The departure of more than 10,000 federal lawyers has left some agencies without sufficient staff and has boosted the ranks of state attorneys general offices and advocacy groups.
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/05/31/us/politics/trump-administration-exodus-of-lawyers.html?unlocked_article_code=1.mlA.dD5J.pYj0ffF2G-RV&smid=nytcore-ios-share
President Trump’s upheaval of the federal government has led to an exodus of more than 10,000 lawyers since the beginning of 2025, a striking loss of legal talent that has left some agencies pushing to find attorneys to carry out his agenda.
Roughly one in five lawyers who worked in the government at the end of 2024 had left by March of this year, according to a New York Times analysis of federal employment data.
Along with the usual retirements and turnover in the federal work force, the last year saw deep staffing cuts and the resignations of some staff members who objected to Mr. Trump’s policies. Their departures show how rapidly the president has eroded the image of the federal government as the gold standard for lawyers seeking public service roles......
While federal agencies brought on about 3,200 lawyers since the beginning of 2025, departures still outpaced hiring, data shows. Lawyers also exited the government at a faster rate than turnover in the overall work force. All told, the federal government employed about 37,000 civilian lawyers at the end of March, 17 percent fewer than it did at the end of 2024.
The Justice Department, which employs more than a quarter of all government lawyers, saw the largest decline in raw numbers. But other agencies — including the Department of Education, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development — lost an even greater share of attorneys.....
Some prospective applicants have also been rattled by the departures of high-profile attorneys inside the administration.
Earlier this month, the general counsel of the Treasury Department, Brian Morrissey, resigned hours after the government announced it was creating a $1.8 billion fund expected to benefit Mr. Trump’s allies, a maneuver the administration said resolved the president’s pending lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service over the leaking of his tax records. (On Friday, a federal judge reopened the case, saying she wanted to examine allegations that the deal was based on “deception.”)
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