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Lindsey Halligan's 'masquerade' as U.S. Attorney must end, judges warn
Halligan isn't a U.S. Attorney, and she will be referred for discipline if she keeps calling herself one, federal judges warn.
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Federal judges aren’t sugarcoating what the Trump DOJ has done to the rule of law.
Journalists must not, either.
Lindsey Halligan is not a U.S. Attorney and must stop referring to herself as one or face possible disciplinary proceedings, a federal judge ruled on Tuesday.
“At the end of the day, Ms. Halligan's response asserts that she is free to act in an unlawful capacity, because she disagrees that she does so unlawfully. But that's not how our legal system works,” U.S. District Judge David Novak, a Trump appointee, ruled. “By having continued to exercise a position to which she was unconstitutionally appointed, including by signing the indictment in this case as ‘United States Attorney,’ Ms. Halligan exercised ‘power that [she] did not lawfully possess.’”
Hours before Novak’s ruling, the Chief Judge of the Eastern District of Virginia separately posted a job listing for her replacement.
‘Undermine the very essence of the Rule of Law’
Shortly before Thanksgiving, U.S. District Judge Cameron McGowan Currie disqualified Halligan and dismissed her cases against James Comey and Letitia James on the grounds that she was unlawfully and unconstitutionally appointed.
Halligan, a Trump White House aide with no prosecutorial experience, remained in the job and continued to sign her name on indictments and legal pleadings.
Judge Novak ordered Halligan to explain why he should not strike the “United States Attorney” affiliation from her signature line and refer her for disciplinary proceedings.
With the Justice Department’s full backing, Halligan defiantly signed a brief ridiculing Novak’s inquiry as an “inquisition” and accusing the judge of making “rudimentary” and “elementary” legal errors. Pam Bondi and Todd Blanche co-signed the brief.
Novak noticed.
The judge wrote that Blanche, Bondi and Halligan’s filing “contains a level of vitriol more appropriate for a cable news talk show and falls far beneath the level of advocacy expected from litigants in this Court, particularly the Department of Justice.”
Judge Novak found it “inconceivable” that the Justice Department “would repeatedly ignore court orders, while simultaneously prosecuting citizens for breaking the law.”
“The Court cannot tolerate such obstinance, because doing so would undermine the very essence of the Rule of Law,” he wrote. “If the Court were to allow Ms. Halligan and the Department of Justice to pick and choose which orders that they will follow, the same would have to be true for other litigants and our system of justice would crumble.”
‘This charade of Ms. Halligan’
Halligan, backed by the Justice Department, tarnished the legacy of her office, the judge wrote.
“The Eastern District of Virginia has long enjoyed the service of experienced prosecutors with unquestioned integrity from both political parties serving as the United States Attorney,” his order states. “Despite coming from different political backgrounds and holding very different ideological views, they all shared an unwavering commitment to the Rule of Law, putting the interests of the citizens of the District before their own personal ambitions, as true public servants do. Unfortunately, it appears that this ethos has come to an end.”
Novak ended his ruling in a similarly scathing fashion.
"In short, this charade of Ms. Halligan masquerading as the United States Attorney for this District in direct defiance of binding court orders must come to an end," he wrote.
For now, Novak stopped short of initiating disciplinary proceedings, but he fired a warning shot.
“The Court recognizes that Ms. Halligan lacks the prosecutorial experience that has long been the norm for those nominated to the position of United States Attorney in this District,” he wrote. “Consequently, and in light of her inexperience, the Court grants Ms. Halligan the benefit of the doubt and refrains from referring her for further investigation and disciplinary action regarding her misrepresentations to this Court at this time.”
Read Judge Novak’s full ruling here.
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