Inside the Corrupt Inner Workings of the Trump DOJ
INSIDE: Erez Reuveni ... Kash Patel ... Ken Paxton
A lot of things happened. Here are some of the things. This is TPM’s Morning Memo. Sign up for the email version.
An Unprecedented Glimpse
Newly released emails and texts provide an extraordinary glimpse of internal government communications during some of the most consequential legal cases of the early months of the Trump II presidency.
The internal communications come from Erez Reuveni, a career Justice Department lawyer who was fired by the Trump administration for being too candid with the court in the Abrego Garcia case. The emails and texts bolster previous allegations Reuveni had made in seeking whistleblower protections.
For our purposes, the most important element of the Reuveni revelations is the planned defiance of federal courts, including misleading, if not downright false, representations to judges, indefensible legal positions, and violations of court orders. The primary villain in the account provided by Reuveni continues to be DOJ official Emil Bove, the former personal attorney for President Trump who was riding herd on the most controversial early Trump II cases and who Reuveni has alleged told DOJ personnel that they might have to tell the courts “fuck you.”
Among the highlights:
In the Alien Enemies Act case before Judge James Boasberg in DC, Reuveni texted a colleague about Bove’s alleged comment: “Guess we are going to say ‘fuck you’ to the court. Super,” he wrote. The colleague responded: “Well, Pamela Jo Bondi is. Not you.”
In the AEA case, it was Bove, according to the internal communications, who said it was legally permissible to deplane the Venezuelan detainees in El Salvador despite Judge Boasberg’s order.
In the Abrego Garcia case, the internal communications show a race by the Trump administration to find evidence to support calling him a MS-13 “leader” as a larger public smear campaign of the wrongly deported Salvadoran was getting into full swing.
For his part, Bove has denied proposing to defy the courts and has said he doesn’t recall saying “fuck you.”
Why It’s All About Emil Bove
The timing of the Reuveni revelations is strategic, which isn’t to say they’re somehow compromised or not credible. The chief culprit in Reuveni’s account is about to get a lifetime seat on a federal appeals court, so waiting until later to tell his story in full would be too little, too late.
Bove’s nomination to the Third Circuit Court of Appeals is expected to come to a vote in the Senate Judiciary Committee next week. Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) said this week that he would “probably” vote to confirm Bove in committee, virtually assuring the nomination will make it to the floor, where it’s not clear enough GOP senators will stand up to block Bove’s lifetime appointment.
Low-Key Purges Continue at DOJ
Beyond the early round of mass firings at the DOJ and FBI, a steady drumbeat of firing, demotions, and resignations continues, the WaPo reports:
The Trump administration is firing and pushing out employees across the Justice Department and FBI, often with no explanation or warning, creating rampant speculation and fear within the workforce over who might be terminated next, according to multiple people with knowledge of the removals who spoke on the condition of anonymity to avoid retribution.
FBI Uses Polygraphs to Test Loyalty to Patel
Dozens of FBI personnel have been subjected to polygraphs to try to sniff out news leaks and disloyalty to FBI Director Kash Patel, the NYT reports:
The use of the polygraph, and the nature of the questioning, is part of the F.B.I.’s broader crackdown on news leaks, reflecting, to a degree, Mr. Patel’s acute awareness of how he is publicly portrayed. The moves, former bureau officials say, are politically charged and highly inappropriate, underscoring what they describe as an alarming quest for fealty at the F.B.I., where there is little tolerance for dissent. Disparaging Mr. Patel or his deputy, Dan Bongino, former officials say, could cost people their job.
The Trump DOJ’s Big Lurch Against Voting Rights
The Democracy Docket has compiled a timeline of the key steps in the Trump DOJ’s sharp anti-voting shift.
Trump’s Anti-Trans Jihad Takes New Turn
The Trump DOJ has subpoenaed confidential patient information from more than 20 doctors and hospitals that provide gender-related treatments to minors, the NYT reports.
Judge Blocks Birthright Citizenship EO
A federal judge in New Hampshire quickly seized on the opening left by the Supreme Court in its birthright citizenship case by certifying a national class action case that enjoins President Trump’s executive order. He paused his decision for seven days to give the Trump administration time to appeal it.
Khalil Sues Federal Gov’t for $20 Million
Mahmoud Khalil, the pro-Palestinian Columbia University graduate student targeted by the Trump administration for his political views, has begun the process of filing a lawsuit against the government under the Federal Tort Claims Act. Khalil is seeking $20 million for false imprisonment, malicious prosecution, and other claims. Khalil has been released from detention but his immigration case is still pending.
Harvard Tries (in Vain) to Placate Trump Administration
WSJ: “Harvard leaders have discussed creating a program that people briefed on the talks described as a center for conservative scholarship, possibly modeled on Stanford’s Hoover Institution, as the school fights the Trump administration’s accusations that it is too liberal.”
Brutal and Self-Defeating
The Trump administration moved to change decades-old policy and deny undocumented immigrants access to Head Start and other federal benefits programs.
2026 Ephemera
The GOP primary for Senate in Texas ain’t for the faint of heart.
State Sen. Angela Paxton (R), the wife of Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton (R), who is challenging incumbent Sen. John Cornyn (R), announced she is filing for divorce:
Lot going on there.
The National Republican Senatorial Committee, the Senate GOP’s campaign arm which is desperate to losing Cornyn’s seat, quickly pounced on the news. “What Ken Paxton has put his family through is truly repulsive and disgusting,” a spokesperson said.
Do you like Morning Memo? Let us know!
Kash Patel, Emil Bove, Bondi... what can one say? Has ever an administration in our nation's history had such a cast of mendacious mediocrities? Texas politics are always baroque, never more so than under Abbott and that's saying something considering some of the doozies they've had as governor. Paxton's career has been emblematic of the total Texas experience. It would all make for a carnival house of horrors train ride if it weren't for the fact it is all in deadly seriousness.
What Reuveni's various bits of internal communication re: Kilmar Abrego suggest is that the preferred audience is SCOTUS, not a rubber-stamping Senate Judiciary Committee, or the GOPer Senate, nor do they particularly concern only Bove's nomination. Rather, these communications clearly play to countless allegations of misrepresentation and callous disregard for truthful testimony throughout the dozens of court cases entered into by tRump's DOJ and DHS, and surely is the clearest indication that this regime has ZERO respect for ethical conduct when in a federal court *by design*, and that such conduct traduces the very nature of legal hearings. It's in fact the destruction of the "presumption of regularity" ethos, without which a court hearing loses its bonafides, end of.
In short, whenever the DOJ or SG files an "emergency" appeal against a federal judge's ruling, SCOTUS should assume in the first instance that the "appeal" is tainted, and that the "facts" as presented are the equivalent of "fuck you" to the lower-court judge and his/her decisions against this regime. THAT'S what should inform the Court's decision-making process, and nothing else.