July 17th was a typical day at the office for Ila Dice. The longtime immigration judge heard a

couple cases in the morning before taking a short break to check her email. A email came through

saying, I think the heading was terminated. Terminated with no notice from a job that she has held

since 2017. The email said that she was being let go,

but it did not say why. Being on track to resolve a thousand cases this year and never having

any bad reviews, only excellent reviews for years and years and years. I was completely blindsided by this.

The immigration courts are part of the Justice Department. Dice says she was only three months shy of

25 years of federal service when her pension and other benefits would vest.

I've only worked for the federal government, so I'm not a controversial person.

Pointing to dashboard statistics available to immigration judges, Dice says she was by far the most productive and efficient jurist in her court in San Francisco.

Consider this. Dice is one of hundreds of career civil servants at the Justice Department to lose their jobs this year.

Some over clashes with the Trump administration and others for unknown reasons.

After the break, how those departures are transforming the Justice Department.

From NPR, I'm Elsa Chang.

It's consider this from NPR.

Max Steyer is president of the Partnership for Public Service. That's a nonpartisan group dedicated to better government and stronger democracy.

The Department of Justice is a exceptional institution that has provided a lot of good for our society and is foundering on the rocks right now.

Steyer says he's more worried about what's happening at DOJ than at any other place inside

the federal government.

The prosecutorial to criminal power, the investigative power of our government is so important

that we do need to pay extra attention to what is occurring at the Department of Justice.

NPR's Kerry Johnson covers the Justice Department and picks it up from here.

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