DOJ 'sabotaged' massive fraud case over MAGA star’s post: new lawsuit

A multimillion-dollar Medicare fraud case in Florida stalled when a MAGA influencer got the prosecutor fired, according to a new lawsuit filed on Friday by Will Rosenzweig, who worked as an assistant US attorney in the Southern District of Florida, Bloomberg Law reports.

Conservative political commentator Natalie Winters unearthed a blog Rosenzweig wrote in which he discussed “his disagreement with policies and rhetoric of the first Trump administration,” the filing says.

Winters claimed the federal prosecutor was part of the “vicious attacks on President Trump and his supporters.”

According to the report, Rosenzweig’s attorneys alleged there were three defendants in the Medicare fraud case and one of them, Sandro Herek, was a follower of Winters. Within hours of Winters’ posts on social media, Rosenzweig got an email firing him. He wasn't even in the office; instead, he was out with his family observing Rosh Hashanah at the time.

"DOJ’s actions effectively sabotaged its own criminal prosecution of a multimillion-dollar fraud case at the urging of a social media post. In doing so, Defendants violated the rights guaranteed to Mr. Rosenzweig under the U.S. Constitution and federal law," the court filing alleges.

The email didn't indicate why Rosenzweig was being fired other than the president had the constitutional authority to hire and fire whoever he wants in the executive branch. But according to Rosenzweig’s attorneys, the DOJ targeted the prosecutor because he used his First Amendment rights "as a private citizen prior to and during the first Trump administration."

“Defendants violated Plaintiff’s constitutionally protected rights by terminating him because of his exercise of this protected speech, or because of his presumed political affiliation and beliefs associated with that speech, or both,” the lawsuit reads.

It caused a huge problem with the Medicare fraud case, forcing the office to beg a federal judge to delay the start of the trial after the top counsel was kicked out by then-Attorney General Pam Bondi, the filing alleges.

“Will Rosenzweig was an excellent prosecutor who returned millions of dollars to the taxpayers by prosecuting healthcare fraud cases,” they said in a statement Friday. “Yet the Department of Justice fired him on the eve of trial because, years ago as a private citizen, he published criticisms of President Trump.”

Several months later, the U.S. attorney’s office announced they were able to get convictions against two of the accused.

Rosenzweig, like many employees of the Justice Department who were shoved out under Trump's "Article II" authority, has sued or joined in lawsuits against the administration for failing to follow the procedure. One more notable suit came from former prosecutor Maurene Comey, who alleged in her lawsuit that she was fired because of Trump's beef with her father, former FBI Director James Comey.

As Politico reported on Friday, the lawsuits from ex-DOJ staff are the next big test of Trump's presidential authority that have been left unanswered by the Supreme Court's previous rulings on the matter.

Lower "courts have consistently ruled that the Trump administration’s maneuvers to keep its unconfirmed prosecutorial picks in office beyond an initial 120-day limit are illegal," the report explained. "Trump has worked around that by giving those people other titles while they act as de facto leaders — and by firing any alternatives elevated by district judges."