{"id":47498,"date":"2025-11-15T06:03:32","date_gmt":"2025-11-15T06:03:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/47498\/"},"modified":"2025-11-15T06:03:32","modified_gmt":"2025-11-15T06:03:32","slug":"miami-us-attorney-instills-fear-as-trump-enemy-probes-ramp-up","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/47498\/","title":{"rendered":"Miami US Attorney Instills Fear as Trump Enemy Probes Ramp Up"},"content":{"rendered":"

Miami\u2019s US attorney is alarming staff with unconventional interrogation tactics to oust prosecutors, while warning the office about dishonesty and disobedience as he staffs up investigations of the president\u2019s perceived enemies, according to multiple people familiar with the situation.<\/p>\n

South Florida\u2019s chief prosecutor Jason Reding Qui\u00f1ones and his leadership team effectively forced resignations of two newcomer assistant US attorneys last week by ordering them to sign statements under criminal penalty of perjury, some of the individuals said.<\/p>\n

They both chose to quit rather than disclose in writing\u2014with the threat of being indicted over misstatements\u2014the names of colleagues and others with whom they\u2019d discussed their recent assignment to a national security unit expected to target<\/a> those involved in past cases against President Donald Trump. <\/p>\n

Word of the sworn statement demand, which several Justice Department veterans called an unprecedented breach of internal protocols for handling possible employee misconduct, rapidly spread through the South Florida office, which has already experienced prosecutor terminations and numerous resignations this year.<\/p>\n

As their district becomes a potential epicenter for Trump-directed indictments, employee anxiety has escalated in recent days. Miami prosecutors are bracing to be called into Reding Qui\u00f1ones\u2019 office and directed to sign statements about their own conversations or be fired, added the people familiar with the office\u2019s operations. <\/p>\n

The two resigning prosecutors, both Republicans who started at the office in 2024, never communicated with the media or shared classified or top-secret information, the individuals said. Rather, they\u2019d sought professional advice from more senior colleagues in and outside the office about whether to accept a politically charged assignment.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not clear if Reding Qui\u00f1ones would\u2019ve retained them had they asked to stay on after refusing to sign the statement.<\/p>\n

The two departed line prosecutors didn\u2019t respond to requests for comment.<\/p>\n

US attorneys and other department leaders who suspect prosecutors of ethics improprieties or crimes would ordinarily refer those matters to independent DOJ investigative bodies, like the Office of Professional Responsibility or Office of Inspector General, not handle the situation in-house, former department officials said.<\/p>\n

Reding Qui\u00f1ones and spokespeople for the Justice Department and US attorney\u2019s office in Miami didn\u2019t immediately respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n

\u2018Integrity Above All\u2019<\/p>\n

Following last week\u2019s staff departures and media attention on the office\u2019s cases through the weekend, Reding Qui\u00f1ones raised new concerns in the office, some of the people said, with a Monday morning staff-wide email obtained by Bloomberg Law titled, \u201cIntegrity Above All.\u201d <\/p>\n

While mistakes are common for lawyers and can almost always be corrected, his message began, \u201cwhat cannot be fixed is dishonesty. Any form of lying, to a colleague, to law enforcement, to opposing counsel, or to the Court, is incompatible with service in this Office,\u201d Reding Qui\u00f1ones wrote.<\/p>\n

He called a meeting the same day for his entire entry-level prosecution team\u2014the section where the two prosecutors who resigned had been employed. Reding Qui\u00f1ones told prosecutors they\u2019re expected to advance the cases they get assigned, suggesting there would be consequences for those who declined, several individuals familiar with the meeting said.<\/p>\n

He didn\u2019t specifically reference the grand jury investigation into a purported widespread conspiracy by past special counsel\u2019s office investigators or the subpoenas Bloomberg News reported<\/a> the office has moved to send to former US officials who probed Russia\u2019s interference in the 2016 presidential campaign.<\/p>\n

Mass Exodus<\/p>\n

The Nov. 10 meeting provided staff with rare face time with a boss who\u2019s been closely linked to Attorney General Pam Bondi and others in Trump\u2019s inner circle.<\/p>\n

Since arriving in August as the first of US attorneys to be confirmed by the Senate this year, Reding Qui\u00f1ones largely secluded himself from career employees and often traveled to Washington, said multiple people with knowledge of his schedule.<\/p>\n

Reding Qui\u00f1ones chose Bondi to administer his oath of office, spurning the tradition of chief judges for the Southern District of Florida swearing in Miami US attorneys.<\/p>\n

Shortly after his return to the office where he\u2019d once been a line prosecutor, Reding Qui\u00f1ones informed supervisors they would need to re-apply for their positions and be evaluated for their alignment with his vision and DOJ priorities, according to an August email obtained by Bloomberg Law.<\/p>\n

\u201cRestore impartial justice\u201d became his oft-repeated mission statement to the public and his employees, some of whom treated it as an accusation that they\u2019d been part of the weaponized DOJ as alleged by Trump and his base.<\/p>\n

He\u2019s also told the office of plans to hire up to 100 prosecutors over the next year, a plan to offset a mass exodus that\u2019s consistent with developments across the department since Trump retook the White House.<\/p>\n

At least three respected Miami prosecutors were fired since the start of this administration, two of whom over ties to former Special Counsel Jack Smith in terminations that preceded Reding Qui\u00f1ones\u2019 term. These moves caused staff to feel unsupported by their leaders well before he took the helm, said lawyers close to the office. <\/p>\n

Many office alums and area defense attorneys said that the widespread exits this year of experienced prosecutors has left the office unable to pursue its traditional role as a leader in sophisticated white-collar fraud and international narcotics cases. <\/p>\n

But in the three months with Reding Qui\u00f1ones in charge\u2014and especially over the past week\u2014the mood has further deteriorated, according to multiple individuals outside the office. The people said prosecutors are seeking to leave amid fears of what they characterize as a witch hunt, but have few options in a sluggish legal market.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Miami\u2019s US attorney is alarming staff with unconventional interrogation tactics to oust prosecutors, while warning the office about…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":47499,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[30866,30864,26284,30860,26282,26283,30862,123,125,124,30861,30865,30863],"class_list":["post-47498","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-miami","tag-affidavits","tag-attorney-dishonesty","tag-criminal-conspiracy","tag-discharge-of-employee","tag-grand-juries","tag-indictment-and-information","tag-interrogation","tag-miami","tag-miami-headlines","tag-miami-news","tag-perjury","tag-prosecutorial-misconduct","tag-resignation-from-employment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47498","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47498"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47498\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/47499"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47498"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47498"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47498"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}