U.S. district judge James Boasberg, who has angered the Trump administration with his rulings regarding Venezuelan deportees, has been assigned to oversee a lawsuit filed against the administration for the use of Signal during a chat about strikes on Houthi terrorists.
According to a document posted on X by Politico’s Kyle Cheney, Boasberg was assigned as the chief judge of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia in the case of American Oversight, which involved Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and other figures of the administration.
Boasberg’s examination of the use of an 18th-century wartime law for deporting accused Venezuelan gangs to El Salvador has enraged President Donald Trump and members of his administration.
He ordered earlier this month that the planes carrying migrants be turned back pending a fourteen-day review of their use of the law. However, the planes continued to their destination.
On Monday, however, the administration refused to provide any further information on the deportations, claiming that it was protected by a “state secret” privilege.
Congressional Republicans have also moved to impeach Boasberg after Trump attacked him and other “crooked judges” on social media.
Republicans moved swiftly to impeach Boasberg after Trump had attacked him in a post on social media.
The lawsuit Boasberg is to hear in the Signal case was filed by American Oversight. This nonpartisan organization, which has targeted all of its actions against the Republican Party, named Hegseth as well as Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabrielbard, CIA director John Ratcliffe and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. It also named Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
The lawsuit claims that the conversation between members of the Administration, which included Jeffrey Goldberg, The Atlantic’s editor-in chief by mistake, violated federal record laws.
The organization stated that it wanted to “recover illegally deleted messages” and “prevent further destruction.” It cited the Federal Records Act, which requires federal officials to preserve communications related to official government work.
