DHS General Counsel James Percival Publishes “Worst of the Worst, District Judge Edition” Naming Four Federal Judges

Opening

On July 23, 2026, DHS General Counsel James Percival posted a thread on his official X account under the heading “Worst of the Worst, District Judge Edition,” naming four sitting U.S. District Judges — Paula Xinis (D. Md.), Matthew Kennelly (N.D. Ill.), Allison Burroughs (D. Mass.), and Hernán Vera (C.D. Cal.) — for rulings against the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement program. The episode is categorically distinct from EOIR’s ongoing termination of immigration judges (see reference-eoir-adjudication-statistics-primary-source-locations and the parallel firing-record research): EOIR judges are DOJ employees who serve at the Attorney General’s pleasure, while Article III district judges named here hold life tenure and cannot be removed by the executive. A list publicly naming them functions as an intimidation instrument rather than a personnel action.

What Happened / Key Facts

Percival’s July 23 thread criticized an order from Judge Xinis in litigation over the government’s compliance with court orders regarding Kilmar Abrego Garcia, quoting Percival’s own line, “Remember Kilmar Abrego Garcia? He is still in the country,” to characterize the order as counterproductive. Kennelly and Burroughs were named over orders temporarily preserving deportation protections for Burmese and Somali immigrants; Vera was named over litigation concerning DHS’s response to immigration-related protests (Above the Law, July 28, 2026). DHS’s public defense of the posts characterized them as “nothing more than a factual review of judicial decisions and their real-world consequences.”

The same posts cited a U.S. Marshals Service figure of 564 threats against federal judges in the preceding fiscal year, up from a previously reported 509 — cited by Percival as context for concern about judicial security, even as critics argued the posts themselves raised that same risk for the four named judges.

On August 20, 2026, 128 retired federal and state judges — joined by the Democracy Defenders Fund and Lawyers Defending American Democracy — filed an ethics complaint with the Florida Bar (Percival is a member of the Florida Bar), alleging the posts violated Florida Rule of Professional Conduct 4-8.2(a), which bars lawyers from impugning “the qualifications and integrity of judges or other officers.” The complaint stated the posts “not only constitute serious professional misconduct, but they threaten the rule of law and increase the risk of violence against judges,” and that they were “attacks on the characters of four sitting judges, based on mischaracterizations of the underlying cases and without concern for the repercussions of those statements” (ABA Journal, Aug. 20, 2026).

On August 28, 2026, the Florida Bar declined to investigate. Bar counsel Christopher Wackes said the Bar “does not investigate or prosecute sitting officers appointed under the U.S. Constitution while they are in office,” adding that proceeding “could encroach on the authority of the federal government concerning these officials and the exercise of their duties.” The complaint was formally closed, with Wackes noting it could be refiled after Percival leaves office (ABA Journal, Aug. 28, 2026).

On September 4, 2026, Percival responded publicly (to Fox News Digital), calling the complaint “frivolous,” terming the tactic “Bar-fare,” and asking the Florida Bar to scrutinize which of the 128 signatories are themselves Bar members for potentially abusing the disciplinary process: “what these 128 former judges did was frivolous, and they were on notice that it was frivolous,” and “if people are this upset about what I’m doing, it must be having an effect that they don’t like” (Fox News, Sept. 4, 2026).

Why This Event Matters

This is a distinct mechanism from the EOIR immigration-judge terminations documented in 2025-12-08–immigration-judge-purge-100-judges-fired: Article III judges cannot be fired, so naming them publicly as a “worst of” list — issued by the government’s own top DHS lawyer, tied explicitly to specific adverse rulings — operates as reputational and security pressure rather than a personnel lever. The Florida Bar’s stated rationale for declining to investigate (a categorical refusal to probe sitting constitutional officers) means the accountability mechanism is structurally unavailable for the duration of Percival’s tenure, regardless of the complaint’s merits.

Research Gaps

• The 315-federal-judges-threatened (Brennan Center, FY2026) and ~200 “pizza doxxing” (The Hill) figures cited in the originating capture lead were not independently verified in this pass — only the U.S. Marshals Service’s 564/509 figures (as reported by Above the Law, citing Percival’s own posts) were confirmed. Brennan Center and U.S. Marshals Service primary reporting should be checked directly before either figure enters canon.
• Whether Percival has made further “worst of the worst” posts naming additional judges since September 4, 2026 is unconfirmed as of this research pass (2026-09-24).
• No confirmation obtained of any formal recusal motion or judicial-conduct-council referral tied to this episode (the task’s third lead, “recusal pressure or disciplinary referrals”) — searches surfaced the Florida Bar complaint/rejection cycle but no docket-level recusal motion.

Related Entries

• 2025-12-08–immigration-judge-purge-100-judges-fired
• 2025-12-19–scotus-rejects-trump-bid-to-silence-immigration-judges
• reference-eoir-adjudication-statistics-primary-source-locations
• percival-james
• investigation-map-april-2026