President Donald Trump speaks with reporters in the Oval Office at the White House, Tuesday, Feb. 11, 2025, in Washington, D.C. (Photo/Alex Brandon).
A federal judge in Arizona has sanctioned an attorney with the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) for making a "factually baseless" accusation against an attorney representing an Iranian immigrant detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
In a 16-page order on Friday, U.S. District Judge Diane J. Humetewa, a Barack Obama appointee, issued sua sponte sanctions after directing the DOJ to account for statements made about the immigration attorney "likely" lying to ICE agents during a deportation attempt.
The order is intended as remedial discipline because those allegations amounted to "factual contentions" lacking "evidentiary support."
The court, in a five-page order to show cause, brought up the sanctions issue on its own in July, explaining that a court "may order an attorney, law firm, or party to show cause why conduct specifically described in the order has not violated" the relevant rule of civil procedure.
The underlying case began as a habeas corpus lawsuit in March.
In April, the court ordered the government to release the petitioner from custody after two deportation attempts were denied and the Trump administration ran aground on 90-day deadlines for the specific statutory authority under which the immigrant was being detained.
But along the way, the DOJ blamed the immigration attorney for foiling one of those deportation attempts in no uncertain terms.
The court characterized this accusation as the government claiming that "Petitioner's counsel made an intentional misrepresentation—a lie—to federal authorities, possibly to the point of criminality."
The court's order spends some time going through procedural minutiae of the case, but focuses on a December 2025 deportation attempt which ultimately ended with the immigrant winning a reprieve. That victory came after the petitioner's attorney informed ICE of a pending motion with the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA).
Here's how Assistant U.S. Attorney Brooks Chupp described that intervention in a response to the habeas petition:
Although it is unknowable exactly what Petitioner's attorney said, it seems likely—because ICE removed him from his scheduled flight—that he represented to ICE that Petitioner was not presently removable due to his pending motion before the Board of Immigration Appeals, and such a statement would have been untrue. Such a statement would also constitute the sort of intentionally obstructionist, bad faith tactic that is designed to frustrate the government's attempts to effectuate a removal order that triggers Section 1231(a)(1)(C).
As it turned out, however, the attorney sent an email that merely apprised ICE of the BIA appeal. The email also explicitly notes, "Just having an appeal pending before the BIA does not in and of itself mean that there is a stay of removal."
In other words, the petitioner's attorney did more or less the exact opposite of what the DOJ attorney claimed.
The court described this divide in withering terms.
"It does not appear that counsel for the government made the reasonable inquiry required by [federal rules], or, most importantly, that his accusation had any evidentiary support," Humetewa previously wrote. "It is difficult to imagine how the accusation could have evidentiary support when counsel himself acknowledged it was 'unknowable' what, if anything, Petitioner's counsel said. Indeed, what evidence has been provided either does not support, or cuts directly against, counsel's accusation."
So, following the show cause order on sanctions, the court gave the government the opportunity to explain itself.
That effort did not end well for the DOJ.
"From the record here, the Court has little difficulty concluding that AUSA Chupp's accusation against Petitioner's counsel was factually baseless from an objective perspective," the latest order reads.
The sanctions order elaborates:
No evidence has been provided to support that Petitioner's counsel "represented to ICE that Petitioner was not presently removable due to his pending motion before the Board of Immigration Appeals." What evidence has been provided supports, at most, that Petitioner's counsel informed the "El Paso field office" that Petitioner had an appeal pending with the BIA, but made no representation as to Petitioner's removability.
The government, for its part, argued the accusation was an effort "to preserve an argument based on an inference."
But the court was not having it. Humetewa found the inference was not "grounded in reality" and, in any event, lacked evidence.
"AUSA Chupp does not argue, nor can he, that his accusation had 'evidentiary support' at any time—least of all when it was made—or that, at the time he made it, it 'likely' would have such support after reasonable investigation," the order goes on.
As punishment, the DOJ attorney must complete two hours of legal training about "the special role of United States Attorneys and the need for evidentiary support for all factual contentions."