Justice Department files misconduct complaint against judge in key deportations case

[LetMyPeopleVote]

U.S. District Judge James Boasberg found cause to initiate contempt proceedings to determine whether the Trump administration violated court orders.

The attack by Trump's DOJ on Judge Boasberg is ominous, and merely the first step in what will be a four-year effort to intimidate and discredit any judges who displease the administration, laying the predicate for ignoring or evading their authority.

www.nbcnews.com/politics/jus...

— Bill Kristol (@billkristolbulwark.bsky.social) 2025-07-29T13:10:08.814Z

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/justice-department/justice-department-misconduct-complaint-judge-james-boasberg-rcna221642

The Justice Department filed a complaint Monday alleging misconduct by a federal judge overseeing several cases involving the Trump administration, including a challenge to the legality of deportation flights to El Salvador in March.

The complaint against James Boasberg, the chief U.S. district judge in Washington, D.C., which was filed by Attorney General Pam Bondi's chief of staff, Chad Mizelle, alleges that Boasberg made improper comments during a judicial conference in March.....

Boasberg is assigned to several notable cases involving the Trump administration, none more high-profile than the Alien Enemies Act case, which was filed in mid-March when three deportation flights took off from the United States en route to El Salvador. During an emergency hearing at the time, Boasberg ordered that any planes that were midair and bound for El Salvador return to the United States after Trump’s executive order invoking the Alien Enemies Act for deportations was made public.

He later found cause to initiate contempt proceedings to determine whether the Trump administration was in willful violation of court orders. An appeals court has paused the process, however.

“Having assumed President Trump would defy court orders, Judge Boasberg issued a [temporary restraining order] and threatened sanctions—all on a false premise," the complaint says, noting that Boasberg spoke at the conference days before he ruled from the bench in the deportations case. "Such conduct violates litigants’ trust in an impartial judiciary and falls below the standards that safeguard the integrity of the judiciary and public confidence in that integrity.”