People participate in a “national shutdown” protest against U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Minneapolis, Minnesota, January 30, 2026.
Alex Roblewski AFP | Getty Images
The Justice Department on Wednesday filed judicial misconduct complaints against all but one federal judge in Minnesota, citing their active status in interviews with The New York Times that criticized the Trump administration’s handling of immigration enforcement cases in that state.
The Justice Department asked the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals to forcefully remove all seven judges who spoke with the Times from cases involving the Department of Homeland Security.
The complaint also asks the Eighth Circuit, which handles cases arising in the District of Minnesota, to investigate what the Justice Department called “improper and unethical conduct by the judge” in an interview with the newspaper.
The complaint names Senior Judge Patrick Schiltz and Senior Judge John Tanheim, who were quoted in an article that ran under the headline “President Trump’s Minnesota population boom threatens democracy, judge warns.”
Mr. Schultz served as presiding judge for the District of Minnesota until July 1, when he assumed the position in 2022, replacing Mr. Tunheim.
Schultz had issued an order on Jan. 28 requiring Immigration and Customs Enforcement to stop violating an order issued by a Minnesota federal judge in a case related to a surge in immigration enforcement in the state. Schultz told the Times that ICE’s violation of the order “created a serious threat to the rule of law.”
Tanheim’s remarks were quoted in the Times after a passage in which the judges said they considered most of the detainees in the cases “like normal people with homes and jobs” and not immigrants, which Homeland Security officials say are “the worst of the worst.”
“In my opinion, they weren’t arresting dangerous criminals on the streets,” Tanheim said, according to the Times.
Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin speaks next to Attorney General Todd Blanche during a press conference at the Department of Justice on September 30, 2026 in Washington, DC, USA.
Kevin Lamarque | Reuters
Other judges spoke to this newspaper on condition of anonymity.
“Judge Schiltz and Judge Tanheim grossly violated at least the Code of Judicial Conduct in their inappropriate and unethical comments to the New York Times,” the complaint, filed by Deputy Attorney General Trent McCotter and Deputy Attorney General Stanley Woodward Jr., says.
“Seven federal judges in the District of Minnesota spoke to the New York Times about cases, some of which are ongoing, that the Department of Justice considers to be clear violations of ethical obligations,” Attorney General Todd Blanche said in a statement.
“Their actions undermined the public’s confidence in Minnesota’s impartial judiciary,” Blanche said.
After CNBC reached out to Schiltz and Tanheim for comment on the complaint, a spokesperson for the U.S. District Court for the District of Minnesota defended the judges’ contact.
“As legal ethics experts have confirmed, our judges acted appropriately within the ethical rules applicable to federal judges in their interviews with The New York Times,” spokeswoman Rebecca Parks said in a statement.
“In fact, in February of this year, the Code of Conduct Commission issued an advisory opinion emphasizing that federal judges can ‘speak and write on core matters of the judiciary, such as defending the rule of law and judicial independence,'” Parks said. “Our judges have acted within this capacity.”
