A federal judge said Monday that the Justice Department’s firing of New York federal prosecutor Maureen Comey last year was illegal.
Judge Jesse Furman also ordered Comey, the daughter of former FBI Director James Comey, to retroactively reinstate her duties as an assistant U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York. The judge also ordered her to receive the money owed.
Maureen Comey, who was involved in the prosecution of Jeffrey Epstein and his accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell, was fired in July 2025.
Her father has long been the target of criticism from President Donald Trump. James Comey is currently facing charges for allegedly threatening President Trump’s life after posting a photo of seashells forming the numbers “86 47” on Instagram. His lawyer is asking that the case be dismissed.
Furman ruled against Maureen Comey in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, rejecting the Justice Department’s argument that then-Attorney General Pam Bondi was free to fire federal prosecutors without cause and that current Attorney General Todd Blanche could approve the action after the fact.
Furman also rejected the Justice Department’s argument that even though the Civil Service Reform Act requires prosecutors to be removed for just cause, the attorney general’s removal of her constitutes an implicit determination that she was removed “for reasons that promote the efficiency of her office.”
The justices said the Justice Department’s argument that the attorney general had the authority to fire Comey under Article II of the Constitution was largely an attempt to “overturn nearly two centuries of Supreme Court precedent.”
“However, this court is obligated to follow Supreme Court precedent unless the Supreme Court overturns that precedent,” Furman wrote.
“This hard-won victory belongs to Mr. Comey, all public servants, and everyone who fights for the rule of law,” Comey’s lawyers said in a statement Monday.
“As the court correctly held, accepting the government’s claim of unlimited executive power would ‘unsettle the very balance established by this nation’s constitutional system,'” the lawyers wrote. “This decision reaffirms our nation’s foundational system of checks and balances: the president is not above the law.”
CNBC has reached out to the Justice Department and the White House for comment on the ruling.
“When career prosecutors are fired without cause, fear can instill in the decisions of those who remain,” Comey wrote in a memo to colleagues in the U.S. attorney’s office after his firing.
“Fear is a tool of tyranny, used to suppress independent thought. Instead of fear, let us give fuel to the fire already burning in the heart of this place, in this moment,” she wrote. “A flame of righteous indignation against the abuse of power. A flame of determination to seek justice for the victims.”
