Top prosecutors in D.C., Minneapolis leave amid turmoil over shooting probe

[LetMyPeopleVote]

Prosecutors in the U.S. attorney’s office left after pressure to investigate the widow of a woman slain by an ICE officer.

Top prosecutors in D.C., Minneapolis leave amid turmoil over shooting probe
Prosecutors in the U.S. attorney’s office left after pressure to investigate the widow of a woman slain by an ICE officer. www.washingtonpost.com/national-sec...

— Jersey Craig (@jerseycraig.bsky.social) 2026-01-13T20:59:41.970Z

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2026/01/13/justice-department-civil-rights-resignations/

Multiple senior prosecutors in Washington and Minnesota are leaving their jobs amid turmoil over the Trump administration’s handling of the shooting death of a Minneapolis woman.

The departures include at least five prosecutors from the U.S. attorney’s office in Minneapolis, including the office’s second-in-command, according to emails obtained by The Washington Post and people familiar with the matter.

Their resignations followed demands by Justice Department leaders to investigate the widow of Renée Good, the 37-year-old woman killed last week by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer who shot into her car, according to two people familiar with the resignations who spoke on the condition of anonymity out of concern for retaliation. Good’s wife was protesting ICE officers in the moments before the shooting. Prosecutors also were dismayed over the decision by federal officials to exclude state and local authorities from the investigation, one of the people said.

Five senior prosecutors in the criminal section of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division also said they are leaving, according to four people familiar with the personnel moves who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss personnel matters.

The departures strip both the Civil Rights Division’s criminal section and U.S. attorney’s office in Minnesota of their most experienced prosecutors. The moves are widely seen as a major vote of no-confidence by career prosecutors at a moment when the department is under extreme scrutiny......

“This exodus is a huge blow signaling the disrespect and sidelining of the finest and most experienced civil rights prosecutors,” said Vanita Gupta, the head of the division during the Obama administration and the associate attorney general during the Biden administration. “It means cases won’t be brought, unique expertise will be lost and the top career attorneys who may be a backstop to some of the worst impulses of this administration will have left.”

[wcmagumba]

1. Seems kinda cowardly to me...I'm not a lawyer though, so maybe it is part of the "secret" lawyer code...

Last edited Tue Jan 13, 2026, 08:16 PM - Edit history (1)

[LetMyPeopleVote]

2. MaddowBlog-An unraveling Justice Department appears to be coming apart at the seams

In 2025, the DOJ struggled with everything from purges to incompetence to weaponization. In 2026, its collapse seems to be accelerating

The Justice Department’s unraveling is accelerating:
- Civil Rights Division resignations
- another prosecutor purged
- bipartisan condemnation of Powell/Fed probe
- multiple court defeats in recent days
- White House takeover
- Trump slams Bondi

An institution in crisis.
www.ms.now/rachel-maddo...

— Steve Benen (@stevebenen.com) 2026-01-13T16:56:50.673Z

https://www.ms.now/rachel-maddow-show/maddowblog/an-unraveling-justice-department-appears-to-be-coming-apart-at-the-seams

But as 2026 gets underway, conditions at the Justice Department have gone from bad to worse. Indeed, almost two weeks into the new year, the DOJ appears to be an agency in crisis, rapidly unraveling before our eyes.

Consider some of the more notable developments from just the past week:

At least four leading officials from the criminal section of the Civil Rights Division resigned in protest after Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Harmeet Dhillon decided not to investigate the fatal shooting of Renee Good.

The Justice Department fired Robert McBride, a veteran prosecutor, after he declined to lead the controversial prosecution of former FBI Director James Comey.

The Justice Department opened an unprecedented criminal investigation into Jerome Powell, the Federal Reserve chair, sparking widespread and bipartisan criticisms.

Vice President JD Vance announced that the administration would soon have a new assistant attorney general but that their work would be “run out of the White House” instead of Main Justice, reinforcing concerns that the West Wing has effectively seized control of the DOJ, which has largely functioned as an independent entity since Watergate.

The New York Times reported on the gutted state of the department, which is plagued by systemic vacancies and prosecutors who fear they’ll be fired for working on cases the political right might not like. Complicating matters, the article added, “personnel typically deployed to national security and fraud cases are being diverted to focus on other priorities, including the president’s demands for investigations into his perceived enemies.”

The Justice Department has suffered a series of defeats in court over the past few days, including embarrassing setbacks in cases related to renewable energy, Energy Department grants to blue states, federal funding for child care and social services in blue states and, as of late Friday, federal election funds.

The Wall Street Journal reported that Donald Trump has “repeatedly” complained to aides in recent weeks about Bondi, “describing her as weak and an ineffective enforcer of his agenda.”

Each of these stories is important in its own right, but taken together, a picture emerges of a Justice Department that appears to be coming apart at the seams.