Judge rules Justice Department unlawfully fired prosecutor Maurene Comey

A federal judge ruled Monday that the Justice Department unlawfully fired Maurene Comey, a career prosecutor and the daughter of former FBI Director James Comey, rejecting the Trump administration’s claim that it could remove her without following federal employment protections.

U.S. District Judge Jesse Furman retroactively reinstated Comey to her position as an assistant U.S. attorney in Manhattan and ordered back pay from her firing in July 2025 through Dec. 20, when she took another job. In a 55-page decision, he found that her removal violated the constitutional separation of powers and federal law.

The administration argued that Article II of the Constitution gave the president unrestricted authority to remove federal prosecutors and that Congress could not limit that power. Furman rejected what he called a “sweeping and unprecedented theory of executive authority,” finding that Comey’s firing violated the Civil Service Reform Act, which protects federal employees.

“Congress granted the Attorney General power to remove Comey,” Furman wrote, but “Congress imposed limits on that power — limits that, even Defendants concede, were violated in Comey’s case.” Accepting the government’s argument, he added, would “unsettle the very equilibrium established by this Nation’s constitutional system.” Furman also found that the manner of her firing deprived Comey of due process, NBC News reported.

Comey had been a federal prosecutor in the Southern District of New York since 2015. Her cases included prosecutions involving Sean “Diddy” Combs, Jeffrey Epstein, Ghislaine Maxwell and former Sen. Robert Menendez. In court filings, the Justice Department acknowledged that she received “outstanding” performance ratings from 2019 through 2024, according to CBS News.

Comey said she was given no reason when she was dismissed. In a letter to former colleagues, she described being “summarily fired via memo” from Justice Department headquarters in Washington. The termination letter said her employment was ending immediately under Article II and federal law. The department later said then-Attorney General Pam Bondi directed her removal.

In a lawsuit filed in September 2025, Comey alleged that she was fired because of President Donald Trump’s hostility toward her father, whom Trump removed as FBI director in 2017. She also alleged that her perceived political affiliation and beliefs played a role, The Guardian reported. Those were Comey’s claims, not findings Furman made about the reason for her dismissal.

The administration had also sought to dismiss her lawsuit, arguing that she should have brought her claims before the Merit Systems Protection Board, which hears federal employees’ appeals. Furman ruled that the federal court could hear the case because the government had based her firing on constitutional authority rather than a civil service law, CBS News reported.

The Justice Department did not immediately respond to requests for comment.