There are unwritten rules for some young law clerks who go to work for federal judges.
One of them is an expectation to eat lunch together every day. Another is to stay for drinks, often late into the evening, when the judge says so. Some nights stretch past midnight. And those social settings can be anything but relaxed.
"If I had declined to participate, it would have marked me as disloyal or difficult," said a former clerk with the initial A. She spoke under those conditions because she fears retribution for talking about her experience. "It was a constant reminder of how completely the judge controlled my time even during supposed breaks."
Federal judges have served as a rare check on President Trump's politically charged policies and executive actions this year. Yet the same power they wield from the bench also can extend deeply into the lives of people who work for them, especially law clerks.
For A and her fellow clerks, that control meant texting each other under the table, trying to figure out how to end the night without irritating their judge. They were law school graduates — professionals — and yet they felt powerless to leave.
"You stay seated, nodding along because upsetting the judge could literally end your career," A said.
For more than a year, NPR has investigated serious misconduct in the federal judiciary — and how difficult it is to hold judges accountable.
At one end of the spectrum, we heard from clerks who alleged they suffered sexual assaults, bullying, and pregnancy discrimination.
But the power imbalance between judges and their young clerks also fuels a broader, more insidious culture, where clerks are expected to surrender control over nearly every aspect of their lives.
A few clerks described incidents when their judges had thrown papers or files at them in anger, behind closed doors in chambers. Others described judges attempting to snoop or surveil them.
In all, NPR heard from dozens of current and former clerks who shared stories about bad behavior by 50 judges spread out across 26 states. The vast majority of those judges continue to serve, with little or no punishment.
NPR is not naming the judges because in most cases, clerks never formally complained about them—and fear that speaking out now could help the judges identify and retaliate against current and former employees.
A former clerk with the initial C says alcohol caused a lot of problems in his chambers. He felt pressure to comply with his judge's directives—and got instructions for when they met up with other judges, too.
"There were instances where if we were seeing a particular judge and that other judge wanted us to drink, we were required to drink," C said. "There were other instances where we were asked to transport our judges without notice after having been drinking."
C said he wanted to fit in, to impress his judge and make the judge happy. In return, he hoped he would get a lifelong mentor–someone who could exemplify high personal and professional standards.
"For young lawyers this power imbalance sets up a kind of trap where they want to make their judges happy and impress them…There's really no good guard rails or mechanisms for accountability," he said.
That dynamic bothers a former clerk called E.
"Life tenure exists for a reason, but I don't think the life tenure should protect people wholly from any sort of repercussions for running unfair or toxic workplaces," E said.
The work of judges has almost never been more visible. Judges are presiding over disputes at the heart of Trump's agenda to remake the federal government and consolidate executive power. Along the way, those judges are confronting hostile rhetoric and sometimes threats of violence simply for doing their jobs.
Gabe Roth, of Fix the Court, said now is the right time for the judiciary to get its act together because of the important role it's playing.
"You need them to be as good as they can possibly be in a situation where they are sort of a focal point of a major national crisis and the bulwark of our democracy," Roth said. "So they need to get their affairs in order."
Only a tiny fraction of law clerks ever formally report wrongdoing or retaliation. E said she talked with investigators in the court system where she lived about her judge bullying her and making racially problematic comments. But she never heard whether there were consequences for that judge, who's still working.
"The biggest takeaway was that, you know, this is really normal," she said. "I think I was really struck by how normal this is and also how quiet it is. Like nobody really talks about it unless, you know, it's like a back channel or something like that."
The federal courts are not subject to Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. That means court employees generally cannot sue over mistreatment or discrimination. The judiciary's internal human resources process is typically the final word.
The federal judiciary said it's done a lot to improve that process since the #MeToo movement emerged eight years ago. Judge Robert Conrad leads the Administrative Office of the Courts, which helps set national policy.
"We have made significant improvements to our workplace conduct, policies and practices," Conrad told Congress at a budget hearing last month.
Conrad testified that a survey released this year suggests the vast majority of employees had experienced no wrongdoing on the job.
He says the courts are working to encourage reluctant employees to ask for help and use the process.
But people who closely follow the courts remain skeptical.
Gabe Roth points to another part of that study, that says fewer than half of the respondents believed workers are encouraged to report misconduct.
"People are still scared about retaliation," Roth said. "They're scared that if they report harassment or discrimination or other wrongful conduct, that they're going to be retaliated against."
A law clerk named N said he understands why. N said he was over the moon when he got hired by his judge. He signed on for one year, with the option of extending for one more.
After nearly a year had passed, he approached the judge about applying for his dream job as a federal prosecutor. The chat did not go well.
"The first thing she said was, 'Well, you'd be breaking a commitment and so if you apply and I get a call from the U.S. attorney, I'm going to have to tell them that you are breaking your commitment to me,'" he said.
N was confused. He'd been a success at work. The judge hardly edited the orders and opinions he drafted.
He felt shaky after the judge tried to block him from moving on.
"I got sick," N said. "Yeah. I actually had to leave the office, like, shortly after we met, and I went home, and I puked, and I just had this terrible, nauseating headache, like, even going into the next day."
After some thought, N decided to apply for that job as a federal prosecutor. The interviews went well. He even met with the U.S. Attorney.
"They say that if you get to the third round, unless something happens, you're going to get hired and for me, something happened," he said.
N applied three times, for jobs in three different U.S. attorney's offices. He finished multiple rounds of interviews, and met with all three U.S. attorneys.
He didn't get any of the jobs.
He ultimately ended up working in a state legal system, one that never called his former judge for a reference.
N considered filing a complaint about the judge but ultimately let it go.
"I just didn't feel like I was going to get a fair audience," he said. "There is a culture in these places and the clerks, we are subordinate. We are inferior. And if it's between your word and a sitting judge, it's the sitting judge."
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