AG Bondi filed judicial misconduct complaint against Chief Judge Boasberg, seeking removal from deportation cases

On July 29, 2025, Attorney General Pam Bondi directed the Department of Justice to file a formal judicial misconduct complaint against Chief Judge James Boasberg of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, seeking his reassignment from deportation-related litigation and a special-committee investigation. The complaint was filed with Chief Judge Sri Srinivasan of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. It alleged that Boasberg had made "improper" remarks at a closed March 11, 2025, judicial conference with Chief Justice Roberts, where he reportedly said he believed the Trump administration would disregard federal court orders and trigger a "constitutional crisis." Boasberg had presided over multiple high-profile rulings blocking Trump administration deportation flights in the months preceding the complaint.

The DOJ's complaint argued that judges may not privately express views about the executive branch's likely compliance with court orders—that doing so forfeits the appearance of impartiality. The formal judicial-conduct machinery carries real institutional consequences: a sustained complaint can result in case reassignment, public reprimand, or referral to the Judicial Council for further disciplinary proceedings. Legal ethicists and judicial-conduct scholars quoted by the ABA Journal questioned whether a judge's private deliberative remarks at a closed judicial conference, which exist precisely to allow frank exchange among judges about the state of the judiciary, could constitute misconduct under any standard.

The complaint explicitly requested Boasberg's removal from deportation cases, making its operative goal transparent. Trump had publicly attacked Boasberg on multiple prior occasions, demanding his recusal from deportation litigation, and had separately demanded impeachment proceedings against other federal judges who ruled against administration priorities. Democracy Docket characterized the filing as part of a broader pattern of executive pressure on the Article III judiciary.