Former employees from justice department’s civil rights division accuse Trump administration of purging experts

More than 200 former employees in the justice department’s civil rights division signed a letter released on Tuesday decrying the “near destruction” of the agency that is supposed to enforce US civil rights laws and accused political leadership of waging a campaign to purge career experts from its ranks.

There was a mass exodus of lawyers earlier this year after political appointees removed career managers, detailed employees to menial work, unilaterally dropped cases, and made it clear the division’s focus would be enforcing Donald Trump’s priorities. By 1 May of this year, the department had lost about 70% of its attorneys – a staggering number. The letter was released on Tuesday to commemorate the 68th anniversary of the founding of the civil rights division.

Georgia lawmaker says colleagues who made fun of president before 2024 win now support him out of fear

Republicans in Congress privately made fun of Donald Trump only to come around to support him when he won their party’s 2024 White House nomination, outgoing GOP House member Marjorie Taylor Greene said on Sunday.

“I watched many of my colleagues go from making fun of him, making fun of how he talks, making fun of me constantly for supporting him, to when he won the primary in 2024, they all started – excuse my language, Lesley – kissing his ass,” Greene, a Georgia Republican, said in a clip of an interview that is set to air on Sunday on CBS’s 60 Minutes program.

Trump team faces mounting pressure as members of Congress allege that the deadly attack was unlawful

US Democrats on Sunday pushed the Trump administration to release video of a second strike on an alleged drug boat incapacitated in the Caribbean, continuing to escalate pressure on the Pentagon amid accusations the attack was unlawful.

Eleven people died in the 2 September attack, including two men killed in a follow-up strike as they reportedly clung to wreckage for an hour. That killing has been met with intense scrutiny and accusations of war crimes after the Washington Post reported defense secretary Pete Hegseth gave an order to “kill them all”. Adm Frank Bradley of the US navy, who oversaw the attack, told lawmakers on Thursday there was no such order – and the Pentagon has defended the legality of the attack.

Government faces setback after judge said it likely violated Comey ally’s protections from unreasonable searches

A federal judge has temporarily blocked prosecutors from accessing materials from a key ally of James Comey on Saturday, making the already uphill criminal case against the former FBI director even more difficult.

Daniel Richman, a Columbia University law school professor who has also represented Comey as an attorney, sued the government in November, saying that the government had unlawfully accessed materials from his computer as they charged Comey with lying to Congress. Richman is a close friend of Comey who worked at the FBI.