The frenetic scale and speed of leadership changes that the Trump administration has made at the Justice Department in its first week alone indicate the degree to which it intends to remake not just the political direction of the department, but also the makeup of its senior career ranks.
Senior officials handling national security and public corruption at the department have been transferred to areas far outside their expertise, as have high-ranking employees overseeing environmental, antitrust and criminal cases. Top officials overseeing the immigration court system were outright fired.
Every new administration replaces the political leadership of federal agencies and, over time, changes some of the senior career officials. But what happened in just a matter of days at the department is much different — sloughing off decades of apolitical expertise to new assignments widely seen in the building as punishments likely to result in resignations.
Collectively, the early moves suggest a deep distrust of the career, nonpartisan staff that typically makes recommendations to the political appointees on whether to charge cases, negotiate settlements or close cases without taking action.
President Trump and his backers have long complained about a “deep state” of career government officials who they believe are hostile to Republican political leadership, and in many ways, the moves are a blitz against parts of the department that enforce laws that some conservatives do not like but cannot get Congress to change.
At the Environment and Natural Resources Division, which brings civil and criminal cases to enforce the nation’s environmental protection laws, attorneys have been ordered to freeze all of its efforts, including making no court filings. For the time being, it cannot file new complaints about companies that are breaking environmental laws, lodge or enter consent decrees to wind down such litigation, or move to intervene in other cases.
The order has led to early problems because the division was negotiating settlements to existing lawsuits and, in some instances, was required by court order to issue filings, like procedural updates.
The changes also targeted some of the career officials who carry the most authority and institutional experience. At least four of the environment division’s section chiefs — nearly half its total — were reassigned last week to a newly created task force focused on going after so-called sanctuary cities that do not cooperate with immigration enforcement as much as the new administration would like.
Most of the senior officials who have been reassigned to immigration issues have little to no legal expertise in the field, having dedicated their legal careers to other issues, such as environmental law. They were told that their pay would remain unchanged and that they had up to 15 days to either accept the transfer or face the possibility of being fired.
Some of the measures underway at the department — like the reassignment of the head of the public integrity section, or a senior official handling national security investigations — are not entirely surprising. Mr. Trump has made plain his distaste for the Justice Department and the F.B.I. over criminal investigations of him and his allies, referring to them over the years as “scum.”
But in the case of some of the reassignments, career officials in the Justice Department find it hard to discern a reason, other than removing people whose legal views carry great weight in the building.
Some Justice Department staff members question whether the decisions violate civil service employment rules, particularly in the case of four senior officials in the office that handles immigration cases. Those people were fired outright, according to multiple people familiar with the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity to publicly discuss personnel matters.
Current and former Justice Department officials described the rapid-fire changes as harrowing for those affected. Multiple people last week described tearful discussions with colleagues who were suddenly forced to consider whether to quit, sue or silently accept their new posting.
The reassignment of the senior environmental lawyers is viewed by some in the division as effectively decapitating their leadership structure and demoralizing the officials who remain, according to people familiar with the changes who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal.
Andrew Mergen, who retired in 2023 after more than three decades at the division, said that while senior officials were sometimes reshuffled under previous administrations, it was “more as a prerogative of management than sort of as this big political move. So nothing like this has ever happened.”
He said he worried that the moves might drive away the department’s institutional expertise.
“Everybody who was there the day that Trump walked in had made the choice to work in the Trump administration, and to do their very best,” Mr. Mergen said, warning of the consequences if there were an exodus of career officials. “It will be a loss to the country if these people leave, and if other attorneys in the Justice Department leave.”
A spokesman for the environment division declined to comment.
The reassignments at the Justice Department have targeted members of the Senior Executive Service — the upper echelon of career employees, who serve directly for the political appointees at agencies. According to the Office of Management and Budget, such employees “are the major link between these appointees and the rest of the federal work force,” because they “operate and oversee nearly every government activity in approximately 75 federal agencies.”
David M. Uhlmann, who was the head of environmental enforcement at the Environmental Protection Agency during the Biden administration, said that simply removing those chiefs “is not going to bring the work of government to a screeching halt,” because their deputies can assume their responsibilities.
But it did underline the Trump administration’s approach to environmental regulation, he said. “The message it sends is that the Trump administration does not intend to hold polluters accountable and is not concerned about protecting communities from harmful pollution,” Mr. Uhlmann said.
The division was also affected by Mr. Trump’s executive order banning diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives. While it has none, a small Office of Environmental Justice dates back to an executive order issued under the Clinton administration that aims to address pollution and health risks that low-income and minority communities disproportionately experienced.
After Mr. Trump revoked that executive order in recent days, the division was told it could not take any steps that would have advanced its goals. And, like others involved with initiatives that promote diversity across the government, career employees of the division who worked for the environmental justice office have been placed on administrative leave, according to people familiar with the moves, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal.
As part of the administration’s push to freeze hiring across all agencies, the Justice Department has also rescinded job offers to its honors program. And like other agencies, the department has been told to submit a list of all probationary employees to the White House, meaning those who have not yet served long enough in their roles and so are not yet entitled to full protection by civil service laws.
It is unclear what officials plan to do with the list, but the request has elicited concern that it would lead to the mass dismissal of relatively new hires.
Lisa Friedman contributed reporting.