A national coalition of locally-elected, top prosecutors, including Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner, announced the formation of the Project for the Fight Against Federal Overreach – an effort to hold federal officials accountable when they exceed their lawful authority, especially in states around the country where federal agents are being surged.

The coalition launches amid growing concerns about warrantless entries, unlawful detentions, and coercive enforcement tactics by federal agents, and it’s intended to ensure that constitutional limits on federal power are actively enforced through lawful institutions.

The group of nine includes prosecutors from Minneapolis, Austin and Dallas in Texas; Pima County in Arizona, which includes Tucson; and Fairfax, Falls Church and Arlington, Portsmouth and Norfolk in Virginia.

The coalition will share strategies and best practices among prosecutors, provide regular public updates on efforts to rein in unlawful federal conduct and educate the public on what paths are legally available, and coordinate on accountability efforts across jurisdictions.

“No agency and no officer is above the law,” said Krasner. “When federal agents exceed their lawful authority, local prosecutors have both the power and the duty to act. The project exists to ensure that accountability is real, coordinated, and enforced through lawful institutions.”

The acronym (F.A.F.O.) was well-thought out as it references a slang term indicating that reckless actions (“f**k around”) will result in severe, inevitable consequences (“find out”). Its formation was spurred by “growing concerns about warrantless entries, unlawful detentions, and coercive enforcement tactics by federal agents,” according to a news release.

In opening an event to announce the coalition, Krasner introduced his colleagues as even-handed prosecutors who take take their oath of office seriously.

“It is a gathering of people who take democracy seriously and are willing to do what their oath requires, to uphold the Constitution and the laws of the United States,” said Krasner. “And, also a moral oath. There is a moral oath that prosecutors have and that is the oath to seek justice. That is what we are all about.”

Project participants emphasized that accountability is critical to keeping trust in the legal system. When they see no consequences for unlawful actions, it means people also understand that the rule of law will crumble. That’s the opposite of safety, said Mary Moriarty, District Attorney of Hennepin County (Minneapolis). “The American people deserve and indeed need to know that local leaders are working together to defend their constitutional rights.”

Krasner said that the coalition has formed – against “misinformation you may have heard from mouth of the Vice President,” he claimed – because prosecutors have the ability to bring state criminal charges against federal officials and to prosecute those charges.

“It would be us. It would be local prosecutors seeing through charges from beginning to end,” said Krasner. “Whether they are criminal homicide charges or they are charges having to do with illegal actions to promote a cover-up, such as obstruction the administration of justice, which is a crime in many jurisdictions. Tampering with evidence, which is a crime. Perjury, false oaths, physical assault, there’s any number of charges that could potentially arise in various jurisdictions where we are seeing, sadly, certain individual ICE officers and federal officers going rogue.”

Prosecuting any police officer raises significant obstacles, since officers are authorized to use deadly force when they reasonably perceive a serious threat. The Constitution’s supremacy clause gives federal agents additional protection, though they do not have absolute immunity, as Vice President JD Vance initially claimed. They can ask for a federal court to shield them from prosecution if their actions were authorized under federal law, and if they can show that they did “no more than what was necessary and proper.”

Participants plan to convene in early February to share strategies for pushing back against the lawless actions of federal forces in states and cities around the country.