Ben'Ary said he was shocked to see his phone was disabled. He found the explanation later in his personal email account, a letter informing him he was fired.
A veteran prosecutor, Ben'Ary handled high-profile cases over two decades at the Justice Department. Yet the same credentials that enhanced Ben'Ary's resume spelled the undoing of his government career.
His termination came hours after right-wing commentator Julie Kelly told her online followers that he had previously served as a senior counsel to Lisa Monaco, the No. 2 Justice Department official in the Biden administration. Kelly also suggested Ben'Ary was part of the "internal resistance" to prosecuting former FBI Director James Comey. Ben'Ary was never involved in the case.
As Attorney General Pam Bondi approaches her first year on the job, the firings of attorneys like Ben'Ary have defined her turbulent tenure. The terminations and a larger voluntary exodus of lawyers have erased centuries of combined experience and left the department with fewer career employees to act as a bulwark for the rule of law as Trump tests the limits of executive power by demanding prosecutions of his political enemies.
Interviews by The Associated Press of more than a half-dozen fired employees offer a snapshot of the toll. The departures include lawyers who prosecuted attacks on police at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, civil rights and ethics enforcers, immigration judges and attorneys who defend administration policies. They continued this week, when several prosecutors in Minnesota moved to resign amid turmoil over an investigation into the shooting of a woman by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer.
"To lose people at that career level, people who otherwise intended to stay and now are either being discharged or themselves are walking away, is immensely damaging to the public interest," said Stuart Gerson, a senior official in the George H.W. Bush administration and acting attorney general early in the Clinton administration.
Justice Connection, a network of department alumni, estimates that more than 230 lawyers, agents and other employees from across the department were fired last year. More than 6,400 employees are estimated to have left a department that at the end of 2025 had roughly 108,000.
The Justice Department says it has hired thousands of career attorneys over the last year. The Trump administration has publicly characterized some of the fired and departed workers as out-of-step with its agenda.
After he was fired, Ben'Ary who led the national security unit at the U.S. attorney's office for the Eastern District of Virginia, posted a note near his door reminding colleagues they had vowed to follow the facts "unhindered by political interference."
But, he warned, "In recent months, the political leadership of the Department have violated these principles, jeopardizing our national security and making Americans less safe."