President Trump\u2019s efforts to keep his loyalist U.S. attorneys in their roles hit a dead end this week, as two top federal prosecutors stepped down over piling complications from their leadership. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Julianne Murray, Delaware\u2019s GOP chair-turned-top federal prosecutor, announced her resignation<\/u><\/a> Friday, just days after Alina Habba said she was leaving her position<\/u><\/a> atop New Jersey\u2019s federal prosecuting office. <\/p>\n\n\n\n They both pinned the blame on a long-standing Senate practice that cut their confirmation ambitions short, and Habba assigned additional fault to the judges whose dockets were upended as the legality of her tenure was questioned. <\/p>\n\n\n\n It appeared to mark a rare reality check for the administration, which has taken extensive steps to keep its embattled U.S. attorneys in their posts, even as courts have ruled they are serving unlawfully. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThere\u2019s a lot of hills that they\u2019re willing to die on, and clearly this isn\u2019t one of them,\u201d said Jessica Levinson, a law professor at Loyola Marymount University. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The resignations follow a ruling<\/u><\/a> by a panel of federal appeals court judges affirming Habba\u2019s disqualification, at the heart of it a rejection of the maneuvers the administration took to keep her and other U.S. attorneys in the positions after their interim terms expired. <\/p>\n\n\n\n When Habba\u2019s temporary tenure ended in July, New Jersey federal judges declined to extend the clock, instead invoking a seldom-used power to appoint her next-in-command to the position. <\/p>\n\n\n\n However, so Habba could remain atop the office, Attorney General Pam Bondi fired the judges\u2019 selected successor and Trump withdrew Habba\u2019s formal nomination. She was given the title of acting U.S. attorney, alongside all the powers that come with it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The administration made similar moves in Nevada, California, New York, New Mexico and Delaware, where the prosecutors were turned from interim to acting U.S. attorneys when judges did not greenlight their continued leadership without Senate approval. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Sigal Chattah and Bill Essayli, the acting top federal prosecutors for Nevada and the district covering Los Angeles, respectively, were disqualified by judges and have appealed. Challenges to the installations of John Sarcone III and Ryan Ellison, who hold the roles in the Northern District of New York and New Mexico, respectively, are pending. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Murray\u2019s appointment had not drawn a legal challenge, but the clock on her interim status ran out last month. A judge declined to extend it<\/u><\/a>, and she suggested the panel\u2019s reasoning in ruling against Habba applied to her authority, as well. <\/p>\n\n\n\n But her tenure was doomed, she claimed, attributing her untimely departure to the Senate\u2019s long-standing blue slip tradition. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The bipartisan practice lets home-state senators veto presidential nominees to district courts and U.S. attorney offices. Murray accused Delaware Sens. Chris Coons and Lisa Blunt Rochester, both Democrats, of refusing to return the slips on her behalf for political reasons. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThis is not about advice and consent,\u201d she said. \u201cBecause of this incredibly flawed tradition, I wasn\u2019t even considered by the Judiciary Committee, let alone the entire Senate.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n As the tradition holds up Trump\u2019s nominees, the president himself has grown increasingly incensed. Trump has diagnosed his U.S. attorneys\u2019 legal troubles as a symptom of the stalled confirmations, which have bumped their tenures outside the interim windows in which many initially served lawfully before their leadership came under legal scrutiny. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Habba faced firm opposition from New Jersey Sens. Cory Booker and Andy Kim, both Democrats, as well. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cToo many GREAT REPUBLICANS are being, SENT PACKIN\u2019,\u201d Trump wrote Thursday on Truth Social<\/u><\/a>. \u201cNone are getting approved!!!\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s teed up a conflict between the president and top Senate Republicans, who have defended the practice because it affords them the same input when a Democrat holds the Oval Office. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Trump called on Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) to \u201cget something done, ideally the termination of Blue Slips,\u201d after failing to convince Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, to change course. <\/p>\n\n\n\n But without the senators\u2019 buy-in, there\u2019s little Trump can do. The president previously vowed<\/u><\/a> to sue over the practice, but such a lawsuit would face long odds and never came to fruition. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIt\u2019s not like changing a law; it\u2019s a custom, or policy,\u201d Levinson said. \u201cTo the extent that they don\u2019t like it, his option is to try and cajole.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n In the Eastern District of Virginia, Trump\u2019s handpicked prosecutor to pursue charges against two of his political opponents faces similar odds. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Lindsey Halligan was installed after her judge-approved predecessor, Erik Siebert, resigned amid pressure to indict two Trump foes, former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James (D). <\/p>\n\n\n\n A federal judge disqualified her<\/u><\/a> \u2014 and dismissed the cases<\/u><\/a> \u2014 last month, ruling she never lawfully held the office in the first place. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The Trump administration this week submitted Halligan\u2019s formal nomination to the Senate Judiciary Committee with little fanfare, paperwork obtained by The Hill<\/u><\/a> shows. The upper chamber\u2019s approval would make permanent her role as the district\u2019s top prosecutor. <\/p>\n\n\n\n However, both of Virginia\u2019s senators are Democrats, and they signaled skepticism about her outlook on Thursday. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Sens. Mark Warner and Tim Kaine told reporters they have a process for making U.S. attorney recommendations to the White House, one that resulted in Siebert\u2019s successful nomination \u2014 until he was pushed out. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe\u2019ll go through the process again, but we\u2019re going to review, and we\u2019ll send qualified nominees,\u201d Warner said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Kaine said Halligan has never reached out to the senators to request a meeting. She took over the office in late September. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe whole thing is an attempt to just end-run the Senate and end-run the judiciary,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The importance of securing Halligan\u2019s confirmation has been amplified by increasingly skeptical judges in her district, who have raised concerns about her lingering presence in the weeks after her tenure was found to be unlawful. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Though the Justice Department initially vowed to appeal Halligan\u2019s disqualification, it has not. Yet, she remains at the helm of the prosecuting office, and her name continues to appear on court filings. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Judges have pushed back from the bench about why her disqualification would not preclude her participation in cases. <\/p>\n\n\n\n One of those judges \u2014 U.S. District Judge Michael Nachmanoff, who oversaw Comey\u2019s case at the trial level \u2014 ordered Halligan\u2019s name struck from a man\u2019s case records, court filings show<\/u><\/a>. Another judge suggested at a hearing<\/u><\/a> that Halligan, like Habba, should resign. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Bondi and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche hit back in a joint statement<\/u><\/a> Monday that accused certain judges in Halligan\u2019s district of pursuing an \u201cunconscionable campaign of bias and hostility\u201d against her and her line prosecutors. <\/p>\n\n\n\n In her resignation note, Habba blamed New Jersey\u2019s district judges, too, claiming they \u201ctook advantage of a flawed blue slip tradition and became weapons for the politicized left\u201d and stopped conducting trials and entering sentences. Bondi said it became<\/u><\/a> \u201cuntenable\u201d for Habba to effectively run the office. <\/p>\n\n\n\n