Justice Department Drops Defense of Administrative Law Judge Removal Protections 

United States: The U.S. Justice Department has concluded multiple layers of restricted removal protections for administrative law judges violate the Constitution, so they will drop their court defense of these restrictions, according to senior officials, as reported by Reuters. 

Constitutional Challenges and Policy Change 

Chad Mizelle of the department’s chief staff group considered administrative law judges to be officials who serve as unelected government employees and are not answerable to constitutional requirements. 

The Justice Department has decided to drop legal support for administrative law judge removal restrictions through a letter written by Acting Solicitor General Sarah Harris sent to U.S. Senator Charles Grassley, which Mizelle shared on X. 

At the same time, as Republican President Donald Trump, alongside his friend Elon Musk, worked to decrease federal regulatory agencies’ power, the Justice Department adopted a policy change. 

The policy change occurred following multiple federal court decisions, which reduced U.S. agency powers after Supreme Court Justices showed they could question broad regulatory authorities. 

Court Rulings Influence Policy Shift 

The U.S. Supreme Court declared unconstitutional the mechanism used by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to implement enforcement actions that shield investors from securities fraud through its administrative judges. The SEC faces criticism from business and conservative groups regarding its ability to seek court cases in front of their internal judges. 

Federal court judges are different from their administrative counterparts who serve as Article III judges under the constitutional section that created the judicial branch. The executive branch agencies such as the Social Security Administration and U.S. Department of Labor and Drug Enforcement Administration are handled by administrative judges during adjudication. 

Union Response and Privacy Concerns 

A spokesperson representing the Association of Administrative Law Judges expected more information from the union’s standpoint. This group maintains 910 administrative law judges who work at the Social Security Administration. 

The union filed a request with the court last week to prevent Musk and ‘Department of Government Efficiency’ led by Trump from accessing personnel information and work records. The union warned that exposing employees’ confidential information creates security dangers, as reported by Reuters. 

Justice Department lawyers defending Musk and Doge indicated through their court filing this Wednesday that DOGE and the defendants’ team did not disclose any sensitive personal records to the public. 

Both Musk and DOGE failed to provide comment in response to requests from journalists.