The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, has Upheld a Lower Court Ruling that Disqualified Sigal Chattah, as the Purported Top Prosecutor in the Nevada U.S. Attorney’s Office.
The Ruling deals a Blow to the Trump (R) Scheme of Bypassing Senate Confirmation to Iinstall Poorly Qualified Loyalists as Top Federal Prosecutors in Blue States, a Key Element of Trump’s Campaign of Retribution.
The Particular Element of the Broader Scheme at Issue here was whether the Attorney General can Dole Out the “first assistant U.S. attorney” Designation to Just Anyone and Install Acting U.S. Attorneys of its Choosing in already Vacant Positions.
Under the Federal Vacancies Reform Act, the First Assistant U.S. Attorney Automatically Assumes the Role of Acting U.S. Attorney when that Post becomes Vacant. The Trump DOJ took that Provision and Ran with it, using the First Assistant Designation on People like Chattah to Circumvent both Senate Confirmation and the Law allowing Federal Judges to Name Interim U.S. Attorneys.
What the the Three-Judge 9th Circuit Panel, Two Trump Appointees and a Clinton Appointee, Unanimously Decided is that the First Assistant must have been Serving in that Role at the time of the Vacancy in the U.S. Attorney Position in Order to Automatically Ascend. Someone like Chattah, Who was Designated First Assistant after the Fact of the Vacancy, is Not Eligible to Serve as Acting U.S. Attorney on the Basis of that Designation.
The “rule of automatic succession applies only to a first assistant who held that position at the time the vacancy arose; it does not apply to a first assistant who never served under a validly appointed official,” the Appeal Court Decided. The Appeals Court also Rejected the Attempts by Trump Attorneys General to “create a de facto Acting U.S. Attorney by delegating all of the functions and duties of the U.S. Attorney to someone else.”
Chattah’s Case is Instructive because of how many Elements of Manipulation and Scheming are Involved. Then Attorney General Pam Bondi (R) Properly named Chattah to the Statutorily Mandated 120-day Term as Acting U.S. Attorney on 4/1/2025. Then Things got Weird.
Chattah is a Trump Loyalist with No Prior Prosecutorial Experience who has Reportedly Abused the Office for Personal and Political Gain. The Federal Judges in Nevada did Not Move to Retain Her in the Role, which they have the Power to do under Statute.
Just before Chattah’s 120-day Term Ended, She Resigned and Bond Designated Her as First Assistant U.S. Attorney. Bondi’s Order Declared that by Law Chattah Aautomatically Ascended back into the Acting Role She had just Resigned. In a Belt-and-Suspenders move, Bondi also made Chattah a Special U.S. Attorney and Purported to Delegate All the Powers of the Nevada U.S. Attorney to Her. The Appeals Court Rejected both Moves as Unlawful.
It’s Important to Note that these Challenges to the Unlawful Appointments of U.S. Attorneys, like the Similarly Successful Challenges of Alina Habba’s Appointment in New Jersey, are coming from Criminal Defendants Seeking to have their Indictments Thrown Out. (The lower court in the consolidated cases brought by multiple criminal defendants had declined to dismiss the indictments, and the appeals court yesterday said it lacked jurisdiction at this stage to consider whether dismissal of the indictments was an appropriate remedy).
So not only is the Trump DOJ Engaged in squirrelly workarounds to install loyalists in blue states and bypass the Senate, but it’s risking having legitimate criminal prosecutions thrown out in order to do so. I know this seems even more in the weeds, but the precise mechanism has been finalized for running one portion of the Justice Department directly out of the White House to target what it euphemistically calls “fraud” but really means elected Democrats in blue states.
The move — reported by Bloomberg’s Ben Penn — shifts bureaucratic power from Main Justice’s Criminal Division to the new National Fraud Enforcement Division, which is being closely overseen at the White House by Vice President JD Vance and deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller. “The regulation also creates leeway for the new operation to take on a vast array of unspecified other cases,” Penn notes.
All indications are that this will be a new tool of retribution even more directly wielded by the White House than Attorney General Todd Blanche is. Also, as I mentioned yesterday, these White House-driven investigations don’t have to yield prosecutions in order to be beneficial to Trump and damaging to his targets. Wide-ranging subpoenas on spurious claims of fraud gives the White House access to documents, communications, personal information, and other potentially useful fodder to use against Democrats and other Trump foes.
NYC Wins When Everyone Can Vote! Michael H. Drucker
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