By Elena Marquez | M•I•A MEDIA GROUP
MIAMI — Jason Reding Quiñones resigned Friday as South Florida’s top federal prosecutor, leaving the office that brought charges against former Cuban President Raúl Castro and oversaw a sweeping inquiry into earlier investigations of President Donald Trump. His departure was one of three senior Justice Department resignations in the days after Democrats won control of Congress in the midterm elections.
Reding Quiñones, a Miami native whom Trump nominated in 2025, said he submitted his resignation to the president effective Friday. He thanked Trump and the prosecutors and law enforcement officers he worked with, saying that leading the office in his home district had been especially meaningful. He gave no public reason for leaving. Attorney General Todd Blanche praised his work combating violent crime, drug trafficking and human trafficking.
The Associated Press, citing people familiar with the matter, reported that officials in Washington had grown frustrated with his management of the office assigned to lead the inquiry. CNN reported that he resigned under pressure from department leadership. Neither Reding Quiñones nor Blanche publicly linked the resignation to the election results.
The inquiry, dubbed the “grand conspiracy” probe, examined whether former law enforcement and intelligence officials conspired to violate Trump’s rights. Its scope included the investigation into contacts between Trump’s 2016 campaign and Russia and the later criminal inquiry into his handling of classified documents after leaving office. The probe had yet to produce criminal charges as of Friday. Joseph diGenova, a prosecutor who had overseen the effort, resigned in September.
For South Florida, the change in leadership also draws attention to a case rooted in Miami’s Cuban exile community. Reding Quiñones’ office secured an indictment of Castro over the 1996 downing of civilian planes flown by the Miami-based group Brothers to the Rescue. Four men were killed. Three decades later, the indictment brought that episode back into public view and made it one of the most closely watched cases handled by the district. The charges are allegations.
In Washington, John Eisenberg, who led the Justice Department’s National Security Division, also resigned Friday. Harmeet Dhillon, who headed its Civil Rights Division, announced her departure Thursday. The turnover comes as Democrats prepare to take over congressional committees and gain more authority to scrutinize the administration. That shift could bring greater attention to how the Justice Department chose and staffed politically sensitive investigations, including the one based in Miami.
The immediate question in Miami is who will lead the Southern District and what that person will prioritize. The office handles a broad docket of federal cases, from violent crime and drug trafficking to cross-border investigations. The Castro prosecution and the inquiry into Trump’s former investigators will draw particular attention during the transition. One is already in court, with charges tied to a loss South Florida has lived with for 30 years. The other has yet to reach that stage.
