ANNALS OF TRUMPI$TAN: Judge rules Alina Habba serving ‘without lawful authority’ as New Jersey’s U.S. attorney. (Jeremy Roebuck, WaPo, August 21, 2025)

DJT has appointed some of his criminal defense lawyers as Acting United States Attorneys in several states.  His appointment of Alina Habba as the United States Attorney for New Jersey was illegal.  From The Washington Post:

Judge rules Alina Habba serving ‘without lawful authority’ as New Jersey’s U.S. attorney

The decision calls into question the administration’s novel strategy for keeping her and other controversial interim choices in top prosecutorial roles.

Updated 

August 21, 2025 at 6:09 p.m. EDTtoday at 6:09 p.m. EDT

5 min

Alina Habba at the White House in March. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)

By Jeremy Roebuck

A federal judge ruled Thursday that Alina Habba, President Donald Trump’s pick for U.S. attorney in New Jersey, is in that role “without lawful authority” — a decision that called into question the administration’s novel strategy for keeping her and other controversial interim choices in top prosecutorial roles.

U.S. District Judge Matthew Brann concluded that Habba, appointed as interim U.S. attorney in March, had served beyond the 120-day expiration date for that role and that the Justice Department’s efforts to keep her past that deadline did not withstand legal scrutiny.

As a result, Brann ordered that “she must be disqualified from participating in any ongoing cases.” However, he paused his decision to give the Justice Department a chance to appeal.

“Faced with the question of whether Ms. Habba is lawfully performing the functions and duties of the office of the United States attorney for the District of New Jersey,” Brann wrote, “I conclude that she is not.”

The ruling delivered a resounding rebuke to both Habba, who previously worked as one of Trump’s personal defense attorneys, and the Justice Department, which went to extraordinary lengths to keep her in the U.S. attorney job after New Jersey’s federal judges last month voted not to retain her.

Since then, questions over Habba’s legitimacy in the role have prompted some federal courts in the state to pause certain proceedings while the leadership of the U.S. attorney’s office remains in doubt. Brann’s decision is likely to only add to that confusion.

Attorney General Pam Bondi vowed to appeal, saying on X that Habba “is doing incredible work in New Jersey — and we will protect her position from activist judicial attacks.” A spokesperson for Habba’s office did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Though Brann’s ruling dealt only with Habba’s appointment, it could reverberate across the country because the Justice Department has used the same complex maneuvers to extend the tenures of other loyalists Trump has installed as interim U.S. attorneys in California, Arizona, New Mexico and New York.

By law, interim U.S. attorney appointments can last for only 120 days. If there is no Senate-confirmed nominee at that point, federal judges are empowered to appoint an acting replacement in their districts.

In most cases, judges opt to extend the tenure of the interim or acting person in the job — and roughly a dozen of Trump’s less headline-grabbing interim appointees have already seen their terms extended.

But in Habba’s case, New Jersey’s federal judges voted not to extend her term and appointed a veteran prosecutor‚ who had been serving as Habba’s chief deputy. Bondi responded by attacking the judges and firing the successor they appointed.

Bondi then installed Habba in the newly vacant chief deputy role. Because there was no one serving at that point as U.S. attorney, Habba as the office’s new No. 2, inherited command of the office on an “acting basis.”

Legal experts have called those maneuvers, which relied on two different laws governing presidential appointments, at best unusual and at worst potentially illegal. The Justice Department has argued that the executive branch has the authority to appoint its preferred candidates to enforce federal laws in each state.

Habba’s brief tenure in New Jersey has made her a partisan lightning rod. She pledged in a statement to a TV network days after her appointment that she aimed to help “turn New Jersey red.” And in just four months, she’s announced investigations of New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy (D) and Attorney General Matthew Platkin (D), and filed felony assault charges against Rep. LaMonica McIver (D-New Jersey) over a scuffle with immigration officials outside a detention facility in Newark.

Though Trump withdrew his formal nomination of Habba to serve a full term in the role as part of the maneuvering around her reappointment, U.S. Sens. Cory Booker (D) and Andy Kim (D) of New Jersey had pledged they would not support her in the Senate because of concerns over her qualifications and her track record as a “partisan warrior.”

Brann, a member of the Republican Federalist Society appointed by President Barack Obama to the bench in the Middle District of Pennsylvania, was asked to consider the legality of Habba’s reappointment last month by a federal appeals court after three defendants facing federal charges in New Jersey sought to have their cases thrown out.

In his opinion Thursday, he said that the administration’s position defied the clear intent of Congress when it crafted the laws around U.S. attorney appointments and would allow the president to bypass both the Senate confirmation process and the role courts play in helping judges fill such vacancies.

“Taken to the extreme, the President could use this method to staff the United States Attorney’s office with individuals of his personal choice for an entire term without seeking the Senate’s advice and consent,” the judge wrote.

Still, Brann concluded the appropriate remedy was not to throw out the cases of the defendants who challenged Habba’s authority. He ordered Thursday they could proceed, but not under her supervision.

Lawyers for one of those defendants hailed the decision.

“Prosecutors wield enormous power, and with that comes the responsibility to ensure they are qualified and properly appointed,” attorneys Abbe D. Lowell and Gerald Krovatin said in statement. The court’s ruling, they continued “underscores that this Administration cannot circumvent the congressionally mandated process for confirming U.S. Attorney appointments.”

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What readers are saying

The comments overwhelmingly criticize Alina Habba's appointment as U.S. attorney in New Jersey, emphasizing that she is serving "without lawful authority" and lacks the necessary qualifications. Many commenters express relief and support for the judge's ruling, viewing it as a... Show more

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