public tuesday

WASHINGTON — A top Justice Department official nominated to become a federal appeals court judge said Wednesday that he never told department attorneys to ignore court orders, denying the account of a whistleblower who detailed a campaign to defy judges to carry out President Trump’s deportation plans.

Emil Bove, a former criminal defense attorney for the Republican president, forcefully pushed back against suggestions from Democrats that the whistleblower’s claims make him unfit to serve on the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Bove’s nomination has come under intense scrutiny after the whistleblower, a fired department lawyer, claimed in a complaint made public Tuesday that Bove used an expletive when he said during a meeting that the Trump administration might need to ignore judicial commands.

“I have never advised a Department of Justice attorney to violate a court order,” Bove told the Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday. He added: “I don’t think there’s any validity to the suggestion that that whistleblower complaint filed yesterday calls into question my qualifications to serve as a circuit judge.”

Bove was nominated last month by Trump to serve on the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which hears cases from Delaware, New Jersey and Pennsylvania. A former federal prosecutor in the Southern District of New York, Bove was on the defense team during Trump’s New York hush money trial and defended Trump in the two federal criminal cases brought by the Justice Department.

The White House said Bove “is unquestionably qualified for the role and has a career filled with accolades, both academically and throughout his legal career, that should make him a shoo-in for the Third Circuit.”

“The President is committed to nominating constitutionalists to the bench who will restore law and order and end the weaponization of the justice system, and Emil Bove fits that mold perfectly,” White House spokesperson Harrison Fields said in an email.

The whistleblower, Erez Reuveni, was fired in April after conceding in court that Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran man who had been living in Maryland, was mistakenly deported to an El Salvador prison. Reuveni sent a letter on Tuesday to members of Congress and the Justice Department’s inspector general seeking an investigation into allegations of wrongdoing by Bove and other officials in the weeks leading up to his firing.

Reuveni described a Justice Department meeting in March concerning Trump’s plans to invoke the Alien Enemies Act over what the president claimed was an invasion by the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua. Reuveni says Bove raised the possibility that a court might block the deportations before they could happen. Reuveni claims Bove used profanity in saying the department would need to consider telling the courts what to do and “ignore any such order,” Reuveni’s lawyers said in the letter.

Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche called the allegations “utterly false,” saying that he was at the March meeting and “at no time did anyone suggest a court order should not be followed.”

“Planting a false hit piece the day before a confirmation hearing is something we have come to expect from the media, but it does not mean it should be tolerated,” Blanche wrote in a post on X on Tuesday.

Bove has been at the center of other moves that have roiled the Justice Department in recent months, including the order to dismiss New York City Mayor Eric Adams’ federal corruption case. Bove’s order prompted the resignation of several Justice Department officials, including Manhattan’s top federal prosecutor, who accused the department of acceding to a quid pro quo — dropping the case to ensure Adams’ help with Trump’s immigration agenda.

Richer writes for the Associated Press.

WASHINGTON — A top Justice Department official suggested the Trump administration might have to ignore court orders as it prepared to deport Venezuelan migrants it accused of being gang members, a fired department lawyer alleged in a whistleblower complaint made public Tuesday.

The whistleblower’s claims about Principal Assistant Deputy Atty. Gen. Emil Bove come a day before Bove is set to face lawmakers Wednesday for his confirmation hearing to become a federal appeals court judge.

In a letter seeking a congressional and Justice Department watchdog investigation, the former government lawyer, Erez Reuveni, alleges he was pushed out and publicly disparaged after resisting efforts to defy judges and make arguments in court that were false or had no legal basis.

The most explosive allegation in the letter from Reuveni’s lawyers centers on a Justice Department meeting in March concerning President Trump’s plans to invoke the Alien Enemies Act over what the president claimed was an invasion by the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua. Reuveni says Bove raised the possibility that a court might block the deportations before they could happen. Reuveni claims Bove used a profanity, saying the department would need to consider telling the courts “f— you,” and “ignore any such order,” according to the filing.

“Mr. Reuveni was stunned by Bove’s statement because, to Mr. Reuveni’s knowledge, no one in DOJ leadership — in any Administration — had ever suggested the Department of Justice could blatantly ignore court orders, especially with” an expletive, the filing says. In the weeks after the meeting, Reuveni says he raised concerns in several cases about efforts to violate court orders through “lack of candor, deliberate delay and disinformation.”

Reuveni’s claims were first reported Tuesday by the New York Times.

Deputy Atty. Gen. Todd Blanche called the allegations “utterly false,” saying that he was at the March meeting and “at no time did anyone suggest a court order should not be followed.”

“Planting a false hit piece the day before a confirmation hearing is something we have come to expect from the media, but it does not mean it should be tolerated,” Blanche wrote in a post on X.

Reuveni had been promoted under the Trump administration to serve as acting deputy director of the Office of Immigration Litigation after working for the Justice Department for nearly 15 years under both Republican and Democratic administrations.

Reuveni’s firing came after he acknowledged in an April court hearing that a Salvadoran man, Kilmar Abrego Garcia, should not have been deported to an El Salvador prison, and expressed frustration over a lack of information about the administration’s actions. After that hearing, Reuveni says, he refused to sign on to an appeal brief in Abrego Garcia’s case that included arguments that were “contrary to law, frivolous, and untrue.”

“The consequences of DOJ’s actions Mr. Reuveni reports have grave impacts not only for the safety of individuals removed from the country in violation of court orders, but also for the constitutional rights and protections of all persons — citizen and noncitizen alike — who are potential victims of flagrant deliberate disregard of due process and the rule of law by the agency charged with upholding it,” Reuveni’s lawyers wrote.

U.S. District Judge James E. Boasberg in April found probable cause to hold the Trump administration in criminal contempt for violating his order to not deport anyone in its custody under the Alien Enemies Act. Boasberg had told the administration to turn around any planes that already headed to El Salvador, but that did not happen.

The administration has argued it did not violate any orders, saying the court decision didn’t apply to planes that had lready left U.S. airspace by the time Boasberg’s command came down.

Trump nominated Bove last month to fill a vacancy on the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which hears cases from Delaware, New Jersey and Pennsylvania. He was already expected to face tough questioning before the Senate Judiciary Committee given his role in some of the department’s most scrutinized actions since Trump’s return to the White House in January.

The top Democrat on the committee, Sen. Dick Durbin, said Tuesday that the allegations from Reuveni are part of a “broader pattern by President Trump and his allies to undermine the Justice Department’s commitment to the rule of law.”

“I want to thank Mr. Reuveni for exercising his right to speak up and bring accountability to Mr. Bove,” Durbin said in a statement. “And I implore my Senate Republican colleagues: do not turn a blind eye to the dire consequences of confirming Mr. Bove to a lifetime position as a circuit court judge.”

Democrats have raised alarm about several other actions by Bove, including his order to dismiss New York Mayor Eric Adams’ corruption case that led to the resignation of a top New York federal prosecutor and other senior Justice Department officials. Bove also accused FBI officials of “insubordination” for refusing to hand over the names of agents who investigated the U.S. Capitol riot, and ordered the firings of a group of prosecutors involved in the Jan. 6 criminal cases.

Richer writes for the Associated Press.