DOJ guidance to prosecutors

In a Jan. 21, 2025 memo, Acting Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove directs the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force and Project Safe Neighborhoods, which tackles violent crime, to prioritize immigration offenses. That includes by requiring assistant U.S. attorneys — lawyers who staff U.S. Attorney’s Offices — assigned to drug-trafficking task forces “to devote significant time and attention to the investigation and prosecution of these crimes.”

“Each U.S. Attorneys Office shall coordinate as appropriate with the federal courts to ... develop processes for handling the increased number of prosecutions that will result,” the memo said.