DOJ Lawyers Work For Justice & The Constitution — Not The White House

In the 1970s, President Richard Nixontried to fire the Department of Justiceprosecutorleading an investigationinto the president's involvement in wiretapping the Democratic National Committee's headquarters.

Since then, the DOJ has generally been run asan impartial law enforcement agency, separated from the executive office and partisan politics.

Those guardrails are now being severely tested under the Trump administration.

In February 2025, seven DOJ attorneysresigned, rather than follow ordersfrom Attorney General Pam Bondi to dismiss corruption charges against New York Mayor Eric Adams. Adamswas indictedin September 2024, during the Biden administration, foralleged briberyand campaign finance violations.

One DOJ prosecutor,Hagan Scotten, wrote in his Feb. 15 resignation letter that while he held no negative views of the Trump administration, hebelieved the dismissal requestviolated DOJ's ethical standards.

Among more than a dozen DOJ attorneys who haverecently been terminated, the DOJfiredErez Reuveni, acting deputy chief of the department's Office of Immigration Litigation, on April 15. Reuvenilost his jobfor speaking honestly to the court about the facts of an immigration case, instead of following political directives from Bondi and other superiors.

Reuveni was terminated for acknowledging in court on April 14 that the Department of Homeland Security had made an administrative error" in deporting Kilmar Abrego Garcia to El Salvador,against court orders. DOJ leadership placed Reuveni on leave the very next day.

Bondi defended the decision, arguing that Reuveni had failed to vigorously advocate" for the administration's position.

I'm a legal ethics scholar, and I know that as more DOJ lawyers face choices between following political directives and upholding their profession's ethical standards, they confront a critical question: To whom do they ultimately owe their loyalty?

Identifying the real client

All attorneys have core ethical obligations, including loyalty to clients, confidentiality and honesty to the courts. DOJ lawyers have additional professional obligations: They have a duty to seek justice, rather than merely win cases, as well as to protect constitutional rights even when inconvenient.

DOJ attorneys typically answer to multiple authorities,including the attorney general. But their highest loyalty belongs to the U.S. Constitution and justice itself.

The Supreme Court established ina 1935 casethat DOJ attorneys have a special mission to ensure that justice shall be done."

DOJ attorneys reinforce their commitment to this mission by takingan oathto uphold the Constitution when they join the department. They also have training programs,internal guidelinesand a long-standing institutional culture that emphasizes their unique responsibility to pursue justice, rather than simply win cases.

This creates a professional identity that goes beyond simply carrying out the wishes of political appointees.

Playing by stricter rules

All lawyers also follow special professional rules in order to receive and maintain a license to practice law. These professional rules are established by state bar associations and supreme courts as part of the state-based licensing system for attorneys.

But themore than 10,000 attorneysat the DOJ face even tougher standards.

TheMcDade Amendment, passed in 1998, requires federal government lawyers to follow both the ethics rules of the state where they are licensed to practice and federal regulations. This includes rules that prohibit DOJ attorneys from participating in cases where they have personal or political relationships with involved parties, for example.

This law also explicitly subjects federal prosecutors to state bar discipline. Such discipline could range from private reprimands to suspension or even permanent disbarment, effectively ending an attorney's legal career.

This means DOJ lawyers might have to refuse a supervisor's orders if those directives would violate professional conduct standards - even at the risk of their jobs.

This is what Assistant U.S. Attorney Danielle Sassoon wrote in a Feb. 12, 2025,letter to Bondi, explaining why she could not drop the charges against Adams. Sassoon insteadresigned from her positionat the DOJ.

Because the law does not support a dismissal, and because I am confident that Adams has committed the crimes with which he is charged, I cannot agree to seek a dismissal driven by improper considerations ... because I do not see any good-faith basis for the proposed position, I cannot make such arguments consistent with my duty of candor," Sassoon wrote.

As DOJ's own guidance states, attorneys must satisfy themselves that their behavior comports with theapplicable rules of professional conduct" regardless of what their bosses say.

Post-Watergate principles under pressure

The president nominates the attorney general, who must be confirmed by the U.S. Senate.

That can create the perception and even the reality that the attorney general is indebted to, and loyal to, the president. To counter that, Attorney General Griffin Bell, in 1978, spelled out three principles established after Watergate to maintain a deliberate separationbetween the White House and the Justice Department.

First, Bellcalled for proceduresto prevent personal or partisan interests from influencing legal judgments.

Second, Bell said that public confidence in the department's objectivity is essential to democracy, with DOJ serving as the acknowledged guardian and keeper of the law."

Third, these principles ultimately depend on DOJ lawyers committed to good judgment and integrity, even under intense political pressure. These principles apply to all employees throughout the department - including the attorney general.

Recent ethics tests

These principles face a stark test in the current political climate.

The March 2025 firing of Elizabeth Oyer, a career pardon attorney with the Justice Department, raises questions about the boundaries between political directives and professional obligations.

Oyer was fired by Bondi shortly after declining to recommend the restoration of gun rights to actor Mel Gibson, aknown Donald Trump supporter. Gibsonlost his gun rightsafter pleading no contest to amisdemeanor domestic battery chargein 2011.

Oyer initiallyexpressed concernto her superiors about restoring Gibson's gun rights without a sufficient background investigation, particularly given Gibson's history of domestic violence.

When Oyer later agreed to testify beforeCongress in a hearingabout the White House's handling of the Justice Department, the administration initially planned to send armed U.S. Marshals officers to deliver a warning letter to her home, saying that shecould not discloserecords about firearms rights to lawmakers.

Oyer was away from home when she received an urgent alert thatthe marshalswere en route to her home, where her teenage child was alone. Oyer's attorney described this plan as both unprecedented and completely inappropriate."

Officialscalled off the marshalsonly after Oyer confirmed receipt of the letter via email.

Why independence matters

In my research, I found that lawyers sometimes have lapses in judgment because of the partisan kinship," conscious or not, they developwith clients. This partisan kinship can lead attorneys to overlook serious red flags that outsiders would easily spot.

When lawyers become too politically aligned with clients - or their superiors - their judgment suffers. They miss ethical problems and legal flaws that would otherwise be obvious. Professional distance allows attorneys to provide the highest quality legal counsel, even if that means saying no" to powerful people.

That's why DOJ attorneys sometimes make decisions that frustrate political objectives. When they refuse to target political opponents, when they won't let allies off easily, or when they disclose information their superiors wanted hidden, they're not being insubordinate.

They're fulfilling their highest ethical duties to the Constitution and rule of law.

Cassandra Burke Robertson is Professor of Law and Director of the Center for Professional Ethics, Case Western Reserve University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.