WTF do they have to do with this case? This isn't a criminal proceeding, it's a civil matter.
You have already answered your own question:
Unfortunately... the Justice Department, likely at the behest of the White House, is intervening to influence copyright law and give corporations even more power.
The US government has more or less become the enforcement arm for the copyright lobby.
Which means they are now advancing copyright/corporate interests.
People who understand APIs understand it's a published contract about what your thing does ... and interfaces to APIs have been interoperable and open for a long time ... you can have your own implementation, but once you publish the API, it's possible for someone to implement it.
Ugh. It's like our government is pushing to see how far it can go to enslave citizens
As long as the corporations call the shots, and have "free speech", and apparently freedom of religion, and money is speech ... what you will find is government being completely beholden to industry. And an fair bit of people who think they know how to run a government saying this is a good idea.
Face it, the world is being coopted by corporate interests, and the laws are being increasingly written to benefit them.
The rest of us? Well, apparently we can't afford enough "speech" to actually get representation from government.
Democracy, but sold to the highest bidder. Which is usually a multinational corporation who is also avoiding taxes to the government who is handing them the keys to the kingdom.