The DOJ should not be the president's personal enforcement tool
"Justice for all" means no one is above the law, and that the law is applied impartially, not to settle personal scores, intimidate opponents, or reward allies.
In today's Justice Department, this basic principle no longer holds.
The Department of Justice is now a tool of personal retribution and intimidation of opponents. It targets people the President dislikes, prosecutes those who stand up to his policies and even fires prosecutors who refuse to go along. It also declines to investigate Trump allies.
An (Incomplete, Ongoing) List of Investigations
Since January 2025, the Department of Justice has indicted or attempted to indict:
- James Comey, former FBI director, who investigated Russian interference in the 2016 election
- Letitia James, New York attorney general who prosecuted President Trump for fraud
- 6 members of Congress who released a video saying U.S. service members could refuse illegal orders
- The Southern Poverty Law Center, civil rights non-profit that has called out the Trump administration for rolling back civil rights and deepening racial injustice
It has also opened investigations into:
- Jerome Powell, Federal Reserve chair, who has refused to obey Trump's orders to lower interest rates
- Adam Schiff, United States Senator, who served as the lead manager of the first impeachment trial of President Trump
- Jack Smith, former special counsel, who led the classified documents and Jan. 6 investigations into President Trump
The common thread isn't crime. It's crossing Donald Trump, or just standing up to him.
Friends Can Get Away With It
Meanwhile, the Justice Department has dropped thousands of investigations into corruption and other offenses. It has paid out more than $8.5 million to allies of Trump who were under investigation. And it has refused to investigate obvious cases of abuse, like the killing of Renee Good at the hands of DHS agents in the winter of 2026.
The Department of Justice has never been perfectly fair. White collar crime prosecutions have been dropping for over a decade, for example, even as low-level offenses are prosecuted at high rates. There are plenty of cases to criticize. But what we're dealing with now is on another scale.
A country where criminal prosecutions are applied as a weapon against some, and not at all against others, is a country based solely on power and access, not justice.
Tell Congress: Investigate the use of the DOJ as a political tool instead of impartial agency.