On Tuesday, a deputy of U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi, alongside the so-called “unlawfully appointed” lead prosecutor, accused a federal judge of impeding the government’s efforts to re-indict James Comey. This accusation comes as the judge preliminarily sided with Comey’s former lawyer and friend, a law professor.

The 20-page opposition document from the Department of Justice, spearheaded by Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche and Lindsey Halligan, directly challenges Senior U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly. The document claims the judge is unlawfully blocking the government’s attempt to re-indict Comey by restricting access to crucial evidence seized from Daniel Richman back in 2017.

Richman successfully persuaded the judge to issue a temporary restraining order over the weekend. He argued that his confiscated items, which contained sensitive information such as client communications, interactions with federal judges, family medical records, and financial details, were used to prosecute Comey without a new warrant on charges of obstruction and false statements in late September and the following month.

On Saturday, Kollar-Kotelly ruled that Richman had met all necessary criteria for a temporary restraining order and was likely to reclaim his property. However, the DOJ contends that Richman’s true aim is not to retrieve his items but to ensure the “destruction” of any copies held by the DOJ, which they argue is a tactic to shield Comey from further charges pursued by the Trump administration.

The DOJ’s filing states: “Petitioner Daniel Richman’s motion for the return of property is essentially a move to suppress evidence, designed to prevent the government from using it in an ongoing criminal investigation or potential prosecution in another jurisdiction. His request for preliminary relief effectively seeks to stop the government from conducting its investigation and potential legal action, which is not legally justified.”

Calling Richman’s motion a “strategic tool to obstruct the investigation and potential prosecution” of Comey, and claiming the judge has “effectively enjoined the government from investigating and potentially prosecuting” the former FBI director, the DOJ said it was no accident that Richman swiftly filed a lawsuit after the dismissal of the criminal case against his pal.

“The close connection to the Comey prosecution is also demonstrated by the timing of Richman’s motion,” the DOJ said, noting that the suit was filed roughly a week after the dismissal of the case.

“Approximately a week later, Richman sought a temporary restraining order enjoining the Government from ‘searching, using, or relying in any way’ on the materials that were seized pursuant to the warrants, ‘as well as any copies thereof or any materials obtained, extracted, or derived therefrom,’” the filing said, describing the suit as a “collateral (and premature) motion to suppress evidence in another criminal proceeding, masquerading as a motion for return of property[.]”

For that reason, and because the DOJ claimed that Kollar-Kotelly’s TRO amounts to an “impermissible” block on a “criminal investigation and potential prosecution in another district,” the government demanded that Richman’s motion be denied and the TRO dissolved.

“Given that Richman has all but conceded that he seeks a suppression remedy directed at a future prosecution (if Comey is reindicted), it would be unreasonable for the Court to allow Richman to collaterally secure that result,” the filing went on, denying that Richman’s Fourth Amendment rights were violated.

As Law&Crime reported last week, Richman asked Kollar-Kotelly to block the government from indefinitely searching his files, which were seized in 2017 as part of the Arctic Haze FBI media leaks probe that led to no charges against him. Despite that outcome, Richman said in his demand for the return of his property, the Trump administration, eight years later, went on to haphazardly use these personal computer files in the since-dismissed prosecution of Comey.

Recall the DOJ alleged that Comey lied to Sen. Ted Cruz on Sept. 30, 2020, when he denied under questioning that he had “‘authorized someone else at the FBI to be an anonymous source in news reports’ regarding an FBI investigation concerning Person 1,” namely Hillary Clinton, because he “knew, he in fact had authorized Person 3” — that would be Richman — “to serve as an anonymous source in news reports regarding an FBI investigation concerning [Clinton].”

Before the Comey case was tossed, a U.S. magistrate judge said the DOJ displayed a “cavalier attitude towards a basic tenet of the Fourth Amendment” by searching Richman’s files without a new warrant, in the apparent hope the findings would make the Comey case stick.

“The Arctic Haze investigation was closed in September 2021, with no charges filed. The Richman materials sat dormant with the FBI until the summer of 2025, when the Bureau chose to rummage through them again,” Magistrate William Fitzpatrick wrote, noting that the government “[i]nexplicably […] elected not to seek a new warrant for the 2025 search, even though the 2025 investigation was focused on a different person” — namely, Comey.

The magistrate said this while issuing a rare order for the government to hand over all grand jury materials to Comey’s defense.

Once the Richman lawsuit was before Kollar-Kotelly, the judge found he was “likely to succeed on the merits of his claim that the Government has violated his Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable searches and seizures by retaining a complete copy of all files on his personal computer (an ‘image’ of the computer) and searching that image without a warrant.”

As a result, Bondi and the DOJ were ordered to “identify, segregate, and secure the image” of Richman’s computer, his “Columbia University email accounts, and his iCloud account,” and any copies. Additionally, the judge said, the DOJ and Bondi could not “access the covered materials” or share them “without first seeking and obtaining leave of this Court.”

When Kollar-Kotelly’s TRO was issued, she said the property return issue would be resolved on an “expedited” basis, and that her order would “remain in effect until 11:59 p.m. ET on Friday, December 12, 2025, or until dissolved by further order of this Court, whichever comes first.”

Hours after the DOJ filing on Tuesday, the judge set a deadline for noon on Wednesday for the DOJ to argue why it should have leave to “access the covered materials for the limited purpose of responding to Petitioner Richman’s claims in this case.”

“This motion should include a proposal for a suitable filter protocol, including an opportunity for Petitioner Richman to review the material at issue and assert any claims of attorney-client privilege on behalf of his clients, if appropriate,” Kollar-Kotelly said.

Richman has also been permitted to respond by 5 p.m. the same day.