A former Justice Department chief of staff has drawn scrutiny after publicly urging lawyers who “support President Trump” to apply for jobs at the department, raising concerns about political neutrality within the federal prosecutorial ranks.

In a post over the weekend on X, Chad Mizelle — who served as a top adviser to Attorney General Pam Bondi during her first seven months in office — invited like-minded attorneys to contact him directly about joining the Justice Department.

“DM me,” Mizelle wrote. “We need good prosecutors.”

About 40 minutes later, the message was amplified by Stephen Miller, a senior White House adviser to President Donald Trump, who reposted it with the comment, “Patriots needed.” On Monday, Jason Reding Quiñones, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Florida, also reposted the message, writing, “We are hiring!”

While the Justice Department includes political appointees — such as senior officials in Washington and U.S. attorneys who lead offices nationwide — assistant U.S. attorneys, or AUSAs, who handle investigations and prosecutions are career civil servants expected by law and tradition to be nonpartisan.

Appearing on a conservative podcast Monday, Mizelle said he had received “hundreds and hundreds of inquiries” from lawyers interested in becoming AUSAs. But the public recruitment pitch, and its promotion by current senior government officials, has unsettled some former federal prosecutors across the political spectrum.

“We shouldn’t have a favorite politician in the Justice Department; we should have a favorite document, and that’s the Constitution,” said Perry Carbone, a former federal prosecutor, reflecting broader concerns that overtly political messaging could undermine public confidence in the department’s independence.

The Justice Department has not commented on the recruitment post or the criticism it has generated.