What specific communications or directives from the Justice Department prompted the Minnesota prosecutors’ resignations?
Executive summary
Six career prosecutors in Minnesota — including First Assistant U.S. Attorney Joseph (Joe) Thompson — and multiple supervisors in the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division resigned after what sources describe as explicit internal directives from senior DOJ officials: to press a criminal inquiry into the widow of Renee Good while declining to open a civil‑rights investigation into the ICE agent who fatally shot Good, and to exclude state investigators from the probe; those directives and the silencing of career prosecutors who offered to lead a civil‑rights inquiry are cited by multiple outlets as the proximate triggers for the departures [1] [2] [3]. The department disputes that the personnel moves were reactions to the Minnesota case, saying some prosecutors sought early retirement well before the shooting [4] [5].
1. The core directive: investigate the victim’s widow, not the officer
Reporting from The New York Times, The Hill, The Independent and MPR details that senior Justice Department officials pressed the Minnesota U.S. Attorney’s Office to open a criminal investigation into Renee Good’s widow — who was near the vehicle when Good was shot — a move that career prosecutors objected to and that many sources say precipitated resignations [1] [6] [2] [7]. Multiple outlets specifically cite the department’s push to prioritize scrutiny of the widow over pursuing a civil‑rights inquiry into the ICE agent’s use of deadly force [1] [8].
2. The refusal to open a civil‑rights probe and sidelining career teams
Sources reporting for CBS News, The Guardian, Newsweek and others say career prosecutors who volunteered to halt other work and lead a civil‑rights investigation were told there would be no such probe at this stage, and that the Civil Rights Division would not be involved, prompting resignations among supervisors in that division as well [3] [4] [8] [9]. Those accounts emphasize that the instruction to forego a civil‑rights inquiry stood in direct contrast with the division’s customary role in officer‑involved deaths [3] [9].
3. Orders to treat the case as an assault on a federal officer and to exclude state actors
Reporting indicates senior DOJ messaging framed the matter to Minnesota prosecutors as an assault‑on‑a‑federal‑officer inquiry rather than a civil‑rights case, and directed that state investigators be pushed out of the federal inquiry — a step that Joe Thompson explicitly objected to before resigning, according to The New York Times and Axios [3] [1] [10]. Local officials and the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension have said they were effectively shut out after the FBI took lead responsibility, an operational choice that sources say reflected Justice Department direction [11] [9].
4. Internal reactions, alternative explanations, and the DOJ rebuttal
News organizations uniformly report that the resignations were motivated by objections to those DOJ directives, but the department released statements denying a causal link — saying some prosecutors requested early retirement before the shooting and calling suggestions otherwise false [4] [5]. The outlets that relied on anonymous internal sources counter that the timing and clustering of departures — including parallel resignations in the Civil Rights Division after leadership was told not to open a civil‑rights probe — point to a pattern of operational and policy directives that career attorneys found untenable [4] [3] [1].
5. Broader context and stakes: mission shifts and career departures
Reporters place the Minnesota resignations inside a wider exodus from the Civil Rights Division and broader Justice Department under current leadership, noting recent mission‑statement changes and heightened politicization of priorities that have already driven departures and concerns about prosecutorial independence; those structural shifts help explain why the specific directives in the Good investigation prompted immediate resignations, according to The Washington Post and other outlets [12] [3]. The limits of available reporting mean there is no public internal memo quoted verbatim in these accounts; instead, the factual record rests on contemporaneous decisions — the push to investigate the widow, the refusal to open a civil‑rights probe, and instructions to exclude state officials — as described by multiple news organizations and anonymous DOJ and office insiders [1] [2] [3].