Trump’s Justice Department scrapped 23,000 criminal investigations in favor of immigration

In the first days after Pam Bondi was appointed attorney general last year, the Justice Department began closing pending criminal cases at a record pace.

The cases included an investigation into a Virginia nursing home with a recent record of patient abuse; fraud investigations involving several New Jersey unions, including one initiated after a top official of a national union was accused of embezzlement; and an investigation into a cryptocurrency company suspected of misleading investors.

In total, the DOJ quietly closed more than 23,000 criminal cases in the first six months of President Donald Trump’s administration, abandoning hundreds of investigations into terrorism, white-collar crime, drugs and other crimes as it shifted its resources to immigration cases, according to a ProPublica analysis.

The bulk of these cases, which were closed without prosecution and known as denials, had been referred to the DOJ by law enforcement agencies in previous administrations who believed a federal crime may have been committed. The DOJ routinely declines to prosecute for a variety of reasons, including insufficient evidence or because a case is not a law enforcement priority.

But the number of denials under Bondi marks a striking change not only from the Biden administration but also from Trump’s first term, according to ProPublica’s analysis, which examined two decades of DOJ data, including the first six months of Trump’s second term. ProPublica determined that the increase is not the result of a legacy of a larger caseload or a greater number of law enforcement referrals.

In February 2025 alone, which included the first weeks of Bondi’s term, nearly 11,000 cases were decreased, the largest number in a month since at least 2004. The previous high was just over 6,500 cases in September 2019, during the first Trump administration.

Some of the cold cases are the result of years-long investigations by federal agencies such as the FBI and the Drug Enforcement Administration. For complex cases, the DOJ can take years to decide whether to file charges.

The change comes as the DOJ has undergone an extraordinary overhaul under the Trump administration, with the closure of entire units, directives to abandon the prosecution of certain crimes and thousands of lawyers who have resigned or, in some cases, been forced out of the agency.

In doing so, the DOJ is retreating from its mission to impartially uphold the rule of law, keep the country safe and protect civil rights, according to interviews with a dozen prosecutors and a open letter from nearly 300 DOJ employees who left the department under Trump. Trump’s DOJ, the staffers wrote, is “using a hammer” in its long-standing work to “protect communities and the rule of law.”

The shift in priorities was outlined in a series of memos sent to attorneys early last year. Trump’s DOJ said it “turns a new page on white-collar and corporate crackdowns” and emphasizes the prosecution of drug cartels, illegal immigrants, and institutions that promote “divisive DEI policies.” Asset, in a speech last March at the ministry, said the changes were necessary after a “capitulation to violent criminals” during the previous administration and would result in the restoration of “fair, equal and impartial justice under the constitutional rule of law.”

The department pursued 32,000 new immigration cases in the first six months of the administration, nearly triple the number under the Biden administration and a 15% increase from Trump’s first term. He brought fewer prosecutions for almost every other type of crime – from drug offenses to corruption – than new administrations in their first six months dating back to 2009.

The DOJ has also closed hundreds of cases involving alleged crimes that the administration has publicly highlighted as law enforcement priorities. Even as the Trump administration mobilized agents of Elon Musk’s Department of Government Effectiveness to root out waste, fraud and abuse in the federal government, the DOJ has dismissed more than 900 cases of fraud relating to federal programs or procurement. Under Trump, the number of major fraud cases against the United States has been about three times higher than the average for similar periods under previous administrations. And while the Trump administration has promised to “make America safe again“, his DOJ has refused more than 1,000 terrorism cases, also more than previous administrations.

Federal prosecutor Joseph Gerbasi spent years in the department’s narcotics and dangerous drugs section, helping to build cases against major suppliers of fentanyl ingredients in India and China. After Bondi’s arrival, he was left perplexed when his team was ordered to abandon their work.

“All the building blocks of what would become successful prosecutions have been removed,” said Gerbasi, who retired as acting deputy chief for policy in March 2025 after 28 years with the department.

The decision had “a considerable deflating effect on morale,” he said.

Barbara McQuade, who worked as a federal prosecutor in Michigan for two decades until 2017 under Republican and Democratic administrations, said it’s not unusual for new administrations to come to power with a few “pet priorities” — like focusing on violent crime or drug trafficking. But she said those changes typically involve modest policy adjustments and that most decisions about which crimes to focus on are usually made at the local level by the U.S. attorney, in coordination with the FBI or other agencies.

“We would review them every five years or so, without having anything to do with any administration, just because it made sense,” she said.

A DOJ spokesperson, in an emailed response to questions about the increase in denials, said that in “an effort to clean, correct, and validate data in the U.S. Attorneys’ case management system,” the department reviewed all pending criminal cases opened before fiscal year 2023, which included updating the status of closed cases. “This Department of Justice remains committed to investigating and prosecuting all types of crimes to keep the American people safe, and the number of denials is a direct result of our efforts to manage the agency more effectively.”

The agency did not respond to questions about what types of cases were denied.

The increase in rejected cases began in February 2025, when the department ordered prosecutors to review every open case initiated before October 2022 and determine whether to close it. Such a review would typically take months, according to a lawyer reviewing the records. A memo, which was given to ProPublica reporters, ordered the review to be completed within 10 days.

Former Justice Department prosecutors told ProPublica that they typically review caseloads every six months with supervisors and that closing pending cases generally would not be a concern. However, they said the February directive was unusual. No one could remember a similar order.

The directive came as top department officials began frequently requesting data on specific types of cases and charging decisions, such as the outcome of fentanyl cases, according to former prosecutor Michael Gordon. Gordon, who helped prosecute the Jan. 6 cases before moving on to prosecuting white-collar crimes, said Washington officials’ “fire drills” became so regular that he became accustomed to the look of despair on his supervisor’s face when he showed up at Gordon’s door, apologetically making yet another frantic request.

“It was either ‘give us some statistics that we can use to make ourselves look good,’ or ‘give us some statistics to show how bad things are in this area,'” Gordon said. “It was never a productive investigation.”

Although Gordon did not see the memo, he remembers receiving a request to review all cases open for more than two years and report their status, entering basic information about those he wanted to continue processing into a master spreadsheet.

“The office was pushing us to close everything by a certain date, so that when they had to show up in Washington, they had a low number of open cases,” he said. “We really had to fight to keep open a case that was more than two years old. »

Gordon said he was fired by the DOJ last June. He filed a lawsuit, alleging that his dismissal was politically motivated. The department did not respond to questions about Gordon’s comments or his lawsuit. The government filed a request late last year, arguing that the Federal Court lacked jurisdiction over the matter. The court has not yet ruled on this request and the case is still pending.

Investigations of individuals or companies whose prosecutions have been denied are generally not reported to the courts and are generally only disclosed in summary form by the DOJ in annual reports. To conduct its analysis, ProPublica obtained denial data from the DOJ and the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, a center that obtains data through Freedom of Information Act requests.

Here are some of the areas most affected by the rise in declinations.

Drugs

As president, Trump frequently spoke of “scourge” of drugs entering the country. At the same time, the Justice Department declined to prosecute nearly 5,000 cases of federal drug law violations, including trafficking and money laundering. The number of refusals was 45 percent higher than the average of the previous three new administrations.

Gerbasi, the anti-narcotics prosecutor, declined to comment on specific cases that might have been dismissed by his office. But, he added, once Bondi was appointed, the office’s priority was to build cases against Tren de Aragua, a Venezuelan group that the Trump administration has labeled a foreign terrorist organization.

“Tren de Aragua was nowhere near the scale or impact of the cartels we were focusing on,” Gerbasi said. “But we were told to generate these cases.”

He said his office had to rush to send people to investigate local gangs in small towns believed to be affiliated with the Tren de Aragua. “They never would have merited a full-scale federal investigation,” he said.

“That told me that decisions were going to be based on political appearances and not on the merits of where investigative resources should be placed.” »

The DOJ declined to comment on Gerbasi’s remarks.

National security

Under Bondi, the DOJ has dismissed more than 1,300 cases involving terrorism and national security, nearly double what was typical at the start of most recent new administrations. While domestic terrorism was the hardest hit program, just over 300 cases involving charges of material support to foreign terrorist organizations were also dropped.

The DOJ’s National Homeland Security Issues Program – which considers cases of suspected espionage activity and the security of classified information – recorded more than 200 denials, four times more than usual in the first six months of a new administration. Some cases involved serving as an unregistered foreign agent, a charge Bondi ordered prosecutors to stop prosecuting unless they involve “conduct similar to more traditional espionage by foreign government actors.”

Jimmy Gurulé, a former federal prosecutor and George W. Bush appointee to the U.S. Treasury Department who investigated terrorism financing, said the decline in terrorism cases was concerning.

“Trump’s DOJ was used as a political weapon,” he said. “It’s a question of prioritization of resources. Are they going to be used for national security threats or to pursue one’s enemies and political critics?” The DOJ did not respond to a request for comment on Gurulé’s comments.

Work

The Justice Department has closed more than 60 union corruption and labor racketeering cases, 2.5 times the number recorded during Trump’s first term. Nearly half of the cases dismissed for these offenses came from the New Jersey U.S. attorney’s office, which in the past has aggressively prosecuted allegations of union corruption. All were refused due to insufficient evidence.

Most of those cases had been opened by Grady O’Malley, an assistant U.S. attorney who oversaw several union corruption prosecutions while working in the New Jersey office for four decades. He retired in 2023 and was troubled to learn from former colleagues that the office was ending open investigations into unions.

A Trump supporter, O’Malley said that while he doesn’t blame the president, he worries the decision to drop so many cases could embolden the unions he and his colleagues have spent years working to hold accountable. “No one is responsible for taking care of union issues, and the unions have every reason to believe that no one is taking care of them. »

The U.S. attorney’s office in New Jersey said it had no comment on the denial of employment cases.

White-collar crime

The Trump administration is committed to eliminating “generalized” fraud in federal benefit programs like food stamps and welfare. The controversial influx of federal agents into Minnesota in January began with a declared crackdown on noncitizens who allegedly defrauded nutrition and child care programs.

The DOJ, however, filed more than 900 cases of fraud in federal programs or procurement during the first six months of his administration, including one targeting a mortgage lender accused by several state regulators of defrauding the Federal Housing Administration. The case was dropped due to “prioritization of federal resources and interests.” The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Alabama, which dismissed the case, did not respond to a request for comment. The number of resolved fraud cases was about double that of the same period under the Biden and Trump administrations.

The agency also closed more than 100 health care fraud cases due to “prioritization of resources and interests,” even though the Trump administration said it was making this area of ​​oversight stricter. a priority.

Among other cases the DOJ determined were not a priority: the investigation into the Virginia nursing home accused of abuse, as well as investigations in Tennessee into fraud at a national chain of hospitals and one of the largest Medicaid managed care companies.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Virginia, through a spokesperson, declined to comment on the nursing home case. A spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney for the Middle District of Tennessee said the office does not comment on investigations that do not result in public charges.

The DOJ’s antitrust division, which works to prevent big companies from creating harmful monopolies, has also dismissed an unusually high number of cases during Trump’s second term. More than 40 cases were dropped in the first six months of Bondi’s tenure. That’s more than double the number decreased over the same period by the previous three new administrations.

Despite the denials, the department said it charged slightly more people with fraud in 2025 compared to the final year of the Biden administration, and those cases reported greater financial losses.

Promises kept

The DOJ under Bondi also quickly implemented many of the priorities outlined in Trump’s early executive orders and in its own “day one” directives to staff.

In February 2025, Trump issued an executive order suspending further investigations under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, which prohibits citizens and businesses from bribing foreign entities to advance their business interests. The order directed the Attorney General to review and “take appropriate action” on all ongoing investigations in order to “preserve the President’s foreign policy prerogatives.”

In the first six months, Bondi’s Justice Department closed 25 such cases, more than the combined number dropped by the previous three new administrations during the same period. One of the cases denied prosecution involved a major automaker, which reported possible anti-corruption violations involving a foreign subsidiary to federal investigators. The DOJ dismissed the lawsuits last June, citing “prioritization of federal resources and interests.”

The first day, Bondi ordered a review from criminal prosecution under the Free Access to Clinic Entrances Act, or FACE Act, which prohibits people from illegally blocking access to abortion clinics and places of worship. The department dropped as many cases under the law in its first six months as the last three new administrations combined, over the same period. Bondi’s order focused on “non-violent protest activities,” even though at least one of the closed cases was being investigated for a violent crime. The DOJ has since charged Immigration and Customs Enforcement protesters and journalists in Minneapolis under the FACE Act. The defendants in this case have pleaded not guilty.

The agency closed three times as many cases alleging environmental crimes as the Biden administration and one and a half times as many as during Trump’s first term. These refusals came as the DOJ reassigned and eliminated prosecutors working on environmental cases. One-fifth of all dropped environmental protection cases were dismissed for “prioritization of federal resources and interests.”