Trump Reshapes the Justice Department, Hangs His Portrait on Federal Buildings, and Calls Past Prosecutors 'Bad People'

The DOJ Speech

Sometime after his January 2025 inauguration, President Trump traveled to the Department of Justice to deliver what the White House billed as an address on law and order. He was the first sitting president to appear at the DOJ in person since Barack Obama, according to WPSU.

Trump did announce a new ad campaign targeting fentanyl use. That took maybe five minutes. The remaining portion focused on criticism of past prosecutors and investigations.

He called former Attorney General Merrick Garland, Democratic election attorney Marc Elias, and Trump-business investigator Mark Pomerantz "really bad people." He accused unnamed former officials of weaponizing intelligence agencies "to thwart the will of the American people." He said coverage of Judge Aileen Cannon, who dismissed the federal classified-documents case against him, should have been "illegal."

"We're turning the page on four long years of corruption, weaponization and surrender to violent criminals," Trump told the crowd, which included Attorney General Pam Bondi and FBI Director Kash Patel.

What the Administration Actually Did

The speech came after weeks of concrete action.

On January 31, 2025, federal prosecutors Sara Levine and Sean Brennan were fired. Both had worked the Justice Department's Jan. 6 Capitol riot investigation, according to CBS News. Their termination letters called those prosecutions "a grave national injustice" — the same phrase Trump used in his blanket pardon of roughly 1,500 January 6 participants, one of his first acts after returning to the White House.

The administration also demoted attorneys connected to other Trump-related cases and revoked security clearances from Special Counsel Jack Smith, Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg, and New York AG Letitia James. Former President Joe Biden's clearance and intelligence briefings were also revoked.

Smith had already resigned before Trump was inaugurated. The Justice Department's own Office of Legal Counsel concluded the Constitution required the election-interference case be dismissed before Trump took office, according to CBS News. The case was dropped.

The Pushback

From one perspective, the DOJ under Biden was itself politicized. It prosecuted a former president during an election cycle, pursued charges that a sitting administration's own legal counsel said were constitutionally problematic, and employed investigators who had preexisting animus toward Trump. Firing those people, on this reading, is not retribution but course correction. Bondi said during her confirmation hearing that she had no plans to politicize the office.

Peter Keisler, who served as acting attorney general under George W. Bush, rejected that framing. "I don't think anyone who's been watching the last four weeks could say they are taking politics out of the law enforcement process," Keisler told CBS News. "Quite the contrary. They are engaging in the very politicization and weaponization that they claim to be trying to eliminate."

Levine, one of the fired Jan. 6 prosecutors, was less measured. "The Justice Department is under attack," she told CBS News. "They're coming after the people that want to uphold the laws that exist. And that should be terrifying to everyone."

Bondi declined a CBS News request for an interview.

The Banners

A parallel story has been unfolding on the sides of federal buildings.

As of June 24, 2026, giant portrait banners bearing Trump's image have appeared on at least four federal buildings, according to Forbes. The most recent: two banners at least 30 feet tall, showing Trump and George Washington under the words "America First," were hung at the Department of the Interior headquarters in Washington. Photographer Andrew Leyden captured the installation.

Similar banners are up at the Department of Justice (slogan: "Make America Safe Again") and the Department of Labor (Trump alongside Theodore Roosevelt, slogan: "American Workers First"). A banner at the Department of Agriculture featuring Trump and Abraham Lincoln has since been removed. The USDA reportedly spent $16,400 on those two banners.

Forbes notes the installations have drawn comparisons to authoritarian imagery. Critics online invoked Hitler and Kim Jong Un. One social media commenter drew a specific historical parallel between the Washington banner and imagery used at a pro-Nazi rally at Madison Square Garden in 1939. The White House and the Interior Department had not responded to Forbes' request for comment as of June 24.

Large exterior portrait banners of a sitting president on federal government buildings have no recent historical precedent. Previous administrations of both parties have not done this.

A federal judge has already ruled that Trump's renaming of the Kennedy Center was illegal because Congress created it as a memorial to John F. Kennedy and renaming requires an act of Congress, according to Forbes. Whether the banner installations face similar legal scrutiny remains an open question as of June 28, 2026.