Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee are hoping to tank the nomination of Emil Bove, an acting deputy U.S. attorney general who President Donald Trump has picked for a lifetime seat as a federal judge for the 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia. But Bove appears to be on track for confirmation despite the troubling allegations of Erez Reuveni, a former immigration lawyer for the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) who alleges that Bove encouraged his DOJ colleagues to blatantly defy federal court orders on President Donald Trump's immigration policy. Bove flatly denies Reuveni's allegation.
In an article published by Salon on July 17, national security expert and former DOJ legal adviser Jesselyn Radack —who now heads the Whistleblower & Source Protection Program (WHISPeR) — emphasizes that whistleblowers like Reuveni play a crucial role in keeping the United States democratic and says she is "glad" he "went public."
"Reuveni's case hits home because of its parallels to my own," Radack explains. "In December 2001, as a legal adviser to the (Justice) Department's Office of Professional Responsibility, I advised the criminal division that an FBI interrogation of 'American Taliban' John Walker Lindh without his lawyer would be unethical. When I was informed three days later that he had been interrogated despite that warning, I advised that the interview might have to be sealed and used only for national security and intelligence-gathering purposes, and not for criminal prosecution."
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Radack continues, "Three weeks later, then-Attorney General John Ashcroft announced that the Justice Department was filing a criminal complaint against Lindh — and in another three weeks, he announced an indictment, insisting that Lindh's rights 'have been carefully, scrupulously honored.' I knew that wasn’t true. I had seen photos of Lindh naked, blindfolded and bound to a board with duct tape. It was our first glimpse of torture after 9/11, and no one flinched."
The former DOJ lawyer argues that the "parallels between" her case in 2001 during George W. Bush's presidency and Reuveni's in 2025 "are uncanny."
"Like Reuveni," Radack explains, "I was pushed out of a job I loved because the Justice Department was playing fast and loose with the court in a case where a defendant appeared to have been tortured. I resigned in protest when it became clear I was going to be transferred to office Siberia or forced out. Reuveni was suspended — and then fired — because he admitted, truthfully, that a man sent to a gulag in El Salvador was deported in violation of a court order and that he did not know the legal basis for that decision."
Radack, however, doubts that Reuveni's allegations will prevent the U.S. Senate's GOP majority from making Bove a federal judge.
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"I predict Bove will also be confirmed, because if leaky, wobbly Pete Hegseth can become secretary of defense, the bar is so low that anyone can clear it," Radack writes. "I only hope that, at the end of the day, Reuveni comes out unscathed from his whistleblowing journey."
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Jesselyn Radack's full article for Salon is available at this link.
