NPR
A veteran Justice Department lawyer has left the agency and is starting a new group to help advise and defend government lawyers under attack from the new administration.
STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
President Trump’s administration is trying many things all at once, and here’s how we have thought about this at MORNING EDITION. We want to keep you informed, rather than overwhelmed, so we are following stories carefully over time, coming back to them, reporting more as we learn more. And that includes this recent news item, which seems many days old, but it’s just a few days old. FBI employees who handled January 6 cases have sued their bosses at the Justice Department. They want to prevent the department from releasing their names and firing them. NPR’s Carrie Johnson reports on a new group that is taking the employees’ side.
CARRIE JOHNSON, BYLINE: Stacey Young spent 18 years as a career lawyer at the DOJ before she departed last month.
STACEY YOUNG: My colleagues right now are terrified.
JOHNSON: Young sees a deliberate campaign to traumatize federal workers and prevent them from doing their jobs.
YOUNG: Many DOJ employees came to me and said, there’s nobody out there who’s helping us. We need help.
JOHNSON: Now Young wants people to know help is on the way. She’s launched a new group called Justice Connection. Young’s already connected dozens of DOJ employees with lawyers, recruited hundreds of alumni to provide advice and started to set up a mental health support network.
YOUNG: They are dedicated. They are apolitical. They are the backbone of the department.
JOHNSON: People all over the Justice Department are reeling from slash-and-burn style personnel actions over the last two weeks. First, Trump administration officials in charge during early days at the DOJ fired the prosecutors who investigated Trump. Then they reassigned career civil servants with decades of experience in national security, civil rights and the environment to work on immigration.
YOUNG: It was quite a warning shot. Everybody in almost every position at DOJ is worried that they could be next.
JOHNSON: DOJ said some of the lawyers it fired could not be trusted to carry out Trump’s agenda, and no FBI agents would lose their jobs for following orders. There is a long process for terminating career employees, and lawyers who work with federal workers say the DOJ does not seem to have followed it. Here’s employment lawyer, Kevin Owen.
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