An Obama-appointed federal judge just handed President Trump’s Justice Department a major setback — and ordered the government to undo the firing of James Comey’s daughter.
U.S. District Judge Jesse Furman ruled Monday that former federal prosecutor Maurene Comey was unlawfully removed from the Southern District of New York in July 2025.
The remedy is unusually concrete: retroactive reinstatement, back pay through December 20, 2025, and a declaration that the government violated federal law and constitutional limits.
The ruling itself spells out the stakes and the relief Furman ordered:
Judge Furman’s 55-page opinion says the firing was not authorized by statute and violated the Civil Service Reform Act’s cause and procedure protections. The court also rejected the administration’s broader claim that Congress cannot regulate the removal of assistant U.S. attorneys because they exercise the President’s executive power.
Furman wrote that nearly two centuries of Supreme Court precedent allow Congress to place removal protections around inferior officers. He concluded that the administration’s reading of Article II would upend a constitutional balance that has existed across many presidencies.
The decision also found violations of the Administrative Procedure Act and Comey’s Fifth Amendment due-process and statutory rights. Furman did not finally resolve her First Amendment claim, indicating that it may now be largely moot.
Conservatives immediately focused on the separation-of-powers question: how far can a lower court go in restricting the President’s control over prosecutors working inside the executive branch?
BREAKING: ONE OBAMA JUDGE just ruled that the Trump DOJ "unlawfully" fired disgraced ex-FBI Director James Comey's daughter, former SDNY prosecutor Maurene Comey
TOTAL BS!
U.S. District Judge Jesse Furman rejected the Trump admin's Article II authority to remove her,… pic.twitter.com/r0OKGak1aQ
— Eric Daugherty (@EricLDaugh) October 26, 2026
CBS News reports that Comey spent roughly a decade as a federal prosecutor and worked on high-profile cases involving Jeffrey Epstein, Ghislaine Maxwell, Sean “Diddy” Combs, and former Sen. Bob Menendez.
The Justice Department acknowledged in court filings that she received “outstanding” performance ratings from 2019 through 2024. Comey argued that she was fired because of her father, former FBI Director James Comey, or because of perceived political beliefs.
That accusation is politically explosive, but Furman’s central holding did not require him to decide the exact political motive. His ruling turned on who had removal authority, what federal civil-service law required, and whether the government followed those requirements.
The demand for an immediate appeal is already building:
BREAKING: Obama Judge Jesse Furman ORDERS Maurene Comey, James Comey's daughter, retroactively REINSTATED as a federal prosecutor, ruling Trump's DOJ UNLAWFULLY fired her
Despite the fact Maurene called Trump a "TYRANT"
HELL NO! APPEAL THIS BS RULING!
Judge Furman claims… pic.twitter.com/WV5w8TeddC
— Nick Sortor (@nicksortor) October 26, 2026
Courthouse News Service notes that Furman was appointed by Barack Obama and framed the termination as an unlawful affront to the separation of powers. Comey has since moved into private practice, which is why the back-pay period stops in December 2025 rather than continuing today.
The district-court remedy runs from July 16 through December 20, 2025, and the ruling remains appealable; no appellate court has yet adopted Furman’s separation-of-powers analysis.
Now comes the real constitutional fight. A district judge has rejected the administration’s strongest Article II theory, but the Justice Department still has an appellate path if it wants a higher court to decide how much removal power the President has over career federal prosecutors.
This may have started as one personnel decision. It is now a test of presidential authority that could travel far beyond one Comey.
This is a Guest Post from our friends over at WLTReport. View the original article here.
The post Obama-Appointed Judge Orders DOJ To Reinstate James Comey’s Daughter — Then Takes Aim At Trump’s Article II Argument appeared first on 100PercentFedUp.com.
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[H/T 100PercentFedUp]
