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The Trump DOJ Has Utterly Collapsed and It Ain’t Pretty
INSIDE: Patrick J. Schiltz … Stephen Miller … Mark Kelly
David Kurtz Feb 04, 2026
The Destruction: DOJ Edition
One of the intended consequences of President Trump’s politicization of the Justice Department is to leave behind a weakened, overwhelmed, decimated organization that simply can’t do its job.
They’re hollowing out the DOJ by purging nonpartisan career attorneys, making life intolerable for those who remain, and replacing them with loyalists sucks the capacity out of the organization. It can’t handle as many cases, isn’t capable of tackling ambitious ones, and the quality of the lawyering suffers in all cases.
This is all coming home to roost in a very visible way in Minnesota, where the lawless Operation Metro Surge has produced hundreds of habeas cases filed by wrongfully detained immigrants. The chief federal judge in Minnesota, speaking for an overwhelmed judiciary, has already publicly castigated the Trump administration for not preparing for the flood of cases that its mass deportation operation in the state was bound to generate. (Chris Geidner explains the ins and outs of why we’re seeing so many cases.)
Meanwhile, the Minnesota U.S. Attorney’s Office has been crippled by mass resignations, including some of its most senior career attorneys. That has left the remaining DOJ attorneys in Minnesota inundated with more cases than they can keep up with. But I’m not sure that does justice to what’s been happening. It’s quite a bit worse than that.
The quality of lawyering has eroded to such a point that government lawyers have been unable to keep up with the court orders demanding that detainees be released. As a result, detainees have lingered in confinement even after courts have ordered their release.
Last week, as the Star Tribune first reported, Ana Voss, a career DOJer who was the chief of the civil division in the Minnesota U.S. Attorney’s Office, submitted an astonishing court filing in which she admitted that her office had not followed a judicial order to release a detainee because they hadn’t seen the email.
“I did not timely read these orders,” Voss reportedly said in the court filing. “I understand that is inexcusable.”
But it doesn’t appear to be a case of incompetence or willful disregard. As Voss explained in the filing: “It has become apparent to me that I am not able to effectively triage and review every order which is not an acceptable practice for me or the United States.”
Voss is reported to have subsequently resigned.
Numerous reports have suggested that mass resignations in the Minnesota U.S. Attorney’s Office are not due solely to the failure to investigate the fatal shootings of Renée Good and Alex Pretti. My suspicion is that the hell-on-wheels inundation of immigration cases is another contributing factor.
More evidence of that emerged yesterday, when Julie Le, an attorney for the government, essentially melted down in court, as FOX9’s Paul Blume reported :
“I wish you would just hold me in contempt of court so I can get 24 hours of sleep,” Le said. “The system sucks, this job sucks, I am trying with every breath I have to get you what I need.”
As Joyce Vance notes, Le is not a regular assistant U.S. attorney but a “special” AUSA. She is reported to have been working as a DHS attorney before being detailed to the Minnesota U.S. Attorney’s Office to help with the flood of immigration cases. Le had been assigned over more than 88 cases since December.
It’s easy to see this as attorneys getting what they deserve for participating in a corrupted system, but remember it’s the detainees who are languishing despite courts ordering their release. I’ve seen defiant DOJ political appointees in court telling judges to shove it. Le does not appear to be one of those kinds of attorneys:
“I am here to make sure the agency understands how important it is to comply with court orders,” said Le, who became visibly emotional during the court hearing.
Le was removed from the U.S. Attorney’s Office after her courtroom remarks, NBC News reports.
When chief Judge Patrick J. Schiltz said last week that the Trump administration had violated 96 court orders in 78 cases since Jan. 1 in Minnesota alone, I first thought this was another Trump administration gambit to defy the judicial branch. And it may be, but it’s not as direct as the confrontations in the Alien Enemies Act and Abrego Garcia cases.
As Princeton’s Deborah Pearlstein notes:
It seems increasingly clear the rampant noncompliance with court habeas orders happening in immigration cases now is not a problem of attorney ethics. It’s a symptom of structural, institutional collapse at the Department of Justice.
The Trump administration is tearing down U.S. Attorney’s offices and undermining Main Justice so that there simply aren’t the resources to even respond to the judicial branch. A burn it all down ethos. Catch me if you can.
Keep an Eye on This One …
U.S. District Judge Paul Magnuson of Minneapolis ordered the pretrial release of two immigrants accused of assaulting an ICE agent who shot one of the men in an incident last month. But the men did not make it out of the courthouse before they were re-detained, by ICE, the Star Tribune reports.
Attorneys for Alfredo Aljorna and Julio Sosa-Celis were quickly back in court, filing a habeas petition seeking their release from ICE custody. Last night, chief Judge Patrick J. Schiltz ordered the Trump administration not to remove the men from Minnesota and, if they already had, then to return them to Minnesota immediately.
Not to get overlooked: At the pretrial hearing, the mens’ attorneys introduced into evidence photos of the shooting scene that suggest the ICE agent shot through a closed door and undermine the government’s account what happened.
Quote of the Day
“In the last few weeks, our family took some consolation thinking that perhaps Nee’s death would bring about change in our country. And it has not.”—Luke Ganger, brother of Renee Good
Judge Protects Anti-ICE Protesters
U.S. District Judge Michael Simon issued a temporary restraining order barring federal agents from using tear gas and other crowd-control weapons against peaceful protesters and journalists outside an ICE facility in Portland, Oregon.
In his order, Simon was harshly critical of the Trump administration:
- “the repeated shooting and teargassing of nonviolent protesters at the Portland ICE Building will likely keep recurring … Defendants’ violence is in no way isolated.”
- “statements made by DHS officials and senior federal executives show that the culture of the agency and its employees is to celebrate violent responses over fair and diplomatic ones.”
- “Rather than reprimanding DHS violence against protesters, senior officials have publicly condoned it.”
- “There are clear instances of excessive force, including a use of force incident recorded by ICE’s own cameras and deemed “inappropriate” and “not reasonable” by a Federal Protective Service (“FPS”) Deputy Regional Director. Yet, the agents involved were not put on leave and do not appear to have been held accountable in any way.”
(snip-Stephen Miller and more)
Scottie's Playtime 
This is beginning to feel like a complicated card game played with seven decks, each with a few cards missing: the winner gets to leave. Only there is no winner.
I’ve never been more torn between wanting to see what happens next, feeling sure it doesn’t happen here, and hoping I die before the place implodes.
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Hi Judy. I seriously worry about what will happen next as you do. Because I feel the people will lose and more and more harm will happen. Because of what is happening in the appeals courts where lower court rulings protecting the people are being overturned by tRump judges. It seems Stephen Miller and Russell Vought are tripling down on their assaults on the public, on civil rights, and on all nonwhite people. Hugs
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Hi. Very interesting post. I have been hearing this on the morning news podcasts by Alison Gill called the Daily Beans and other podcasts I watch. The first part of this post reminded me of Randy’s post about Musk and the admin gutting all the normal nonpartisan government workers and in cases where needed replacing them with deeply partisan right-wing maga supporters. Creating the very deep state the republicans have been complaining existed. As for the courts I blame Obama for not fighting Moscow Mitch McConnell harder to fill the appelate court positions, leaving them for tRump to fill. A lot of good positive lower court rulings protecting civil rights are being overturned in the appeals courts by right wing tRump appointed judges. It seems the people can’t win or get a break against the fascist authoritarian force directed against us. Hugs
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Well, what would you have wanted Pres. Obama to do about Sen. McConnell not hearing his judicial nominations? If there was a constitutional way to circumvent the US Senate and appoint a judge, I’m certain the president would have done it. What do you think he should have done?
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Hi Ali. What everyone wanted him to do and Obama refused because he never wanted to look like an angry black man. Use the bully pulpit the presidents have. He could have built political pressure, rallied for it, and gone all in for Garland who I never supported but was better than tRump’s picks. Fox hate opinion channel ran weeks on Obama wearing a tan suit and using a hotter mustard than yellow yet Obama never went on the offensive. He let them constantly savage him with very little response. When will Democrats learn to use their voice, raise it as republicans do. Tom Homan constantly tried to talk over a reporter that I posted this morning, claimed lies were facts, and when those clips are replayed on right wing media he will be believed and a hero. Democrats are bringing a butter knife and the roberts rules of order to a damn gun fight for our democracy! The other side is destroying our democracy and doesn’t care about the niceties, and we better get the same idea before there is not a democracy to protect. Obama was worried about his legacy as the first black man so let racists walk all over him. He took the public option for the ACA off the table before even meeting with republicans because they sent a note saying they wouldn’t support it. Then they did not support the bill anyway and have tried to kill it since. That is what he should have done, stand up and bark like past presidents did before him. Not just stay quiet and take it meekly by releasing written press releases. Hugs
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I agree with most of what you wrote, but this is mostly about judges making orders in favor of we the people, the administration not obeying the court, and the people who keep the flow going not being able to keep up with the massive numbers of cases of the admin violating people’s civil rights. And, yes, as in my other post, it’s thanks to DOGE and other government-cutting actions by this administration. If I recall correctly, these stories were coinciding with some commentary here about the government not obeying orders of courts. My idea on that was that the lawyers in DOJ are too incompetent to be able to do the job I used to do before I even studied the paralegal courses, but turns out it’s also because the government has overloaded itself with cases of rights violations, and the people who still work in DOJ cannot possibly keep up.
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Hi Ali. You are correct; this is about the administration not following court orders and getting away with it as the departments needed in court are gutted and then staffed with very incompetent people not having a clue about their job. Yes that is what your post was about. But ask yourself why all the above. That becomes the next important step to solve.
The judge’s orders are ignored because the guy who told the administration to say fuck you to the courts got promoted. Yes the republicans made Emil Bove III an appeals court judge. The republicans are totally letting tRump do anything he wants and we know that. Why are the democrats in congress not in the courts, in public town halls, or holding rallies shouting about this? It is a total messaging failure that is going to cost us. I could go back to Schumer pushing a 78 year old woman into congress and supporting her with a PAC and the DNC because she supported him staying speaker and is a corporate democrat supporting Israel, while the younger person polling much better is ignored. Our democratic party is far too interested in keeping the support of the wealthy donor class than in doing what they need to do to save democracy. If we want to hold the administration to account we need to get forceful and play hardball to do it. Hugs
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