Barbara McQuade, Columnist

I Devoted My Life to Serving Justice. It's Being Shamed.

As a former US attorney, I never could have imagined President Trump's vengeful speech at the Department of Justice's Great Hall.

March 17, 2025 at 5:23 PM UTC

By Barbara McQuade

Barbara McQuade is a professor at the University of Michigan Law school, a former US attorney and author of "Attack from Within: How Disinformation Is Sabotaging America."

It’s all about me.
Photographer: Roberto Schmidt/AFP/Getty Images

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Thirty-five years ago, I visited the Great Hall at the Department of Justice for the first time. In my eyes, the grand art deco space was nothing short of a temple of justice, with large statues depicting noble concepts, a female figure called The Majesty of Law and a male likeness known as the Spirit of Justice.

The statues would later face controversy when then-Attorney General John Ashcroft ordered the partially nude figures covered, a dustup that now seems quaint.