Mass firings reshape Justice Department, eroding career ranks and norms

A sweeping year of firings, reassignments and departures has remade the U.S. Department of Justice, removing scores of career lawyers and agents and draining institutional knowledge at a time when prosecutors face some of the most consequential cases in recent memory. Interviews and alumni networks say the personnel changes have “erased centuries of combined experience,” leaving prosecutors and legal experts warning of long-term damage to the department’s independence.

Justice Connection, a network of former Justice Department employees, estimates more than 230 lawyers, agents and other staff were fired during the past year and that more than 6,400 employees left the department by the end of 2025; Justice Connection puts the department’s total workforce at roughly 108,000 employees at year-end. Multiple internal accounts and oral histories compiled from more than 60 fired or departed attorneys describe actions that ranged from targeted dismissals of high-profile prosecutors to apparently random terminations and reassignments.

The personnel shake-up touched a broad cross-section of the department. Prosecutors who worked on prosecutions arising from the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol were among those dismissed, as were civil rights and environmental enforcers, counterterrorism teams, immigration judges and lawyers who had defended administration policies. One Jan. 6 prosecutor who lost her job said, “The people working on these cases were not political agents of any kind.”

Individual cases underscore the pattern. A counterterrorism lawyer who was cited in a presidential speech was among those fired while performing routine duties; another Los Angeles prosecutor targeted in social-media posts was dismissed in March. An immigration lawyer later acknowledged in court that a Salvadoran national had been mistakenly deported and then publicly accused the department of attempting to mislead judges, an assertion the department denied. News of firings also touched members of the special-counsel team that produced two high-profile criminal investigations; the special counsel resigned earlier this month after submitting a two-volume report, and more than a dozen employees who had worked on those prosecutions lost their positions.

The departures have not been confined to Washington. Prosecutors in Minnesota moved to resign amid controversy over an investigation into a fatal shooting by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer, and career staff across regional offices reported an accelerating exodus. One former long-serving prosecutor, cited in coverage of the wave, was three months shy of 25 years of service when dismissed.

Department officials and administration spokespeople say thousands of attorneys have been hired over the past year and that some separations reflected personnel who were out of step with new priorities. Critics counter that the pattern amounts to a purge that undermines norms designed to keep career prosecutors insulated from politics. A Partnership for Public Service official summed the concern bluntly: “he was more worried about DOJ than any other place in government.”

The policy implications are consequential. Eroding career capacity increases litigation risk for the government, reduces continuity in complex investigations and could chill aggressive enforcement in areas from corporate crime to environmental protection. For markets and regulated industries, the changes raise uncertainty about enforcement consistency and prosecutorial predictability, potentially altering how companies allocate compliance resources and manage legal risk.

Restoring morale and expertise will likely require more than new hires. Legal scholars and former officials say rebuilding institutional trust will take time, clearer safeguards for career officers and a recommitment to norms that keep prosecutions insulated from political swings. Without those steps, the personnel upheaval may have lasting effects on the department’s ability to enforce the law impartially.