The DOJ’s top watchdog highlights Rachael Rollins in a scathing report to Congress, saying the ex-U.S. Attorney for Massachusetts was an example of significant misconduct — citing her case in the same sentence as sex offender Jeffrey Epstein’s suicide.
Right off the top in his introduction, DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz calls out Rollins’ resignation in May for an attempt to “influence” the Suffolk DA’s race, “among other things,” as a focus of his policing.
It’s a harsh indictment that Horowitz stressed along with a probe into the shoddy “supervision” of pedophile Epstein, who committed suicide while in the custody of the Federal Bureau of Prisons in Manhattan in 2019.
“The OIG’s Investigations Division closed 125 criminal or administrative misconduct cases, and
its work resulted in 44 convictions or pleas and 84 terminations, administrative disciplinary actions, and resignations,” Horowitz wrote.
Rollins is again the top example in the IG’s section on “Investigative Highlights,” where Horowitz cites a litany of ethical sins.
“The OIG found that Rollins used her position as U.S Attorney and used non-public DOJ information available to her by virtue of her position as U.S. Attorney, in an effort to influence the outcome of an election, in violation of the Standards of Ethical Conduct for Employees of the Executive Branch, as well as Department policy and the obligations under the Ethics Agreement she signed after her nomination as U.S. Attorney,” the report states.
Horowitz was alluding to the race for Suffolk District Attorney, where she backed losing candidate Ricardo Arroyo over incumbent DA Kevin Hayden. Arroyo also lost in his re-election bid for Boston City Council.
Horowitz doesn’t stop there.
He says Rollins “willfully made a false statement of material fact” and “attended a partisan political fundraiser without approval from the Deputy Attorney General.”
That July 2022 fundraiser in Andover was first reported by the Herald, where Rollins told a Herald reporter she wasn’t violating the federal Hatch Act just before walking inside to meet with First Lady Jill Biden and other top Democrats. It did violate the act.
“Her attendance was contrary to the ethics advice she received before the event,” Horowitz adds.
U.S. Senator Tom Cotton, R-Ark., sent a letter to Horowitz demanding an investigation into Rollins’s attendance at the fundraiser a day after setting in motion her ultimate downfall.
Rollins was named the U.S. Attorney for the Bay State in December of 2021, with Vice President Kamala Harris casting the tie-breaking vote for the fellow progressive Democrat once considered a rising star.
Veteran prosecutor Joshua Levy is now the acting U.S. Attorney for the state and is expected to soon be able to drop the “acting” tag.
Rollins, the former DA for Suffolk County who also once worked at Massport, could not be immediately reached for comment.
In the end, it was her attempt to tip the scales of the DA race by leaking to the Boston Globe ahead of the primary that sealed her fate, ensuing DOJ reports state. The Herald received similar information but didn’t publish until after the primary, the report correctly points out.
Her tenure as the top federal prosecutor in the state was riddled with other transgressions, the IG states, that ended with her forced resignation.
“The OIG remains committed to its mission to detect and deter waste, fraud, abuse, and misconduct,” Horowitz tells Congress in the semiannual report, adding his Hotline (at oig.justice.gov/hotline) remains a key source of tips.
