Trump DOJ official may have just broken the law during petty social media spat: expert

A key figure in President Donald Trump's Justice Department may have just violated the First Amendment rights of a conservative lawyer who dared to criticize her behavior, wrote Adam Klasfeld of All Rise News on Monday.

The controversy unfolded over the weekend, in response to a post from Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Harmeet Dhillon, who threatened investigation and criminal prosecution of the Democrats who ran the House January 6 Committee.

"No statute of limitations will hinder DOJ's efforts to bring justice to those who weaponized persecution of American citizens. January 6th 2026 is NOT a deadline for DOJ to bring prosecutions," she wrote, claiming that Democrats' ongoing investigation for years past that point gives her authority to investigate far longer. In response to criticism of her argument, she then posted from her personal account, "My goodness… are you people really gonna make me put down my knitting and explain Statutes of Limitation to you?! FFS."

Damin Toell, a Brooklyn-based attorney and political commentator, replied to this outburst. "Yes. You work for the DOJ now," he wrote. "This isn’t supposed to be something you do for fun and dopamine on social media anymore."

Shortly after this, he posted a screenshot of Dhillon having blocked his account, writing, "We were following each other," with a shrug emoji.

But this could turn into a further legal controversy, warned Klasfeld.

"Incidentally, public officials blocking social media critics can violate their First Amendment rights, even on their personal accounts," Klasfeld posted. "The DOJ *Civil Rights* Division head should know this."

Trump himself has run into similar legal dustups from his prior habit of blocking critics when he was primarily active on Twitter, since renamed to X. An appeals court ruled in Knight v. Trump that the president blocking people on his personal account was an unconstitutional silencing of viewpoints, although the Supreme Court later vacated this decision and established a somewhat narrower precedent.