SCOOP: There’s only one enforcement attorney left at the CFTC’s Chicago office. Known as a group of heavy-hitters, attorneys and investigators in the Chicago office have had a role in most major CFTC enforcement actions since the birth of the agency in 1975. In recent months, that office has become a ghost town. Three former CFTC attorneys say the office’s reputation made it an appealing target for reductions in force. “I believe I was retaliated against, along with some of my colleagues,” says one who lost their job last summer. “Chicago is the spiritual home of the futures markets; it’s where it all began,” says one former attorney in the Chicago enforcement division. “To wipe out the enforcement staff in a place like Chicago sends a very bad signal to market participants about whether the government is watching what they’re doing and whether or not they have to abide by the law.” Many attorneys pushed out of the agency were mid-career. “If I was a different person,” one told me, “I would launch a crypto scam right now, because there’s no cops on the beat.”