U.S. Attorney General and Tampa Townie, Pam Bondi, fired Asst. U. S. Attorney Michael Gordon last month, “without cause,” following his “outstanding” performance review and latest successes in court, including prosecuting Leo Govoni, a multi-million dollar fraud defendant who allegedly stole from a fund for special needs children. He and two other Assistant U.S Attorneys, who all worked on prosecuting January 6th rioters’ cases, were fired on the same day, in violation of the Federal Civil Service Act, Gordon claims. Because he was fired without due process and in violation of federal law, Gordon is now suing his former employer, the U.S. government.

The January 6th Prosecutions Were Non-Partisan, says Gordon

Gordon says his job was non-partisan. He was tasked to “do justice without fear or favor.” He denies being a “deep state operative,” as he has been called in certain MAGA Republican circles. He is a former high school history and government teacher who taught his students about democracy and the American values of equality and justice for all. Later, he became a lawyer as a second career, and he spent the last eight and a half years in the Tampa office of the U.S. Attorney representing the government in various types of prosecutions. Then, Trump was elected, and Gordon, along with all of us, watched the hoards of people invade the U.S Capitol on January 6th, 2021, and bring desecration to the most sacred halls of American democracy.

The January 6th rioters’ prosecutions were the largest mass prosecution effort in a single federal court in U.S. history. When a call went out from the District of Columbia federal prosecutor for assistant U.S. Attorneys (AUSA’s) to volunteer to help prosecute the January 6th rioters, Mike Gordon volunteered. He worked remotely from his home in Tampa to prepare the cases during the pandemic, and flew to D.C. for court appearances. His efforts were very successful and resulted in numerous convictions. His last trial jury was deliberating when he was informed that Trump had pardoned ALL of the January 6th defendants. Gordon’s last trial ended before a verdict was returned.

The Decision to Fire Gordon was made Without Any Input from his Own Office

When he returned to Tampa, he returned to prosecuting big, white-collar fraud cases, like that of  Pinellas County resident Leo Govoni. Gordon obtained an indictment of Govoni for essentially fraudulently stealing millions of dollars from a fund of assets that belonged to special needs children and adults. One day after he successfully argued to keep Govoni in jail pending his trial, on June 27, an administrative assistant in his office handed him a letter from Bondi telling him that he was fired, effective immediately, with no cause given, and apparently, after no consultation with his local supervisors and managers in the U.S. Attorneys’ Office in Tampa.

His office was blindsided by this decision, Gordon says, and they are still outraged by it. In fact, Gordon explains that when Pam Bondi came to visit the Tampa Office after his firing, “People were so upset that just a few weeks ago, when Attorney General Bondi came and visited the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Tampa, which is a normal thing AGs do periodically, people were asked to come do a photo- op with her. And… basically, across the office, most people boycotted that. Very few people were willing to come and take a photograph with her because morale was so damaged by my firing by her.”

Gordon’s Firing was Without Cause and Without Due Process

Mike Gordon, as a history teacher and a lawyer, is most worried that the 50-year-old legal guardrails put in place by Congress to curb executive branch authority after the corruption of the Nixon years, are now being torn down by the Trump administration. Without civil service protections for non-political federal employees, like Gordon, “we’ll have a kind of a nightmare scenario for the country, where unqualified people are put in positions of power just because they are friends with the right person.”

Meanwhile, Gordon is perfecting his chocolate chip cookie recipe and enjoying time with his children before moving into a new job. He’s certain it will not be a problem for him to be hired because he’s no “deep state operative.”

Listen to our whole discussion on demand from the MidPoint archives here, on the WMNF app, or as a WMNF Midpoint podcast on Spotify or Apple Music.

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