Justice Department officials are drafting plans to broadly restructure — and significantly downsize — several key units in Washington responsible for investigating cases of fraud and public corruption, according to three people briefed on the changes.
The plans, which have not been finalized, could be announced within the next few days. If enacted, they would be the latest initiative by the Trump administration aimed at limiting the ability of prosecutors in Washington to bring sensitive and politically fraught cases against business figures and elected officials.
It remains unclear if the department plans to farm out cases to U.S. attorney’s offices around the country, as has been discussed internally; use the shift to drastically cut the number of investigations; or both.
The move, like the forced transfers or firings of career nonpolitical prosecutors in recent weeks, is part of an effort to reduce the power of divisions that Trump appointees claim were politically “weaponized” or otherwise overused under the Biden administration….
The public integrity unit, which focuses on criminal cases against elected officials, has already been particularly hard hit. Several of its prosecutors resigned last month after top officials pushed to drop a bribery case against New York’s mayor, Eric Adams.