Attorney General Pam Bondi’s decision to swiftly fire a career Justice Department official over a secretly recorded conversation about how the Trump administration is handling the Jeffrey Epstein files has now exploded into a federal lawsuit accusing her of violating bedrock constitutional protections.

Joseph Schnitt, a 23-year DOJ employee who managed the Federal Witness Security Program, was on a first date with a woman purportedly named “Skylar” he had met on the dating app Hinge when she began asking him what he knew about Epstein and his convicted sex trafficking accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell, according to his lawsuit filed on Nov. 24 and obtained by Atlanta Black Star.

During the more than hour-long date and what he considered to be a private conversation at a restaurant in Old Town Alexandria, Virginia, on Aug. 4, 2024, Schnitt told “Skylar” that the Trump administration would likely shield Republicans while exposing Democrats when they release the notorious Epstein files.

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“They’ll redact every Republican or conservative person in those files, leave all the liberal Democratic people in those files,” Schnitt told the woman who had identified herself as an au pair, but who the lawsuit says is actually Dominique Phillips, a right-wing operative who previously worked for the conservative nonprofit organization Turning Point USA.

Phillips allegedly deployed a hidden camera to record Schnitt while on assignment for conservative activist and muckraker James O’Keefe, who posted the video on several online platforms on Sept. 4.

The video also included Schitt saying that the recent transfer of Maxwell to a minimum-security prison violated DOJ policy for sex offenders and amounted to “offering her something to keep her mouth shut.”

Hours before the video was posted online, Schnitt received a text message from O’Keefe Media Group (OMG) asking him for comments he had made during a hidden camera interview with an undercover reporter.

Initially “baffled,” the complaint says, he soon realized that the query was related to his date with “Skylar,” and reported the situation to his supervisor at DOJ.

Schnitt told his supervisor about the date and maintained “that he had only talked to the woman about information he learned through the news and his personal opinions based on that information,” the lawsuit says, and that he never told her that he had any special or inside knowledge of the case.

His supervisor told Schnitt to send an email summarizing the encounter to the Acting Director of the Office of Enforcement Operations, which he did, “making clear that he did not rely upon any official information” in his comments and that he “did not have any knowledge about the Epstein Files due to his employment responsibilities.”

“The DOJ is committed to transparency and is in compliance with the House Oversight Committee’s request for documents,” the post said.

The following day, on Sept. 5, Bondi personally fired Schnitt, issuing a memo that said he was terminated “based on your publicly inappropriate comments that were detrimental to the interests of the Department,” pursuant to Article II of the Constitution and U.S. law.

The lawsuit contends that as a member of the civil service, Schnitt was entitled to substantive due process before summary removal from federal service, and that his sudden and arbitrary firing was unlawful.

Schnitt had consistently received positive performance reviews during his 23 years of service, served as a leader on several important projects, and had no previous disciplinary history before his firing, the lawsuit claims.

The “entire premise of the Government’s termination” of Schnitt is “remarks he made during what he believed was a private date with a potential romantic partner,” his attorney Mark Zaid wrote in the complaint, and not based on his work performance.

His personal conversation during non-duty hours is “quintessential protected speech on a matter of public concern,” the lawsuit asserts. The federal government has retaliated against Schnitt “due to his constitutionally protected freedom of speech,” which did not take place in a government facility, use government equipment, or rely upon government systems or databases.

What he told the undercover reporter during the date that was actually “a complete set-up” was based on “publicly available information reported in the news media, as well as his own personal opinion on matters of public concern.”

“Had he possessed any information about the topic through his official duties, he never would have said anything,” Zaid wrote.

The lawsuit argues that Bondi’s termination memo and his firing without due process violated the First and Fifth Amendments, the Administrative Procedure Act, and the Privacy Act, resulting in depriving him of a job, loss of income, and harming his reputation and future employment prospects.

Schnitt seeks a jury trial to determine monetary damages, including back pay, and a court order immediately reinstating him to his federal service position, and name-clearing hearing.

The DOJ, Turning Point USA and O’Keefe Media Group have declined or not immediately responded to reporters’ requests for comment on the lawsuit.

Judge Tanya Chutkan ruled on Monday that Democracy Forward demonstrated that their request was reasonably tailored to a “matter of widespread and exceptional media interest in which there exist possible questions about the government’s integrity that affect public confidence.”