Court Bounces Trump's Pick for NJ Prosecutor

The Trump administration's maneuvers to keep Alina Habba in place as New Jersey's top federal prosecutor were illegal and she is disqualified, a federal appeals court said Monday. A panel of judges from the 3rd US Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia sided with a lower court judge's ruling after hearing oral arguments at which Habba—a former lawyer for the president—was present on Oct. 20. The ruling comes amid the push by President Trump's administration to keep Habba as the acting US attorney for New Jersey, a powerful post charged with enforcing federal criminal and civil law. It also comes after the judges questioned the government's moves to keep Habba in place after her interim appointment expired and without her getting Senate confirmation, reports the AP.

Habba is not the only Trump administration prosecutor whose appointment has been challenged. Last week, a federal judge dismissed criminal cases against former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James after concluding that the hastily installed prosecutor who filed the charges, Lindsey Halligan, was unlawfully appointed as interim US attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia. A lower court judge said in August that Habba's appointment was done with a "novel series of legal and personnel moves" and that she was not lawfully serving as US attorney for New Jersey. That order said her actions since July could be invalidated, but he stayed the order pending appeal.

The Habba case comes after several people charged with federal crimes in New Jersey challenged the legality of Habba's tenure. They sought to block the charges, arguing she didn't have the authority to prosecute their cases after her 120-day term as interim US attorney expired. Shortly after her appointment, she said in an interview with a right-wing influence that she hoped to help "turn New Jersey red," a rare overt political expression from a prosecutor. She then brought a trespassing charge, eventually dropped, against Democratic Newark Mayor Ras Baraka stemming from his visit to a federal immigration detention center. Habba later charged Democratic Rep. LaMonica McIver with assault in the same incident, a rare federal criminal case against a sitting member of Congress.