By Andrew Goudsward
Dec 1 (Reuters) – A federal appeals court determined on Monday that Alina Habba, a former personal lawyer to Donald Trump, was unlawfully appointed as the top federal prosecutor in New Jersey and disqualified her from supervising cases in a decision rebuking the Republican president.
The unanimous ruling by a three-judge panel of the Philadelphia-based 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals was the latest blow to Trump and his Justice Department as they seek to install loyalists to oversee key U.S. attorney offices around the country.
The 3rd Circuit upheld U.S. District Judge Matthew Brann’s ruling in August that the Trump administration violated a federal appointments law in naming Habba as acting U.S. attorney in New Jersey.
“It is apparent that the current administration has been frustrated by some of the legal and political barriers to getting its appointees in place,” Judge D. Michael Fisher wrote in the ruling. “Its efforts to elevate its preferred candidate for U.S. Attorney for the District of New Jersey, Alina Habba, to the role of Acting U.S. Attorney demonstrate the difficulties it has faced.”
The ruling is likely to impact scores of active federal criminal cases in New Jersey, forcing the Justice Department to find a new prosecutor to supervise those cases. The administration could appeal the decision to the U.S. Supreme Court.
A Justice Department spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Lawyers representing Cesar Pina, one of three criminal defendants who has challenged Habba’s authority to supervise cases, welcomed the 3rd Circuit’s decision.
The decision shows that “President Trump cannot usurp longstanding statutory and constitutional processes to insert whomever he wants in these positions,” attorneys Abbe Lowell, Gerry Krovatin and Norm Eisen said in a statement, referring to U.S. attorney posts.
Pina has pleaded not guilty to wire fraud, money laundering and bribery charges.
APPOINTMENT CHALLENGES
The ruling is the first by a federal appeals court on the administration’s attempts to install temporary U.S. attorneys, though others have been challenged in court.
A federal judge last week dismissed criminal cases that had been brought against two high-profile Trump adversaries, former FBI Director James Comey and New York state Attorney General Letitia James. The judge found that the Trump-aligned prosecutor, Lindsey Halligan, who brought the charges had been unlawfully appointed as interim U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia.
The ruling in that case, which the Trump administration has vowed to appeal, dealt with a separate but related appointments law.
Judges have also rejected U.S. attorney appointments in the Central District of California and Nevada in recent months. The Justice Department is appealing the Nevada ruling.
U.S. attorneys typically must be nominated by the president and confirmed by the Senate, but other laws allow for temporary appointments in certain circumstances.
Regarding Habba, criminal defendants in two cases challenged a series of maneuvers that the Justice Department used to attempt to keep Habba in her post after judges on New Jersey’s District Court opted not to extend her interim appointment. The Justice Department accused the judges of political motivations.
That court instead named Habba’s top deputy Desiree Grace, a career federal prosecutor, as her successor, prompting the Justice Department to fire Grace and attempt to reinstall Habba.
Lawyers for the defendants argued that the maneuvers bypassed the Senate confirmation process and would improperly allow a prosecutor to serve indefinitely.
The Justice Department argued that the appointment was lawful, and that Attorney General Pam Bondi granted Habba authority to supervise cases under a second title, special attorney.
Habba, who had no prior prosecutorial experience, represented Trump during his years out of the presidency, including during a New York civil trial in which a jury found Trump liable for defaming writer E. Jean Carroll, who had accused him of sexual assault.
Habba attracted controversy during her interim tenure for claiming in an interview that she could use her office to help Republicans in New Jersey, and for her decision to charge Democratic U.S. Representative LaMonica McIver following a confrontation with federal agents outside an immigration detention center in May.
(Reporting by Andrew Goudsward; Editing by Alex Richardson and Will Dunham)
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