DOJ goes after fired employees who won’t go away

The U.S. Department of Justice is going after workers fired by President Donald Trump who have refused to leave.

The details are documented in a column posted on the website for constitutional expert Jonathan Turley.

It explains that the DOJ has petitioned for a writ of Quo Warranto against three people who had served as board members of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, fired by Trump, because they “continued to hold and exercise their office.”

The CPB, which funds NPR and PBS, was hit this week with the loss of more than a billion dollars when Congress adopted a rescissions package that pulls that money back from what was allocated for the organization.

Named are Laura G. Ross, Thomas E. Rothman and Diane Kaplan, who are accused of “usurping and purporting to exercise unlawfully the office of board member of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.”

It explains Trump “lawfully removed each defendant from office on April 28, 2025.”

And it explains, “As recent Supreme Court orders have recognized, the President cannot meaningfully exercise his executive power under Article II of the Constitution without the power to select—and, when necessary, remove—those who hold federal office. Personnel is policy, after all.”

The three, told they were dismissed, “immediately sought a preliminary injunction against the president and other officials, seeking to enjoin the government from completing their firing,” court filings noted.

The commentary said, “Their effort was unsuccessful as the court held that their claim the president lacked authority to remove them from office was unlikely to succeed.”

The DOJ’s complaint now accuses the three of “continuing to usurp the office of Board Member of the CPB by ‘participating in board meetings, voting on resolutions and other business that comes before the board, and presenting themselves to the public as board members. All of this [was] manifestly unlawful.'”

The former board members charged that CPB was created by Congress as a “private corporation,” and they are not subject to the president’s authority to dismiss them.

They claimed the president’s actions violated the Administrative Procedure Act and violated the separation of powers.

The DOJ pointed out that CPB board members are appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate, like other federal officials, Congress restricts the makeup of the board, limits their compensation, and has charged the organization with taking actions “to achieve the objectives and to carry out the purposes” of the law.

Further, it is a “designated federal entity,” is subject to inspections by an inspector general, and is subject to congressional oversight hearings.

But, court filings charge, the three held board meetings in May and June where they voted “in their official capacity,” adopted resolutions and acted “as if the preliminary injunction they sought had been held in their favor.”

Actually, the court filings confirm the president, under his Article II powers, with his “power to appoint someone … presumptively carries with it the incident power of removal.”

It cites a Supreme Court ruling regarding Amtrak, which was set up as a corporation and not a government agency.

“The Supreme Court held ‘that where, as here, the Government creates a corporation by special law, for the furtherance of governmental objectives, and retains for itself permanent authority to appoint a majority of the directors of that corporation, the corporation is part of the Government for purposes of the First Amendment. … The Supreme Court later applied similar analysis to hold that Amtrak is also ‘a governmental entity for purposes of the Constitution’s separation of powers provisions.””

The DOJ is asking that the court enter a judgment for the defendants to “be ousted and excluded.”