Ben Penn

DOJ Demotes Virginia Criminal Chief as It Mulls Comey Case (1) The Justice Department demoted a veteran criminal chief in the Eastern Virginia office that’s weighing key decisions in dismissed cases against two of Trump’s perceived enemies, people familiar with t...

Veteran criminal chief demoted in EDVa. A retired EDNC guy is parachuted in. By @benjaminpenn.bsky.social
news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/...

Bondi Orders FBI Extremism Intelligence Review with Antifa Focus Attorney General Pam Bondi directed the FBI to undergo an exhaustive analysis of domestic terrorism intelligence—focusing primarily on antifa—in a memo implementing Trump’s response to the Charlie Kir...

AG Bondi implements Trump policy by directing FBI to undergo massive collection of domestic terrorism intelligence focused on antifa, per internal memo obtained by @bloomberglaw.com:
news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/...

DOJ No. 2 Knocks White-Collar Bar for Weaker Enforcement Claims The Justice Department is taking notice of inconsistencies when white-collar defense lawyers complain on LinkedIn about softer Trump enforcement only to advocate for client relief, Deputy Attorney Gen...

Deputy AG Todd Blanche to white collar lawyers this morning: DOJ is monitoring your LinkedIn posts & client memos for inconsistencies when they complain of weak Trump enforcement, only to seek relief from prosecutor weaponization news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/...

FBI Seeks ‘Seditious Conspiracy’ Probe of Democratic Lawmakers The FBI is pressuring domestic terrorism agents to open a seditious conspiracy investigation into six Democratic lawmakers who advised military service members to defy unlawful orders, according to th...

Scoop: FBI aims to escalate its inquiry into 6 Democrats who made video for troops by pressing domestic terrorism squad to launch a formal seditious conspiracy investigation. Washington Field Office leaders are pushing back b/c they don't see a crime. news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/...

DOJ Demotes Virginia Criminal Chief As It Mulls Comey Dismissal The Justice Department demoted a veteran criminal chief in the Eastern Virginia office that’s weighing key decisions in dismissed cases against two of Trump’s perceived enemies, people familiar with t...

News: DOJ demotes Lindsey Halligan's criminal chief as her office weighs new charges against Jim Comey, Tish James. Nearly two-decade EDVA veteran replaced by a North Carolina transplant. news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/...

DOJ Legal Adviser Says Halligan Can Still Be Called US Attorney The Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel has advised that Lindsey Halligan can continue to be referred to as the Eastern District of Virginia’s US attorney in court filings, according to an em...

NEWS: DOJ's Office of Legal Counsel has blessed the use of Lindsey Halligan's name as US Attorney on her prosecutors' court filings despite a judge ruling she was illegally appointed. They're advised to add DAG Todd Blanche to the signature block as well.
news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/...

Halligan should be listed in the signature block used on all pleadings as “United States Attorny and Special United States Attorney,” according to the email, which misspells “Attorney.”

DOJ Legal Adviser Says Halligan Can Still Be Called US Attorney The Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel has advised that Lindsey Halligan can continue to be referred to as the Eastern District of Virginia’s US attorney in court filings, according to an em...

NEWS: DOJ's Office of Legal Counsel has blessed the use of Lindsey Halligan's name as US Attorney on her prosecutors' court filings despite a judge ruling she was illegally appointed. They're advised to add DAG Todd Blanche to the signature block as well.
news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/...

DOJ Demands Data Troves From US Attorneys on Trump’s Priorities The Justice Department sent US attorneys scrambling this week to meet a pre-Thanksgiving deadline to collect troves of data demonstrating compliance with Trump-directed crackdowns on immigration, poli...

News: DOJ has sent US attorneys scrambling to meet a Thanksgiving eve deadline to collect vast amounts of case data showing progress in meeting Trump directives, such as crackdowns on immigration and political violence in wake of Charlie Kirk shooting news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/...

DOJ Defense of Top Prosecutors Tees Up Debate for Supreme Court The Justice Department’s plans to appeal a ruling that an interim US attorney is unlawfully serving is likely to force the Supreme Court to weigh in on the Trump administration’s maneuvers to install ...

Lost in the huge Comey/James dismissals is Halligan has a new No. 2, an ex-prosecutor parachuting in from Ky., who'd be in line to refile the Trump retribution charges depending on outcome of appeal. Robert McBride has no EDVA experience. w/ Celine Castronuovo:
news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/...

Motion denied. Case proceeds to summary judgment hearing Dec. 2.
Smartmatic statement: "The court made clear that Fox's attempts to delay accountability won't work, and its day of reckoning is coming."

Smartmatic Bribery Case Can’t Escape Voter Conspiracy Shadow (1) The Justice Department’s bribery indictment of voting machine company Smartmatic reflects a rare alignment of career prosecutors with conspiracy theorists in Trump’s base and the president’s biggest m...

A hearing is getting under way in NY Supreme Court to consider Fox News' motion to postpone a ruling on Smartmatic's $2.7B defamation suit until DOJ's recent bribery indictment of voting machine co. is resolved.
ICYMI on the unusual Trump DOJ charges -
news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/...

Smartmatic Bribery Case Can’t Escape Election Conspiracy Shadow The Justice Department’s bribery indictment of voting machine company Smartmatic reflects a rare alignment of career prosecutors with conspiracy theorists in Trump’s base and the president’s biggest m...

News: Voting machine co. Smartmatic to be arraigned today in 1st corporate foreign bribery indictment in 15 years.
Comes after Miami US Atty shut down negotiations, bolstering Fox News in defense of Smartmatic defamation suit.
I explore the twists & turns:
news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/...

Miami US Attorney Instills Fear as Trump Enemy Probes Ramp Up Miami’s US attorney is alarming staff with unconventional interrogation tactics to oust prosecutors, while warning the office about dishonesty and disobedience as he staffs up investigations of the pr...

2 Miami prosecutors (both Rs) quit - after being asked to join a unit targeting Trump foes - when MAGA US atty ordered them to sign statements under penalty of perjury naming who they’d talked to. That’s an unheard of interrogation tactic within DOJ. news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/...

The interrogation tactic of ordering sworn statements from prosecutors - with the threat of being indicted - appears unprecedented even for Trump DOJ that’s been forcing out career staff all year. It circumvents DOJ protocols of referring employee misconduct matters to OIG or other offices.

Morale among Miami prosecutors was already very low from their seasoned colleagues repeatedly getting fired or resigning. But Reding Quinones’ leadership of late is escalating fear as their district becomes epicenter for Trump revenge cases.

Miami US Attorney Instills Fear as Trump Enemy Probes Ramp Up Miami’s US attorney is alarming staff with unconventional interrogation tactics to oust prosecutors, while warning the office about dishonesty and disobedience as he staffs up investigations of the pr...

NEWS: Miami US Attorney prompted prosecutor resignations by demanding they sign statements under penalty of perjury naming those with whom they discussed an assignment expected to target Trump's foes, prompting office-wide fear of witch hunt news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/...

DOJ Miami Office Readies Conspiracy Probe Into Trump Enemies (2) The South Florida US attorney’s office is recruiting prosecutors and restructuring its chain of command in preparation for a grand jury investigation expected to target former Justice Department offic...

Re-upping this on life inside the DOJ Miami office that’s become ground zero for Trump enemies prosecutions: resignations, recruiting outsourced to a voter fraud conspiracist, crim chief walled off after Posobiec post. Tensions continue to rise. My story:
news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/...

And now it appears it was John Thune, not Cruz, who is receiving more of the credit (or blame)

I'm told Sen. Ted Cruz led this effort. Senate Judiciary Committee Democrats weren't consulted on the addition of this language, per a source familiar. Committee's top Dem, Dick Durbin, was among the 8 Ds who voted to advance the spending measure last night.

Shutdown Deal Would Let Senators Sue Over Jack Smith Searches Senators whose phone records were sought by Special Counsel Jack Smith would gain authority to sue for millions in damages under a provision buried in the Senate-advanced deal to reopen the government...

Buried inside the deal to reopen government is a provision that would give Senators private right of action to sue for millions in damages over their phone records being analyzed by Jack Smith's team.
news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/...

UPDATE: Two DOJ line prosecutors have resigned under duress shortly after being asked to join this grand jury team. Both were accused by Miami superiors of leaking about the secretive assignment, and bow out after short, promising careers as prosecutors.

Figuring prominently in this effort is a former line prosecutor & law school classmate of US Attorney Reding Quinones. This lawyer, Scott Strauss, was forced out as a fed prosecutor over attempts to investigate 2020 voter fraud conspiracy but now may be returning to DOJ.

Figuring prominently in this effort is a former line prosecutor & law school classmate of US Attorney Reding Quinones. This lawyer, Scott Strauss, was forced out as a fed prosecutor over attempts to investigate 2020 voter fraud conspiracy but now may be returning to DOJ.

DOJ Miami Office Readies Conspiracy Probe Into Trump Enemies (1) The South Florida US attorney’s office is recruiting prosecutors and restructuring its chain of command in preparation for a grand jury investigation expected to target former Justice Department offic...

SCOOP: Inside the Miami US attorney’s office readying grand jury probes into DOJ officials/special counsel’s offices who investigated Trump:
- recruiting lawyers
- election conspiracist’s possible return
- MAGA influencer-fueled reorg
news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/...

FBI Conducts Whiplash Firings, Rehirings Linked to Trump Probe The FBI fired at least six agents who worked with Special Counsel Jack Smith, only to quickly restore employment Monday for some of them who are pursuing a high-priority public corruption investigatio...

NEWS: Up to four FBI agents who were fired yesterday over Arctic Frost, then reinstated b/c US Attorney Pirro said they're critical to an active public corruption probe, have been fired and walked out a 2nd time today. news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/...

To be more clear, Patel’s anger is over news of his own personal travel being out there all week. The senior official he forced out oversees FBI aviation teams and many more crisis management functions.

FBI Ousts Leader as Patel Fumes Over Attention to Agency Jet Use The FBI forced out a senior official overseeing aviation shortly after Director Kash Patel grew outraged about revelations of his publicly-available jet logs indicating he’d flown to see his musician ...

Scoop: FBI ousts senior official after Kash Patel’s fury over news of his use of government jet to see girlfriend perform. The removed head of critical incident response group was 27-year FBI veteran who oversaw aviation sections.
news.bloomberglaw.com/ip-law/fbi-o...

US Attorney Lindsey Halligan, flanked by a security detail, attended both days of arguments in a lower-profile case with appeal to President Trump.
Jury quickly acquitted man her office accused of soliciting Trump's murder on social media.
My story: news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/...

DOJ Criminal Chief Pick Misspoke to Senate on White House Policy A senior Trump Justice Department nominee told senators he “inadvertently misspoke” when declaring at his confirmation hearing that DOJ rescinded its policy on communicating with the White House about...

News: Nominee to lead DOJ Criminal Division tells Senate Judiciary Committee he was mistaken in declaring at his hearing that DOJ rescinded policy on communicating w/ White House. He doesn't retract separate remark that DOJ will soon be updating the policy. news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/...