Raskin to Acting AG Blanche: DOJ Pattern of Defying Court Orders 'Strongly Suggests' Prosecutors Ordered to Violate the Law

Rep. Jamie Raskin, senior House Judiciary Committee Democrat, sent a formal letter on July 14 to Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche documenting a pattern of DOJ prosecutors misleading courts and defying lawful orders, stating that the frequency “strongly suggests that DOJ prosecutors are being ordered, or at least encouraged, to violate the law.” The letter is tied to fallout from the Boasberg contempt inquiry — the criminal contempt investigation into deportation flights to El Salvador’s CECOT prison in defiance of a direct court order — which a Trump-era appeals court panel subsequently shut down (2026-06-01–boasberg-contempt-stalled-bove-confirmed-third-circuit).

The letter is one of the first formal congressional records to characterize DOJ’s court defiance as a directed pattern rather than a series of isolated incidents — a distinction that matters because it shifts the accountability question from individual-prosecutor misconduct to institutional policy, and creates a documentary record that could support future oversight subpoenas.

Corrected 2026-10-01: removed the Brennan Center for Justice citation — confirmed on refetch to be a general explainer dated February 14, 2025 (over a year before this letter), unrelated to Raskin’s July 14, 2026 letter. The entry’s sole remaining source, the primary-document PDF, was unreachable (HTTP 403) on two retry attempts; its claims are left as-is pending access. Status set to disputed: fewer than 2 sources currently support the entry’s core claim.