.S. citizen under the name Philippe Bien-Aime, the defendant used a fraudulent, “photo-switched” passport to enter the U.S. under the name Jean Philippe Janvier. In 2001, Bien-Aime was placed in removal proceedings and ordered removed under the Janvier identity. 

He appealed the removal order, but he withdrew the appeal, representing that he had returned to live in Haiti. In reality, Bien-Aime remained in the U.S. and, using the new name and date of birth, married a U.S. citizen to obtain permanent resident status. The marriage was fraudulent and invalid because he was already married to a Haitian citizen. After making numerous false and fraudulent statements in adjustment and naturalization proceedings, he was naturalized in 2006 under the Bien-Aime identity.   

The man served as the mayor of North Miami. 

“This Administration will not permit fraudsters and tricksters who cheat their way to the gift of U.S. citizenship,” said Assistant Attorney General Brett A. Shumate of the Justice Department’s Civil Division. “The passage of time does not diminish blatant immigration fraud.”

The complaint, filed on Feb. 18, alleges that Bien-Aime illegally procured naturalization for several reasons. 

First, he was subject to a final removal order, which disqualified him from naturalization and precluded the former Immigration and Naturalization Service from considering his application for permanent resident status. Second, the removal order prohibited U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services from considering his naturalization application and granting U.S. citizenship. 

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IT WAS ALL A SETUP: FBI Internal Emails Reveal Biden White House Coordinated with DOJ on Mar-a-Lago Raid

Fox News on Friday obtained internal FBI emails proving that the Biden White House coordinated with the Justice Department to raid Mar-a-Lago.

Biden’s FBI raided Mar-a-Lago in 2022 and seized boxes of records from Trump’s Florida estate.

More than 3 dozen machine-gun-toting agents descended on Mar-a-Lago in August 2022, and by November, Biden’s DOJ appointed a special counsel to investigate the documents stored at the Florida residence.

The raid came after the National Archives (NARA) visited Mar-a-Lago in early 2022 and demanded documents from Trump.

Court documents revealed that Biden’s FBI authorized the use of deadly force during their raid on Mar-a-Lago, which was authorized by US Attorney General Merrick Garland.

Corrupt FBI agents released staged photos of the ‘classified’ documents laid out on the floor of Mar-a-Lago.

Newly obtained FBI emails reveal Joe Biden was indeed coordinating with the DOJ in the months leading up to the Mar-a-Lago raid.

The Biden White House repeatedly denied having any foreknowledge of the raid. In fact, Joe Biden said he found out about the raid in media reports.

“New emails obtained by Fox News from May 2022, 3 months before Mar-a-Lago was raided by the FBI, illustrated coordination between the White House Counsel’s office and the DOJ regarding an interview of Walt Nauta,” Fox News reporter Davis Spunt said.

Walt Nauta, a former White House employee and Navy veteran who worked as a valet for Trump and served as a personal staffer at Mar-a-Lago, was indicted along with Trump in 2023.

According to the federal indictment reviewed by The Gateway Pundit, Nauta was charged along with Trump in counts 32, 33, 43, 35, and 36.

The charges include conspiracy, withholding a document or record, corruptly concealing a document or record, concealing a document in a federal investigation and scheme to conceal.

Walt Nauta was also charged alone in count 38: False statements and misrepresentations.

The charges against Walt Nauta were dismissed last year.

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DoJ Released Much More on Epstein’s Israel Ties—But Media Still Aren’t Much Interested

Late last month, the US Department of Justice (DoJ) published 3.5 million pages about convicted sex offender and financier Jeffrey Epstein.

On top of the grotesque and horrifying photos and emails that appear to offer more evidence of systemic and widespread child abuse, the Epstein files revealed further allegations of his ties to Israel and its intelligence agency Mossad.

The Epstein/Israel revelations have been covered at length by independent and overseas media outlets:

  • “The Israeli government installed security equipment and controlled access to a Manhattan apartment building” that Epstein managed (Drop Site News, 2/18/26). Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak and Israeli spy Yoni Koren were frequent guests at the apartment, and Rafi Shlomo, then–director of protective service at the Israeli mission to the United Nations, “controlled access to the apartment for guests, and even conducted background checks on cleaners and Epstein’s employees.”
  • An informant told the FBI he “became convinced that Epstein was a co-opted Mossad agent” (Middle East Monitor, 2/8/26).
  • Epstein emailed Barak in December 2018: “You should make clear that I don’t work for Mossad :)” (Dissident, 2/2/26). Barak responded, “You or I?” Epstein replied, “That I don’t :).”
  • Epstein emailed Barak twice in November 2017 (London Times, 2/8/26): “Did Boies ask you to help obtain former Mossad agents to do dirty investigations?” and “Boies said he got to the Mossad guys through you? True? This is getting a lot of press.” Barak responded, “Call me. [Redacted] in Paris.” (Epstein was likely referring to attorney David Boies, who was facing scrutiny at the time for hiring a private firm, run largely by former Mossad officers, to investigate women who accused his client Harvey Weinstein of rape, and journalists trying to expose the allegations—New Yorker, 11/6/17.)
  • Epstein’s foundation backed pro-Israel projects like Friends of Israel Defense Forces and the Jewish National Fund, which buys land in Palestine to build settlements (Middle East Eye, 2/7/26).

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Boasberg Rubber-Stamps DOJ Request To Keep FBI-Twitter Payments Secret

When the Twitter files hit in December of 2022, they revealed that the Biden administration had paid Twitter at least $3.4 million between October 2019 and February 2021 to reimburse the pre-Musk, left-leaning social media giant for a flood of requests. 

During this period, the Biden DOJ was going after vaccine skeptics, lab-leak proponents, 2020 election ‘deniers,’ Catholic parents, Hunter Biden laptop / Burisma content, and conservative news outlets. We also learned that the FBI’s Elvis Chan and crew were holding weekly meeting with Twitter on “misinformation,” and flagged thousands of accounts for the above. 

Days after the Twitter files were released, watchdog group Judicial Watch sued the Biden DOJ, which oversees the FBI, over a FOIA request demanding to know how much the FBI paid Twitter from 2016 onward. The FBI initially refused, but eventually released 44-pages of documents with the key payment details redacted – claiming the data was protected under FOIA’s “Exemption 7(E),” which lets agencies hide info about law enforcement methods if releasing it could help criminals or enemies dodge detection.

Judicial Watch then narrowed their claims to just those redacted payment amounts (JW dropped other issues such as vendor names), however in December of 2025, the Trump DOJ asked Judge James Boasberg for a Motion for Summary Judgement to deny Judicial Watch’s request – effectively concealing the extent to which the FBI, under Trump and Biden, was going after Americans. 

In its request for summary judgement, US Attorney Jeanine Pirro’s office (say it ain’t so!) argued that revealing payments that are tied to real investigations could reveal super secret investigative methods – such as how much the FBI is “engaging” with Twitter vs. other platforms, which could lead to ‘bad guys’ (criminals, hackers, foreign spies) to switch to platforms with less FBI activity, and that it might reveal shifts in FBI priorities over time.

Revealing the quarterly totals could also betray “mosaic theory,” where seemingly harmless info (like one quarter’s payment) can be pieced together with public data (e.g., Twitter’s transparency reports) to form a big picture of FBI strategies.

Earlier this month, Boasberg agreed – ruling that revealing the payments could expose FBI “techniques and procedures” (how they monitor online threats) and help bad actors figure out what the FBI is focused on, allowing them to adapt and change strategies. 

Boasberg wrote in his opinion that the 7(E) exemption is valid because it could “risk circumvention of the law.” 

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US Justice Department issues new ‘Russiagate’ subpoenas – AP

The US Department of Justice has reportedly issued a fresh round of subpoenas, as it continues to investigate the campaign by President Donald Trump’s opponents to undermine his 2016 victory with claims of “Russian interference.”

The move was reported by the Associated Press on Wednesday, citing anonymous sources within the Justice Department. According to these sources, the department is seeking documents compiled since January 2017, when US intelligence agencies issued a statement alleging that Russia conspired with the Trump campaign to defeat Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election.

It is unclear whether the subpoenas will lead to any criminal charges.

The 2017 statement, issued jointly by all 17 US intelligence agencies, claimed that Russian President Vladimir Putin personally “approved and directed” a cyber-warfare and influence campaign against the Clinton campaign. Controversially, it included in its appendices a summary of the so-called ‘Steele dossier’, a Democrat-funded report compiled by former British spy Christopher Steele.

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Fulton County Files Lawsuit to Claw Back Election Evidence – Some Major Issues with Filing Revealed by Board Member

Last month, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and Department of Justice executed a search warrant on the Fulton County Elections and Operations Hub, seizing over 650 boxes of election records from the 2020 election.

The Gateway Pundit reported on the claims that led to the search, including missing ballot images (as admitted by Fulton County in the federal case Curling v. Raffensperger), missing tabulator opening tapes and unsigned closing tapes for all advance in-person voting locations, and numerous other issues.

Now, The Gateway Pundit has learned that the Fulton County Board of Commissioners [BOC] Chairman, Robert Pitts, the Fulton County Board of Registrations and Elections [BRE], as well as Fulton County itself, have sued the federal government in hopes of retaining those election records seized by the FBI.

The basis of the lawsuit (below) is Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure Rule 41(g), which regulates “unlawful search and seizure of property” and provides a means for returning said property.

However, according to a letter sent to Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr by BRE member Julie Adams, several problems exist within the filing.

This article will deal with those issues rather than the substance of the lawsuit itself.  The substance will be covered in a following article.

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Biden Judge Holds DOJ Lawyer in Civil Contempt Over Immigration Case, Fines Him $500 Per Day

A Minnesota-based federal judge on Wednesday held a Justice Department attorney in civil contempt over an immigration case and fined him $500 per day for violating her order.

US District Judge Laura Provinzino, a Biden appointee, said the DOJ lawyer violated her orders in a habeas case related to the release of an ICE detainee’s papers.

DOJ lawyers in Minnesota are buried in immigration cases as leftist organizations fight to keep illegal aliens from being deported.

A JAG lawyer from the Department of War is assisting in immigration cases in the US Attorney’s Office due to case overload.

The judge held him in contempt after one of the habeas cases ‘fell through the cracks.’

According to Fox 9: Judge Provinzino had ordered a detained immigrant held by ICE in El Paso, Texas, be released in Minnesota with all of his identification papers. ICE released the man in Texas with none of his papers, forcing his attorney to find him a shelter for the night and flight back to Minnesota.

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Justice Department ‘Should Take About 20 Years’ To Reschedule Marijuana, GOP Congressman Says

The Justice Department should “take about 20 years” to finish the marijuana rescheduling process, a GOP congressman who staunchly opposes cannabis reform tells Marijuana Moment.

With the proposal to move marijuana from Schedule I to Schedule III of the Controlled Substances Act (CSA) still pending, Rep. Andy Harris (R-MD) is in no rush to have DOJ see the process through—despite President Donald Trump’s December executive order directing the attorney general to quickly finalize the rule.

“Last I looked, it hasn’t been rescheduled. The president said to look into it,” Harris said in an interview on Thursday, adding that he hasn’t directly communicated with the Justice Department about the issue but that “everybody understands what I want it to look like.”

“I don’t think I’ve been subtle about it,” Harris said. “All I know is every day that goes by and it’s not rescheduled is another good day.”

The prohibitionist congressman said he isn’t sure if internal disagreements within DOJ are to blame for the delayed rescheduling action, but “the wheels grind a little slowly around here sometimes.”

“On this one, they should take about 20 years to grind,” he said.

In December, Harris separately said Trump doesn’t have the authority to unilaterally reschedule marijuana via executive order. But while lawmakers could overrule any administrative move to enact the reform, it would be a “heavy lift” in the Republican-controlled Congress, he acknowledged.

For what it’s worth, the congressman may be at risk of being unseated in November due to redistricting in his state.

The Maryland House of Delegates earlier this month approved a congressional redistricting proposal that would leave anti-cannabis Harris especially vulnerable in the next election, according to analysts, giving Democrats an advantage in the state’s first congressional district for the first time since the last map was drawn in 2011. It remains to be seen whether the Senate will follow the House’s lead to pass the legislation, however.

Meanwhile, another GOP lawmaker on the other side of the debate, Congressional Cannabis Caucus co-chair Rep. Dave Joyce (R-OH), recently told Marijuana Moment that while marijuana rescheduling might not be at the top of the agenda for the Justice Department or White House amid competing interests, he and bipartisan colleagues will be ready when “opportunity does present itself.”

Joyce separately said last month that he doesn’t think the attorney general would seek to undermine the president’s executive order to move marijuana to Schedule III despite any personal reservations she may have about the policy change.

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