Attorney General Pam Bondi has accused federal judges of waging an “unconscionable campaign of bias and hostility” against the former beauty queen Donald Trump handpicked to prosecute his enemies.
Weeks after the courts ruled that Lindsey Halligan was unlawfully serving as interim U.S. attorney—dismissing her indictments against former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James—Bondi lashed out at “rogue judges” who have questioned her continued involvement in court matters.
“Certain district court and magistrate judges in the Eastern District of Virginia are engaging in an unconscionable campaign of bias and hostility against U.S. Attorney Lindsey Halligan and her line AUSAs (assistant US attorneys),” Bondi and her deputy attorney general, Todd Blanche, said in a statement.
“Lindsey and our attorneys are simply doing their jobs: advocating for the Department of Justice’s positions while following guidance from the Office of Legal Counsel.
“They do not deserve to have their reputations questioned in court for ethically advocating on behalf of their client. This Department of Justice has no tolerance for undemocratic judicial activism.”
The angry rebuke, posted on Monday by the DOJ, did not name the “certain judges” Bondi had complained about.
However, in the last few days, a number of judges in the region have told prosecutors in open court that they did not believe Halligan’s name should be on new criminal case filings, such as guilty plea documents and indictments.
Among them was Magistrate Judge William Fitzpatrick and U.S. District Judge Michael Nachmanoff, both of whom have objected to Halligan’s ongoing work after federal judge Cameron McGowan Currie found last month that she was appointed illegally.
Therefore, according to Currie’s ruling, all actions taken after her appointment were unlawful.
Halligan is a former beauty pageant contestant. who Trump installed to prosecute Comey after pushing out her predecessor, Erik Siebert, in Virginia’s Eastern District.
The former FBI director is a longtime adversary of the president, who Trump blames for helping to trigger special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election.
Comey pleaded not guilty in October to charges related to claims that he lied to Congress during testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee in September 2020.
James, the New York Attorney General who successfully sued Trump for civil fraud, was also indicted by Halligan on charges of bank fraud and making false statements to a financial institution.
However, she has vehemently denied wrongdoing, labeling the charges as “baseless” and “nothing more than a continuation of the president’s desperate weaponization of our justice system.”
But the cases brought forward by Halligan were botched from the start. Last month, for instance, Fitzpatrick slammed the DOJ for what he said was a “disturbing pattern of profound investigative missteps” in its bid to prosecute Comey.
He also said Halligan, who had never prosecuted a case prior to Comey’s, seemed to make “fundamental misstatements of law” to the grand jury that could jeopardize the indictment altogether.
Bondi has vowed to appeal the ruling that found Halligan had been unlawfully appointed as her department considers how to pursue Trump’s revenge plot against Comey and James.
In her joint statement on Monday, she wrote: “We will continue fighting for public safety in courtrooms across the country, and we will not be deterred by rogue judges who fail to live up to their obligations of impartiality because of their own political views.
“The American people, and the people of the Eastern District of Virginia, deserve nothing less.”
