Judge Rules Maurene Comey Was Unlawfully Fired as Federal Prosecutor
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A federal judge ruled on Monday that Maurene Comey, who served a decade as an assistant US attorney in Manhattan, was unlawfully fired from the post last year, despite her work on some of the nation’s highest-profile cases and what the court described as “the highest accolades from supervisors and peers alike.”
Judge Jesse Furman found that the July 2025 dismissal of Ms. Comey, the daughter of former FBI Director James Comey, violated the constitutional separation of powers. He granted her retroactive reinstatement and back pay from the date of her firing through December 20, writing that the remedy was needed “to make her whole” and to ensure she suffered no adverse employment consequences from the “unlawful termination.”
Ms. Comey sued the Justice Department and other officials after her dismissal, arguing that her termination also violated the First Amendment and the due process clause of the Fifth Amendment. She asserted she was fired because she was the daughter of James Comey, a longtime adversary of President Trump, or because of her perceived political affiliation and beliefs.
Judge Furman rejected the government’s defense that Ms. Comey could be dismissed because federal prosecutors exercise the president’s “conclusive and preclusive” powers. “The Court concludes the Defendants are wrong,” he wrote. The claim that Congress is barred from regulating the removal of federal prosecutors, he added, “flies in the face of nearly two centuries of Supreme Court precedent.” To accept the argument, the judge wrote, “would be to unsettle the very equilibrium established by this Nation’s constitutional system.”
Her lawyers — Ellen Blain, Nicole Gueron, Deepa Vanamali and Margaret Donovan — called the ruling “a hard-earned victory” belonging “to Ms. Comey, to all civil servants, and to all fighting for the rule of law.” The decision, they said, “reaffirms our bedrock system of checks and balances: the President is not above the law.” The Justice Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The firing had been viewed as particularly personal given her father’s adversarial relationship with Mr. Trump, who dismissed James Comey as FBI director in May 2017 as the bureau investigated ties between Russia and Mr. Trump’s 2016 campaign. The department has dismissed career employees who took part in investigations of the president or who were perceived as opposed to its agenda; some of those separations have also produced federal litigation.
The ruling requires the department to restore Ms. Comey to her former position. Whether the administration appeals was not immediately clear.