Trump ramps up retribution campaign with push for Bondi to pursue cases against his foes

Eight months into his second term, President Donald Trump's long-standing pledge to take on those he perceives as his political enemies has prompted debates over free speech, media censorship and political prosecutions.

From late-night comedian Jimmy Kimmel's suspension to Pentagon restrictions on reporters and an apparent public appeal to Attorney General Pam Bondi to pursue legal cases against his adversaries, Trump has escalated moves to consolidate power in his second administration and root out those who have spoken out against him.

In a post on social media this weekend addressed to Bondi, Trump said “nothing is being done” on investigations into some of his foes.

“We can’t delay any longer, it’s killing our reputation and credibility,” he said. Noting that he was impeached and criminally charged, “JUSTICE MUST BE SERVED, NOW!!!”

Criticizing investigations into Trump’s dealings under Democratic President Joe Biden’s Justice Department, Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., said Sunday that “it is not right for the Trump administration to do the same thing.”

Trump has ratcheted up his discussion of pursuing legal cases against some of his political opponents, part of a vow for retribution that has been a theme of his return to the White House. He publicly pressed Bondi this weekend to move forward with such investigations.

Trump posted somewhat of an open letter on social media Saturday to his top prosecutor to advance such inquiries, including a mortgage fraud probe into New York Attorney General Letitia James and a possible threat case against former FBI Director James Comey.

He posted that he had “reviewed over 30 statements and posts” that he characterized as criticizing his administration for a lack of action on investigations.

“We have to act fast — one way or the other,” Trump told reporters later that night at the White House. “They’re guilty, they’re not guilty — we have to act fast. If they’re not guilty, that’s fine. If they are guilty or if they should be charged, they should be charged. And we have to do it now.”

Trump later wrote in a follow-up post that Bondi was “doing a GREAT job.”

Paul, a frequent Trump foil from the right, was asked during an interview on NBC's “Meet the Press” about the propriety of a president directing his attorney general to investigate political opponents. The senator decried “lawfare in all forms."

Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., said it was “unconstitutional and deeply immoral for the president to jail or to silence his political enemies.” He warned it could set a worrisome precedent for both parties.

“It will come back and boomerang on conservatives and Republicans at some point if this becomes the norm,” Murphy told ABC’s “This Week.”

The Senate's Democratic leader, Chuck Schumer of New York, said on CNN's “State of the Union” that Trump is turning the Justice Department "into an instrument that goes after his enemies, whether they’re guilty or not, and most of them are not guilty at all, and that helps his friends. This is the path to a dictatorship. That’s what dictatorships do.”

The Justice Department did not respond Sunday to a message seeking comment.

Each new president nominates his own U.S. attorneys in jurisdictions across the country. And Trump has already worked to install people close to him in some of those jobs, including former Fox News host Jeanine Pirro in the District of Columbia and Alina Habba, his former attorney, in New Jersey.

Trump has largely stocked his second administration with loyalists, continuing Saturday with the nomination of a White House aide as top federal prosecutor for the office investigating James, a longtime foe of Trump.

Trump announced Lindsey Halligan to be the U.S. attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia on Saturday, just a day after Erik Siebert resigned from the post and Trump said he wanted him “out.”

Trump said he was bothered that Siebert had been supported by the state’s two Democratic senators.

“There are just two standards of justice now in this country. If you are a friend of the president, a loyalist of the president, you can get away with nearly anything, including beating the hell out of police officers,” Murphy said, mentioning the defendants in the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol pardoned by Trump as he returned to office. “But if you are an opponent of the president, you may find yourself in jail.”

Trump has styled himself as an opponent of censorship, pledging in his January inaugural address to “bring free speech back to America” and signing an executive order that no federal officer, employee or agent may unconstitutionally abridge the free speech of any American citizen.

Under a 17-page memo distributed Friday, the Pentagon stepped up restrictions on the media, saying it will require credentialed journalists to sign a pledge to refrain from reporting information that has not been authorized for release, including unclassified information. Journalists who don’t abide by the policy risk losing credentials that provide access to the Pentagon.

Asked Sunday if the Pentagon should play a role in determining what journalists can report, Trump said, “No, I don’t think so."

"Nothing stops reporters. You know that,” Trump told reporters as he left the White House for Charlie Kirk’s memorial service.

Trump has sued numerous media organizations for negative coverage, with several settling with the president for millions of dollars. A federal judge in Florida tossed out Trump’s $15 billion defamation lawsuit against The New York Times on Friday.

Perhaps the most headline-grabbing situation involves ABC's indefinite suspension Wednesday of veteran comic Jimmy Kimmel’s late-night show. What he said about Kirk’s killing had led a group of ABC-affiliated stations to say it would not air the show and provoked some ominous comments from a top federal regulator.

Trump celebrated on his social media site: “Congratulations to ABC for finally having the courage to do what had to be done.”

Earlier in the day, the Federal Communications Commission chairman, Brendan Carr, who has launched investigations of outlets that have angered Trump, said Kimmel’s comments were “truly sick” and that his agency has a strong case for holding Kimmel, ABC and network parent Walt Disney Co. accountable for spreading misinformation.

“We can do this the easy way or the hard way," Carr said. "These companies can find ways to take action on Kimmel or there is going to be additional work for the FCC ahead.”

Sen. Markwayne Mullin, R-Okla., argued that Kimmel's ouster wasn't a chilling of free speech but a corporate decision.

“I really don’t believe ABC would have decided to fire Jimmy Kimmel over a threat,” he said Sunday on CNN. “ABC has been a longstanding critic of President Trump. They did it because they felt like it didn’t meet their brand anymore.”

Not all Republicans have applauded the move. On his podcast Friday, GOP Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas called it “unbelievably dangerous for government to put itself in the position of saying we’re going to decide what speech we like and what we don’t, and we’re going to threaten to take you off air if we don’t like what you’re saying.”

Trump called Carr “a great American patriot” and said Friday that he disagreed with Cruz.

Kinnard can be reached at http://x.com/MegKinnardAP.

FILE - Host Jimmy Kimmel speaks at the Oscars in Los Angeles on Feb. 26, 2017. (Photo by Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP, File)

FILE - Erik Siebert, interim U.S. Attorney for the eastern district of Virginia, speaks as Attorney General Pam Bondi, right, and Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin, left, listen during a news conference at the Manassas FBI Field Office, March 27, 2025, in Manassas, Va. (AP Photo/Rod Lamkey, Jr., File)

FILE - Attorney General Pam Bondi speaks to reporters as President Donald Trump listens, Friday, June 27, 2025, in the briefing room of the White House in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin, File)

President Donald Trump speaks in the Oval Office of the White House, Friday, Sept. 19, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

WASHINGTON (AP) — Before President Donald Trump's administration started dismantling the Education Department, the agency served as a powerful enforcer in cases of sexual violence at schools and universities. It brought the weight of the government against schools that mishandled sexual assault complaints involving students.

That work is quickly fading away.

The department’s Office for Civil Rights was gutted in Trump’s mass layoffs last year, leaving half as many lawyers to investigate complaints of discrimination based on race, sex or disability in schools. Those who remain face a backlog of more than 25,000 cases.

Investigations have dwindled. Before the layoffs last March, the office opened dozens of sexual violence investigations a year. Since then, it's opened fewer than 10 nationwide, according to internal data obtained by The Associated Press.

Yet Trump's Republican administration has doubled down on sexual discrimination cases of another kind. Trump officials have used Title IX, a 1972 gender equality law, against schools that make accommodations for transgender students and athletes. The Office for Civil Rights has opened nearly 50 such investigations since Trump took office a year ago.

Even before the layoffs, critics said the office was understaffed and moved too slowly. Now, many firms that handle Title IX cases have stopped filing complaints, calling it a dead end.

“It almost feels like you’re up against the void,” said Katie McKay, a lawyer at the New York firm C.A. Goldberg.

“It feels like a big question mark right now,” she said. “How are we supposed to hold a school accountable once it has messed up?”

An Education Department spokesperson said the office is working through its caseload, blaming President Joe Biden's Democratic administration for leaving a backlog and rewriting Title IX rules to protect LGBTQ+ students. Trump officials rolled back those rules.

“The Trump Administration has restored commonsense safeguards against sexual violence by returning sex-based separation in intimate facilities,” spokesperson Julie Hartman said. “OCR is and will continue to safeguard the dignity and safety of our nation’s students.”

The layoffs have slowed work at the Office for Civil Rights across the board, but it has an outsize impact on cases of sexual violence. Students who are mistreated by their schools — including victims and accused students alike — have few other venues to pursue justice.

Many are now left with two options: File a lawsuit or walk away.

One woman said she’s losing hope for a complaint she filed in 2024. She alleges her graduate school failed to follow its own policies when it suspended but didn't expel another student found by the school to have sexually assaulted her. No one has contacted her about the complaint since 2024.

The woman recently sued her school as a last resort. She said it feels like a David and Goliath mismatch.

“They have all the power, because there is no large organization holding them accountable. It’s just me, just this one individual who’s filing this simple suit," the woman said. The AP does not typically identify people who say they are victims of sexual assault unless they grant permission.

The civil rights office is supposed to provide a free alternative to litigation. Anyone can file a complaint, which can trigger an investigation and sanctions for schools that violate federal law.

In 2024, the agency received more than 1,000 complaints involving sexual violence or sexual harassment, according to an annual report.

It’s unclear how many complaints have been filed more recently. Trump's administration has not reported newer figures. In conversations with the AP, some staffers said cases are piling up so quickly they can’t track how many involve sexual violence.

In December, the department acknowledged the civil rights backlog and announced dozens of downsized workers would be brought back to the office amid a legal challenge to their layoffs. The workers' return offers some hope to those with pending civil rights complaints. Department officials have vowed to keep pushing for the layoffs.

Before Trump was elected to his second term, the office had more than 300 pending investigations involving sexual assault, according to a public database. Most of those cases are believed to be sitting idle as investigators prioritize easier complaints, according to staffers who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retribution.

The details of past cases underscore the urgency of the work.

In 2024, the office took action against a Pennsylvania school system after a girl with a disability told staff she had been sexually touched by a bus driver. She was put back on that driver’s bus later that afternoon, plus the next two days. The district was required to designate a Title IX coordinator for its schools, review previous complaints and consider compensation for the girl's family.

That year, the office demanded changes at a Montana school where a boy was pinned down by other students and assaulted after a wrestling practice. The students had been suspended for three days after school officials treated it as a case of hazing instead of sexual assault.

In another case, the office sided with a University of Notre Dame student who had been expelled over accusations of sexual misconduct. The student said the college never told him precisely what he was accused of and refused to interview witnesses he put forward.

Cases that get attention from the federal office are being handled under federal rules created during Trump’s first term. Those rules were designed to bolster the rights of students accused of sexual misconduct.

Lawyers who work with accused students see little improvement.

Justin Dillon, a Washington lawyer, said some of his recent complaints have been opened for investigation. He tells clients not to hold their breath. Even before the layoffs, cases could drag on for years, he said.

Others gave up on the office years ago. The LLF National Law Firm said it stopped filing complaints in 2021 in favor of suing schools directly. Lawyers at the firm said the office had become incapable of delivering timely outcomes, which was only worsened by the layoffs.

Complaints can be resolved several ways. They can be dismissed if they don't pass legal muster. Many go to mediation, akin to a settlement. Some end in voluntary agreements from schools, with plans to rectify past wrongs and prevent future ones.

In 2024, under Biden, the office secured 23 voluntary agreements from schools and colleges in cases involving sexual violence, according to a public database. In 2018, during Trump’s first term, there were 58. Since Trump took office again last year, there have been none.

The dismantling of the Office for Civil Rights comes as a blow to Laura Dunn, a civil rights lawyer who was influential in getting President Barack Obama's Democratic administration to make campus sexual assault a priority. As the issue gained public attention, the office started fielding hundreds of complaints a year.

“All the progress survivors have made by sharing their story is being lost,” said Dunn, who's now a Democratic candidate for Congress in New York. “We are literally losing civil rights progress in the United States, and it’s pushing us back more than 50 years.”

The Associated Press’ education coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. The AP is solely responsible for all content. Find the AP's standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

FILE - The U.S. Department of Education building is seen in Washington, on Nov. 18, 2024. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana, File)