After President Donald Trump singled him out for possible impeachment, a Republican lawmaker is officially going to war against Judge James Boasberg with a new bill inspired by GOP grievances against him, per a report from Bloomberg.
Boasberg is a Washington D.C., federal district judge appointed by former President Barack Obama, who first drew the ire of MAGA Republicans in 2025 when he ruled against Trump’s attempt to use the Alien Enemies Act as a means to carry out his mass deportation agenda. Those same Republicans later accused him, with no evidence, that he had forced his way onto a case against the Trump administration for its use of the Signal messaging app for military communications, despite the court’s repeated insistence that he had been randomly assigned to the case per its standard policy.
In light of his frequent rulings against the administration, Trump has called for Boasberg to be impeached, which prompted pushback from Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts. Numerous other Republicans began to echo those calls, including Sen. Eric Schmitt, a Missouri Republican, who also this week unveiled a new proposed bill, the BOASBERG Act, that would target the unfounded allegations against the judge.
“A Republican senator has introduced legislation that would require random case assignment in federal district courts,” Bloomberg’s report explained, adding later, “If passed, Schmitt’s legislation would also require district courts to publicly share their practices when it comes to the assignment of civil cases, or to say why cases can’t be randomly assigned. Anyone who attempted to ‘manipulate or evade the randomized case assignment system’ would face penalties, according to the bill. District judges would also be removed from a case if the Supreme Court vacates, reverses, or stays their rulings. Appeals court judges would also lose their case assignments if the Supreme Court vacated or reversed a judgment that affirmed a lower court ruling.”
The report continued: “Under the bill, federal appeals courts would also be subject to random assignment procedures when it comes to creating the three-judge panels that hear cases, and cases could only be reassigned in limited circumstances. Judges would also be randomly assigned when it comes to the rare three-judge courts stood up to weigh challenges to district maps. And both district and appeals courts would have to share statistics annually on judicial assignments and reassignments.”
“The BOASBERG Act prevents Judges from forcing their way onto cases and is an important piece of court transparency legislation that will help restore the American people’s confidence in our judiciary,” Schmitt said in a statement about the new proposal.
Bloomberg also noted a segment of Schmitt’s proposal, which said that it was not meant “to prevent district courts from assigning cases filed within a division to 1 or more judges.” The outlet interpreted this as an effort not to target the practice of “judge shopping,” wherein litigants find a way to file their suits in smaller districts where they are “all but guaranteed” to land a judge friendly to their cause, which conservatives have been accused of doing frequently in recent years.