Bush Judge Torches Trump’s DOJ

Department of Justice building with American flag. — TRUMP DOJ SLAMMED

A federal judge appointed by George W. Bush just told the Trump Department of Justice that its subpoenas against Minnesota Democrats were not law enforcement — they were harassment.

Story Snapshot

The DOJ subpoenaed Governor Tim Walz, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, and other Minnesota officials in January 2026, claiming they obstructed immigration enforcement.
U.S. District Judge Patrick Schiltz, a Bush appointee, ruled the subpoenas were designed to coerce and punish, not to investigate a real crime.
The judge found the DOJ could not name even one solid reason why the subpoenas were legally justified.
Immigration agents made over 3,000 arrests in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area in six weeks, but the judge said that still did not make the subpoenas lawful.

What the DOJ Actually Did and Why It Backfired

The Department of Justice served subpoenas on Governor Walz, Mayor Frey, and four other Minnesota officials in January 2026.^[1] The DOJ claimed the officials had conspired to block federal immigration officers from doing their jobs.

To make that case, prosecutors reached for a Civil War-era law previously used against groups like the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys — a law meant to stop people from physically obstructing federal officers.^[3] Using that same statute against elected state officials for setting policy was always going to be a hard sell in court.

Federal immigration agents had been busy in Minnesota. U.S. Border Patrol Commander Gregory Bovino reported more than 3,000 arrests in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area over just six weeks.^[6]

The administration pointed to that number as proof that active enforcement was underway and that state resistance was a real problem. But high arrest numbers do not automatically prove that state officials committed a crime. The DOJ still had to connect the dots between what the officials said or did and an actual criminal act. It never did.

The Judge’s Ruling Was Not Close

Judge Schiltz unsealed his 30-page ruling in June 2026. His words were blunt. He found the “dominant purpose” of the subpoenas was to “coerce Minnesota officials into assisting the federal government with enforcing civil immigration law and to harass and retaliate against them for failing to do so.”^[2]

That is a direct accusation that the DOJ weaponized a grand jury — one of the most powerful legal tools in the country — for political pressure rather than justice.

The judge went further. He wrote that the DOJ “has struggled — without success — to identify a single plausible investigatory justification” for the subpoenas.^[2] He also found the links between the records sought and any possible criminal act were “extremely weak to nonexistent.”

Most damaging of all, Judge Schiltz wrote that the Justice Department “is not conducting a criminal investigation, but is instead using the grand jury process for other (unlawful) purposes.”^[7] That is not a close call. That is a judge saying the government lied about what it was doing.

Why a Bush Judge Matters Here

Judge Schiltz was not appointed by a Democrat. George W. Bush put him on the bench. That matters because it makes it much harder to dismiss the ruling as partisan. When a conservative judge reads the DOJ’s own filings and concludes the evidence is overwhelming that the subpoenas were unlawful, that is not liberal media spin.

That is a legal finding from someone with no obvious motive to protect Tim Walz.^[9] The administration called the state’s legal challenge “frivolous,” but the judge’s ruling suggests the opposite was true.^[8]

The Bigger Problem This Case Reveals

This episode fits a pattern worth watching. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has for years used subpoena power to pressure state and local governments into helping enforce federal immigration law — something the Constitution does not require them to do. States have the legal right to decide where they spend their own resources.

The DOJ’s own admission, captured in the judge’s ruling, that it was not running a criminal investigation confirms the subpoenas were a pressure tactic, not a law enforcement tool. That distinction matters enormously for anyone who believes the government’s legal powers should not be used as political weapons, regardless of which party holds power.

Federal judge has halted the Trump administration effort to subpoena Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and others in an immigration enforcement probe.https://t.co/gekujqp1MM

— Gary Buckley™ (@myrddenbuckley) June 22, 2026

The Trump administration may appeal, and the immigration enforcement debate in Minnesota is far from over. But for now, a federal court has drawn a clear line. You can disagree with a governor’s policies. You can fight those policies in Congress or in court.

What you cannot do — at least according to this ruling — is use a grand jury to punish an elected official for refusing to do the federal government’s job for it. That boundary protects everyone, including conservatives who may one day face a DOJ run by the other side.