Washington — The Justice Department took the unusual step Wednesday of filing a judicial misconduct complaint against all but one of the federal district judges in Minnesota, after most of them spoke to the New York Times about concerns about the government’s handling of cases during its surge in immigration enforcement earlier this year. Attorney General Todd Blanche announced the filing of the complaint with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit at a news conference, where he also said Minnesota prosecutors had secured an indictment against 10 noncitizens. for having cast votes illegally in previous elections. “We have the right, like every litigant before a court, to have a judge who is fair and impartial,” Blanche said. “We have no choice but to act.” Attorney General Todd Blanche speaks during a press conference at the Department of Justice on September 30, 2026, in Washington, D.C. Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images At the center of the complaint is a New York Times story published earlier this month titled “Trump Surge in Minnesota Threatens Democracy, Judge Warns.” As part of the story, Judge Patrick Schiltz attended a 90-minute interview and shared his views on what he said were repeated violations of court orders by the Trump administration. The article said six of Minnesota’s seven federal bench members also spoke with reporters to discuss the federal government’s immigration crackdown in the state, called Operation Metro Surge. Schiltz was appointed to the federal bench by President George W. Bush and clerked for Justice Antonin Scalia on the Supreme Court. The judicial misconduct complaint names Schiltz and Judge John Tunheim, appointees of President Bill Clinton, as well as “unnamed district judges” serving on the U.S. District Court for the District of Minnesota. In the article, Tunheim rejected the Trump administration’s claim that it was arresting “the worst of the worst” in Minnesota. “In my opinion, they were not arresting people who were dangerous criminals on the street,” Tunheim told the Times. The Justice Department said Schiltz and Tunheim’s conduct “is particularly egregious” and stated that the two “flagrantly violated the Code of Judicial Conduct with their inappropriate and unethical comments” to the Times. The complaint is signed by Acting Deputy Attorney General Trent McCotter and Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodward. Officials said Schiltz’s comments in particular were “overly political and address issues that are pending,” either before the judge or an appeals court. They said Tunheim’s comment was “less detailed” but “equally unethical.” “If anything is a ‘serious threat to the rule of law,’ it is judges who repeatedly and brazenly exceed their authority and then launch a partisan press campaign that includes criticizing the government for filing an emergency appeal when a judge refused to rule on a search warrant request,” McCotter and Woodward wrote. They asked the Eighth Circuit to order Schiltz and Tunheim to recuse themselves from matters involving the Department of Homeland Security. They said the appeals court should also launch an investigation into the “inappropriate conduct” of Minnesota judges who “‘covet publicity’ rather than adhering to the rule of law when resolving cases or controversies.” The Judicial Conference, the policymaking body for the federal courts, issued an advisory opinion in February that provides ethical guidance to judges on public discourse and civic engagement. The body said ethical principles “enable judges to speak or write about the independence of the judiciary, or uphold the rule of law generally, including why both values are crucial to our system of government.” Additionally, the Judicial Conference said its Codes of Conduct Committee believes there is “room, at least in some circumstances, for the measured defense of judicial colleagues from illegitimate forms of criticism and attacks that risk undermining judicial independence or the rule of law, whether or not they rise to the level of persecution.” In response to the misconduct allegation, Schiltz said in a statement: “As legal ethics experts have confirmed, in speaking to the New York Times he was acting within the ethical rules that apply to federal judges.” Citing the Judicial Conference committee’s advisory opinion that allows federal judges to address “fundamental judicial issues” such as the rule of law and judicial independence, Schlitz said, “that’s exactly what I did.” A federal district court spokesperson also said that “our judges acted within this capacity” as described at the Judicial Conference and were “well within” the ethics rules of the federal judiciary. The Trump administration launched Operation Metro Surge in December 2025 and deployed more than 3,000 immigration authorities to Minnesota as part of its immigration enforcement campaign. Border czar Tom Homan announced in February that Operation Metro Surge would end and the number of federal immigration agents in the state would be reduced. But the escalation of immigration actions led to violent clashes between federal authorities and protesters. Two people, Renee Good and Alex Pretti, were killed in Minnesota in January, sparking criticism of tactics used by Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection. In federal courts, Minnesota judges were inundated with dozens of petitions from immigrants challenging their detentions and asking to be released. In a pair of extraordinary orders issued in the case of an Ecuadorian, Schiltz accused the Trump administration of failing to respond to “dozens” of court orders. It identified 96 court orders in 74 cases that it said ICE had violated. “ICE is not a law unto itself,” he wrote in an order issued Jan. 28. In another, from two days earlier, Schiltz said the Trump administration “decided to send thousands of agents to Minnesota to detain foreigners without taking any steps to deal with the hundreds of habeas petitions and other lawsuits that would surely result” and said “the court’s patience has run out.” The Trump administration and federal judges have stepped up amid a series of decisions against the federal government on a range of issues, including immigration. Trump and senior members of his administration have attacked federal judges on social media, calling them “radical left judges” and “activists.” A former top Justice Department official last year filed a judicial misconduct complaint against Chief Judge James Boasberg, a member of the Washington, D.C., district court, over comments he allegedly made during a closed-door meeting of judges. But the complaint was dismissed in December after the Justice Department failed to provide “sufficient evidence” about the alleged statement, according to a decision by Jeffrey Sutton, chief judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. The complaint was transferred from the federal appeals court in Washington to the Sixth Circuit because of concerns about possible recusals. The Justice Department also filed a misconduct complaint against Judge Ana Reyes, who sits on the same court as Boasberg, over comments she made during a hearing in a case related to Trump’s plan to ban transgender people from serving in the military. The administration accused Reyes of “hostile and egregious misconduct.” Jacob Rosen contributed to this report. More from CBS News Go deeper with The Free Press
