The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) are undergoing significant changes.
During the week of Thursday, February 13, 2025, NBC News conducted a review of the U.S. attorneys listed on Justice.gov, the DOJ’s official website. Between Tuesday, February 11, 2025, and Thursday, February 13, 2025, the news organization found at least 12 names had been changed. The White House nor the DOJ offered an official statement regarding the workforce turnover.
Among the attorneys leaving the DOJ are Erek L. Barron, Dena J. King, Ismail Ramsey, Tara McGrath, and Tessa Gorman. However, the DOJ did not provide an official list of the attorneys who had recently exited the department.
“It has been an honor to serve as U.S. Attorney, working alongside an exceptional team in this office and forging strong partnerships with our law enforcement agencies and communities in pursuit of justice,” McGrath said. “As I step down from a decades-long career in public service, I remain inspired by dedicated public servants across this district and am proud of all we achieved together.”
While McGrath’s statement was posted to the DOJ’s website, other attorneys, including Trent Morse, reportedly learned of their termination after receiving a note that read, “At the direction of President Donald J. Trump, I am writing to inform you that your position as U.S. Attorney is terminated, effective immediately.”
The message Morse reportedly received from the White House signals a departure from the previous Trump administration. During Trump’s first term, then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions asked U.S. attorneys to resign, and only one attorney was reportedly terminated after refusing to resign.
The latest round of layoffs at the DOJ follow a previous round of layoffs at the FBI. At the end of January, at least least five top FBI officials were reportedly told to resign or they’d be fired. Moving forward, the Trump administration’s potential layoff of probationary employees could leave nearly 1,000 employees in and around the FBI without work.
“Right now, Special Agents in probationary status are risking their lives in locations spread across the country to serve warrants, conduct surveillance on gangs and narcotics traffickers, stop threats to national security, and protect vulnerable populations from predators,” FBI Agents Association President Natalie Bara said. “Displacing these rank-and-file public servants would create a gap in the FBI workforce that could be devastating to the FBI’s mission—one that would take approximately twenty years to fill with new Special Agents. The combination of losing Special Agents working cases now as probationary employees and creating a long-term weakness in the FBI workforce would jeopardize ongoing and future investigations and put our nation and its people in unnecessary danger for many years to come.”
