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lindsey halligan
Watchdog Files Bar Complaint Against Trump Prosecutor on Comey, James Cases
Along with "vindictively" harming the defendants, the group leader said, Lindsey Halligan "is singlehandedly undermining—maybe irrevocably—the public's confidence in the impartiality of the Department of Justice."
Nov 11, 2025
As former Federal Bureau of Investigation Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James work to have the criminal charges against them dismissed, a watchdog group on Tuesday filed a bar complaint against Lindsey Halligan, who is spearheading the cases as interim US attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia.
The Campaign for Accountability (CfA) sent the complaint to the Florida Bar and the Virginia Bar, which both have jurisdiction because Halligan is a Florida-licensed lawyer practicing in Virginia. She previously served as a defense attorney for President Donald Trump, and before her current job, she had no prosecutorial experience.
In September, shortly after Halligan took over for Erik Siebert, who declined to bring charges against Comey or James, the ex-FBI director was charged with lying to Congress—and Trump vowed that "there'll be others." In early October, James—who successfully prosecuted Trump for financial crimes before his second term—was indicted for mortgage fraud. Critics argue both cases are part of the administration's broader effort to punish the president's "enemies."
The CfA complaint outlines how Halligan may have violated Virginia's rules for attorneys that require candor to the court and competence, and prohibit extrajudicial statements, the prosecution of a charge the prosecutor knows is not supported by probable cause, and conduct involving dishonesty, deceit, misrepresentation, or conduct prejudicial to the administration of justice.
"We are asking the Virginia and Florida bars to investigate, making clear that a government appointment is not a hall pass for unethical behavior."
In addition to violating the Virginia and Florida rules for lawyers, Halligan may have violated her oath to "support the Constitution of the United States" and to "faithfully discharge the duties of the office of attorney and counselor at law," the document explains. "More generally, Ms. Halligan's actions appear to constitute an abuse of power and serve to undermine the integrity of the Department of Justice (DOJ) and erode public confidence in the legal profession and the fair administration of justice."
Along with laying out Halligan's actions in the Comey and James cases, the complaint notes her related correspondence on the messaging application Signal with Lawfare's Anna Bower, which the journalist reported on in detail.
"Ms. Halligan's actions with respect to the prosecution of Mr. Comey and Ms. James, and her Signal exchange with Ms. Bower, appear to represent a serious breach of her ethical obligations," the complaint says. "Her conduct undermines the integrity of the DOJ, appears to have violated multiple provisions of the Virginia and Florida rules of professional conduct, and undoubtedly will erode public trust in the legal system if permitted without consequence."
"The committee has a responsibility to stop Ms. Halligan from abusing her position and her Florida bar license for improper purposes," the document stresses. "Failing to discipline Ms. Halligan under these egregious circumstances will embolden others who would use our system of justice for their own political ends."
"Campaign for Accountability respectfully requests that the Committees in both states conduct a thorough investigation into these allegations, determine if any violation occurred and, if so, impose appropriate disciplinary measures," the complaint concludes.
The group's executive director, Michelle Kuppersmith, said in a statement that "it is difficult to overstate the damage wrought by Ms. Halligan's actions. In addition to unjustly and vindictively inflicting direct personal harm on Mr. Comey and Ms. James, she is singlehandedly undermining—maybe irrevocably—the public's confidence in the impartiality of the Department of Justice."
"Ms. Halligan appears to have violated numerous rules of professional conduct for lawyers," she added. "We are asking the Virginia and Florida bars to investigate, making clear that a government appointment is not a hall pass for unethical behavior."
CBS News noted that while Halligan and the DOJ did not respond to requests for comment on the complaint, Attorney General Pam Bondi publicly praised her the week that Comey was indicted, writing on social media: "This was a big week at the Department of Justice. Our EDVA US Attorney Lindsey Halligan did an outstanding job. We will continue to fight for accountability, fairness, and the rule of law because the American people deserve nothing less."
Bondi, also of Florida, has faced her own bar complaint—filed in June by Democracy Defenders Fund, Lawyers Defending American Democracy, Lawyers for the Rule of Law, and dozens of individual attorneys, law professors, and former judges, who collectively accused her of engaging in "serious professional misconduct that threatens the rule of law and the administration of justice.”
In the wake of another prosecutor charging Trump’s ex-adviser John Bolton, Reuters/Ipsos polling published late last month showed that a majority of American adults think the Republican president is using US law enforcement "to go after his enemies."
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Prosecutor Handpicked to Go After Trump's Enemies Attacked Journalist in Bizarre Texts
Some observers speculated that US Attorney Lindsey Halligan may have violated federal law by sending "disappearing messages" about an ongoing case.
Oct 21, 2025
Lindsey Halligan, the US attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, who was hand-picked by President Donald Trump to bring criminal charges against his political rivals, left a legal journalist befuddled earlier this month when she sent unsolicited text messages containing sensitive details about one of her highest-profile cases.
On Monday night, Anna Bower, a senior editor at Lawfare, published the full text message exchange, which pertained to the prosecution of New York Attorney General Letitia James, against whom Halligan brought charges for mortgage fraud earlier this month.
The case against James has been widely criticized as politically motivated, as James had previously brought a case against Trump for financial crimes, which resulted in a finding against him in a civil fraud trial in 2022.
The president appointed Halligan, a former insurance lawyer who has never prosecuted a criminal case but previously worked as a personal attorney for Trump, to take over for her predecessor, Erik Siebert, who was forced out for declining to prosecute former FBI Director James Comey on what he believed to be flimsy charges.
Halligan first messaged Bower on October 11, just two days after the indictment against James had been handed up by the Department of Justice (DOJ), accusing her of misrepresenting how she intended to use a rental property in Norfolk, Virginia, to secure a better mortgage rate in 2020, allegedly by claiming that it was for personal use as a "second home" when she was actually renting it to a family of three.
Even before Halligan's texts, Bower said she was "among the skeptics" of the case's merits, noting that the type of mortgage agreement signed by James not only allowed her to rent the property after a year, but that the indictment "provides scant details about the circumstances of the supposed rental arrangement" James supposedly made with clients in violation of her mortgage contract.
Her perception was bolstered by reporting from the New York Times, which revealed that since 2020, the home has been occupied by James' grand-niece, who does not pay rent on the property, and that James stays there several times per year.
In response to the report, Bower—an analyst who often provides commentary on legal stories that she did not herself report—posted on X that “this is important exculpatory evidence because the indictment accuses James of seeking a ‘second home’ mortgage when in reality she intended to use it as an ’investment’ home by renting it.”
This post apparently caught the attention of Halligan, who messaged Bower on Signal later that afternoon.
"Anna, Lindsey Halligan here," the first message read. "You are reporting things that are simply not true. Thought you should have a heads up."
Bower explained: "I assumed the exchange was a hoax because, while it is not unusual for lawyers to reach out to me about my reporting or commentary, it is highly unusual for a US attorney to do so regarding an ongoing prosecution—particularly in a high-profile case in which her conduct is already the subject of immense public scrutiny."
But she later confirmed it was Halligan, and asked what precisely her post had gotten wrong.
Halligan responded: "You're assuming exculpatory evidence without knowing what you're talking about. It's just bizarre to me. If you have any questions, before you report, feel free to reach out to me. But jumping to conclusions does your credibility no good."
Noting that she was not the person who reported the story, Bower asked if the Times report had gotten something wrong. Halligan brought the conversation back to Bower.
"Yes they did but you went with it!" she said. "Without even fact checking anything!!!!"
Halligan referred Bower to the DOJ's indictment of James, but Bower noted that the indictment's "odd and ambiguous" wording did not actually contradict the Times' reporting. When she asked for more clarification about what specific details were inaccurate, Halligan said "I can't tell you grand jury stuff," even though her discussion with Bower had already discussed grand jury materials.
When Bower explained that it was still "unclear" what the Times report had gotten wrong, Halligan began to launch into a personal attack against her.
"You're biased," Halligan wrote. "Your reporting isn't accurate. I'm the one handling the case and I'm telling you that. If you want to twist and torture the facts to fit your narrative, there's nothing I can do. Waste to even give you a heads up."
Bower again insisted that she'd be "happy to correct" any mistakes, but that she "can't do so without a sense of what I supposedly got wrong."
Halligan replied: "Continue to do what you have been and you'll be completely discredited when the evidence comes out."
Over the subsequent days, when Bower would continue to reach out to Halligan to ask about other aspects of the case, she was met with more insults and eventually silence.
When Bower reached out to the DOJ for comment, a spokesperson responded that Halligan was "attempting to point you to facts, not gossip, but when clarifying that she would adhere to the rule of the law and not disclose grand jury information, you threaten to leak an entire conversation."
"Good luck ever getting anyone to talk to you when you publish their texts," theDOJ added.
After sending the DOJ another set of follow-up questions on Monday in anticipation of the story's publication, Bower received another text from Halligan minutes before the story was to be posted. Bower described the exchange as follows:
"By the way—everything I ever sent you is off record. You're not a journalist so it's weird saying that but just letting you know."
I responded: "I'm sorry, but that's not how this works. You don't get to say that in retrospect."
Halligan was unpersuaded: "Yes I do. Off record."
"I am really sorry. I would have been happy to speak with you on an off the record basis had you asked," I said. "But you didn't ask, and I still haven't agreed to speak on that basis. Do you have any further comment for the story?
To my surprise, she kept going: "It's obvious the whole convo is off record. There's disappearing messages and it's on signal. What is your story? You never told me about a story."
Halligan has a bachelor's degree in politics and broadcast journalism from Regis University. And as Bower notes, she has frequently dealt with the press as a member of Trump's legal team.
"As anyone who professionally engages with the media as routinely as Halligan would know, the default assumption when a reporter speaks with a public official is that everything is 'on the record,' meaning that anything the source says can be printed with attribution," Bower wrote.
The saga is the latest in a series of gaffes that have called Halligan's credibility as a prosecutor into question.
Her indictment against Comey has been ridiculed by legal scholars for being "almost devoid of factual material," as Benjamin Wittes, the co-director of the Harvard Law School-Brookings Project on Law and Security, put it. While attempting to present charging documents to a magistrate judge, she mistakenly presented two inconsistent documents, which the judge said "has never happened before."
While attempting to have the case against Comey for allegedly making false statements thrown out of court, his attorneys argued that Halligan altered some of his testimony, including by claiming that he was speaking about “Hillary Clinton” when he was actually answering a question about “the Clinton administration.”
Following the reveal of her exchanges with Bower, Andrew Fleischman, a trial and appellate lawyer in Georgia, joked on social media that "Halligan has all the poise and butt-dialing capacity of a sober [Rudy] Giuliani."
Others, like Matthew Gertz, a senior fellow at Media Matters for America, raised the possibility that Halligan’s use of “disappearing messages” on Signal could have violated federal law, which requires federal prosecutors to preserve evidence that may be favorable to the accused.
In a CNN interview with Kaitlan Collins on Monday night, following the release of the texts, Bower explained that she has spoken to other legal reporters and prosecutors in the days since her conversation with Halligan.
Her sources in the legal profession, she said, "have never quite seen an exchange like this.”
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'What Tyranny Looks Like': Democracy Defenders Slam Trump DOJ's Indictment of NY AG James
"This isn't justice," said Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer. "It's revenge. And it should horrify every American who believes no one is above the law.”
Oct 09, 2025
Critics sounded the alarm Thursday after the US Department of Justice indicted Democratic New York Attorney General Letitia James—who successfully prosecuted President Donald Trump for financial crimes—for alleged bank fraud in what democracy defenders called the president's latest weaponization of the DOJ against a political foe.
Days after another prosecutor in Virginia resisted intense pressure from Trump and Attorney General Pam Bondi and declined to pursue charges against James, US Attorney of the Eastern District of Virginia Lindsey Halligan—a former personal attorney for Trump whom the president appointed to her lifetime seat despite having never prosecuted a case—indicted James for allegedly defrauding a bank and making false statements to a financial institution.
"This is nothing more than a continuation of the president’s desperate weaponization of our justice system," James said in response to the news. "I am not fearful—I am fearless. We will fight these baseless charges aggressively, and my office will continue to fiercely protect New Yorkers and their rights."
This is nothing more than a continuation of the president’s desperate weaponization of our justice system.I am not fearful — I am fearless. We will fight these baseless charges aggressively, and my office will continue to fiercely protect New Yorkers and their rights..
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— New York Attorney General Letitia James (@newyorkstateag.bsky.social) October 9, 2025 at 2:36 PM
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) said in response to the indictment: "This is what tyranny looks like. President Trump is using the Justice Department as his personal attack dog, targeting Attorney General Tish James for the ‘crime’ of prosecuting him for fraud—and winning."
“One US attorney already refused this case," Schumer added. "So, Trump handpicked an unqualified hack that would go after another political enemy. This isn't justice. It's revenge. And it should horrify every American who believes no one is above the law.”
Congresswoman Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas) said on social media that the Trump administration is targeting James "for one reason: She had the courage to hold Donald Trump accountable."
"This is political weaponization of our courts, plain and simple—and proof that when you stand up to corruption, they come for you," she added. "I stand with Attorney General Letitia James. This attack won’t silence the truth."
Trump Wants the Nobel Peace Prize for War, Insurrection, and Indicting Letitia James with @mehdirhasan.bsky.social A desperate Trump is attempting to distract from the Epstein Files by indicting Letitia James and declaring war on American critics.thelefthook.substack.com/p/trump-want...
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— Wajahat Ali (@wajali.bsky.social) October 9, 2025 at 2:23 PM
Politico reported that James' case has been assigned to Judge Jamar Walker, an appointee of former President Joe Biden.
Halligan recently filed criminal charges against former FBI Director James Comey—who oversaw investigations into Russian interference in the 2016 election and potential ties to Trump's campaign—for allegedly making a false statement to Congress and obstruction of a congressional proceeding.
Critics accuse Trump of signaling to Bondi his wish for her to go after some of his political enemies, who in addition to James and Comey include Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), who led the first House impeachment trial of the president. Following Comey's indictment, Trump vowed that "there'll be others."
Trump forced out Erik Siebert, Halligan’s predecessor, amid his refusal to indict Comey or file charges against James, who in 2022 filed a civil lawsuit against the then-former president, his two eldest sons, and the Trump Organization for business fraud. Trump and his organization were found liable for fraud and ordered to pay hundreds of millions of dollars in penalties, although an appeals court later overturned the fine while upholding the fraud findings.
Last month, the DOJ subpoenaed James as part of a probe into whether she violated Trump’s civil rights by suing him, his sons, and his business.
In addition to Democratic lawmakers, pro-democracy campaigners also slammed Thursday's indictment, with Stand Up America executive director Christina Harvey contending that "this is revenge and another dangerous abuse of power."
"Just days after prosecuting James Comey, Trump’s Justice Department pursued charges against New York Attorney General Letitia James in a thinly veiled act of retaliation for defeating Trump in court," Harvey added. “Americans do not want our president using taxpayer-funded prosecutors and law enforcement to exact revenge. If prosecutors can't even do their jobs without facing prosecution themselves, none of us are safe from Trump's overreach.”
Lisa Gilbert, co-president of the consumer advocacy group Public Citizen, said in a statement:
Yet again, the vengeful Donald Trump has demanded the perversion of justice, this time with the vindictive charges against New York Attorney General Letitia James. Yet again, career prosecutors have recommended against bringing criminal charges. Yet again, only an interim US attorney who previously served as Trump’s personal lawyer was willing to seek the indictment.
Attorney General James will defend herself from these unjust charges and continue to do her job. But this prosecution is directed not only against Letitia James, but all Americans. No one should fear criminal prosecution because they stand up to Donald Trump.
“The government should be for the people," Gilbert added. "It should serve justice and law and regular Americans. It should not be distorted to serve the vindictive revenge effort of a single man. Even if that man is the president and the president thinks he is a king.”
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