A week before an expected committee vote on the controversial nomination of Trump ally Emil Bove for a federal judgeship, CBS News has obtained emails and text messages shared with Congress by a whistleblower who accuses Bove of unethical actions while he was a top Justice Department official this year.
The messages were released Thursday morning by Senate Judiciary Committee Democrats who are trying to defeat Bove’s nomination for a judicial appointment to the Third Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals. The text and email messages allegedly offer new insight into the administration’s response to its mistaken deportation of Kilmar Abrego Garcia from Maryland to El Salvador on March 15.
The whistleblower is former Justice Department attorney Erez Reuveni, who was fired April 11, after more than 14 years at the agency, when department leadership accused him of presenting an insufficiently vigorous argument on behalf of the Trump administration during Abrego Garcia’s court proceedings.
Last month, Reuveni issued a public statement opposing the nomination of Bove, who is one of Mr. Trump’s former criminal defense lawyers.
The text and email messages, which were obtained by Democratic leadership on the Senate Judiciary Committee, show Reuveni unsuccessfully pressed his colleagues and other federal agencies for assistance in fulfilling a court order that Abrego Garcia be returned to the U.S. in March. Dozens of the email messages also allegedly reveal attempts by Trump administration officials to label Abrego Garcia a leader of the gang MS-13 — which Abrego Garcia’s lawyers have strongly denied — and downplay the agency’s mistake in removing him to El Salvador.
Some email exchanges in which Reuveni was a recipient during the week of March 27 included questions about the extent of Abrego Garcia’s membership or leadership of MS-13 and inquired about whether or how the U.S. could request that El Salvador return Abrego Garcia.
The messages by Reuveni also warn about the legal peril of ignoring court orders. One of the messages in the batch purportedly showed that a homeland security official conflated Abrego Garcia’s alleged MS-13 membership with membership in Tren de Aragua, a different gang based in Venezuela.
Some of the text messages from Reuveni included exchanges by Reuveni and a Justice Department colleague in which they refer to alleged instructions from Bove to communicate a “f*** you” to the court’s order that Abrego Garcia and others be returned from El Salvador to U.S. custody after the March 15 deportation flights.
One such exchange between Trump administration officials, including Justice Department officials, from the night of the March 15 court order to return the deportation flights, includes a reference to the alleged “f*** you” guidance.
The messages are emerging two weeks after Reuveni filed a whistleblower complaint alleging that he was “threatened, fired, and publicly disparaged” after questioning instructions from Bove and other officials to ignore court orders.
The Justice Department denied the claims at the time. Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche called the allegations “utterly false,” referred to Reuveni as a “disgruntled former employee” and said, “at no time did anyone suggest a court order should not be followed.”
Reuveni first drew attention after the Trump administration deported Abrego Garcia to a prison in El Salvador, defying a 2019 court order barring him from being sent to the Central American country.
Weeks after the mid-March deportation, Reuveni conceded to a Maryland federal judge that Abrego Garcia was deported by mistake and “should not have been removed.” When the judge pressed for details on why the government couldn’t fly Abrego Garcia back, Reuveni said he’d “asked the government the same question” and did not receive an answer.
Reuveni was quickly put on leave, with Attorney General Pam Bondi suggesting he failed to “zealously advocate on behalf of the United States.” Six days later, Reuveni says he was fired.
Abrego Garcia was eventually returned to the U.S. in June, months after a judge ordered his return. He is now awaiting trial for criminal smuggling charges, and has pleaded not guilty.
Sen. Dick Durbin, the top Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, said he sought the text messages and emails. Durbin said, “Senators raised these allegations at Emil Bove’s judicial nomination hearing, and he offered only carefully wordsmithed responses. So, I asked for documentation from Mr. Reuveni to further substantiate his claims.”
“Text messages, email exchanges, and documents show that the Department of Justice misled a federal court and disregarded a court order. Mr. Bove spearheaded this effort, which demanded attorneys violate their ethical duty of candor to the court,” Durbin said.
The White House did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
At his Senate confirmation hearing last month, Bove denied Reuveni’s accusations of any unethical conduct.
“I have never advised a Department of Justice attorney to violate a court order,” Bove told the Senate Judiciary Committee. He added, “I don’t think there’s any validity to the suggestion that that whistleblower complaint filed yesterday calls into question my qualifications to serve as a circuit judge.”
The committee is expected to hold a hearing on Bove’s confirmation Thursday, according to two congressional sources.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/whistleblowers-texts-allude-to-alleged-bove-directive-to-defy-court-order/
