Justice Dept. Leader Suggested Violating Court Orders, Whistle-Blower Says

A senior Justice Department official, Emil Bove III, told subordinates he was willing to ignore court orders to fulfill the president’s aggressive deportation campaign, according to a whistle-blower complaint by a department lawyer who has since been fired.

The account by the dismissed lawyer, Erez Reuveni, paints a disturbing portrait of his final three weeks on the front lines of the Trump administration’s legal efforts to ship immigrants overseas, often with little notice or recourse. In Mr. Reuveni’s telling, Mr. Bove discussed disregarding court orders, adding an expletive for emphasis, and other top law enforcement officials showed themselves ready to stonewall judges or lie to them to get their way.

Mr. Reuveni’s account, which was obtained by The New York Times, was filed to lawmakers and the Justice Department inspector general on Tuesday, just one day before Mr. Bove is scheduled to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee for a nomination to a federal appeals court.

Mr. Reuveni was a career lawyer at the department for nearly 15 years until April, when he expressed concern in federal court that the administration had mistakenly deported a migrant to a megaprison in El Salvador. Mr. Reuveni was put on administrative leave a day later and ultimately fired.

In a statement, Harrison Fields, a White House spokesman, praised Mr. Bove as “an incredibly talented legal mind and a staunch defender of the U.S. Constitution who will make an excellent circuit court judge.”