Trump-Appointed Judge Halts Lindsey Halligan’s ‘Masquerade’ as U.S. Attorney

On Tuesday evening, Attorney General Pam BondisaidLindsey Halligan, the attorney that President Donald Trump sought to appoint as the top federal prosecutor for the Eastern District of Virginia, will not take on that position. This might seem like past news, as it has been two months since U.S. District Judge Cameron McGowan CurrieconcludedThat Halligan’s appointment was unlawful. However, rather than retreating following Currie’s decision, Halligan remained, employing the same approach that George Costanza used.attemptedAfter he dramatically quit his job as a real estate agent, she acted as if nothing had occurred and wished no one would realize.

George was not able to escape consequences, nor was Halligan. “This performance by Ms. Halligan pretending to be the United States Attorney for this district in clear violation of mandatory court rulings needs to stop,” said U.S. District Judge David J. Novak, a nominee of Trump’s.declared on Tuesday in a criminal caseincluding an indictment signed by Halligan. Novak prohibited Halligan from “presenting herself as the United States Attorney in any document or otherwise before this Court until she is legally eligible to hold the position, either through Senate approval or appointment by this Court.”

It was a fittingly shameful end to Halligan’s short tenure as a federal prosecutor, which started because Trump needed a loyal follower who would have no qualms about pursuing indictments against two of his enemies: former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James. Halligan quickly came through with the results.grudge-driven indictmentsthat Trump insisted on, only to have themdismissedbecause the president was in such ahurrythat he violated legal limits regarding the selection of temporary U.S. attorneys.

From the start, Halligan’s tenure in that role was characterized by legal inconsistencies and humiliating mistakes. Her lack of competence was not unexpected, as she had no prior experience in prosecution and could not count on the support of her subordinates, who were reluctant to get involved in cases against Comey and James because they believed there wasn’t sufficient evidence to justify them. Halligan’s primary qualification for the position was her willingness to ignore the issues with those cases, setting her apart from Erik Siebert, the experienced prosecutor whom Trump initially selected as U.S. attorney.

Trump pushed Siebert out on September 19, upset over his refusal to pursue charges against Comey and James. In a Truth SocialpostThe following day, Trump declared that Halligan would take Siebert’s place, while instructing Bondi to proceed without further delay. “We can’t wait any longer,” he said to Bondi. “JUSTICE MUST BE DELIVERED, IMMEDIATELY!!!”

Even though Trump referred to Halligan as “a very capable lawyer,” her professional history did not involve any experience as a prosecutor, which one might expect to be a basic qualification for a U.S. attorney position. Halligan, who earned her law degree from the University of Miami in 2013, worked in insurance law for roughly ten years. She joined Trump’s legal team starting in 2022.

Halligan helped defend Trump in the federal casethat accused him of unlawfully keeping presidential documents after he left office in 2021. She took part in alawsuitunreasonably claiming that CNN defamed Trump by referring to his stolen-election theory as “the Big Lie”—a statement made by a federal judge appointed by Trumpdismissedin 2023, Halligan also contributed to overcomingchallengeson Trump’s qualification to run as a 2024 presidential candidate.

When Trump selected Halligan to take over from Siebert, she was working as a special assistant to the president and the White House’s senior associate staff secretary. While serving in the White House, she was themain advocate of Trump’s executive orderfocused on “bringing back truth and reason to American history” by removing “the impact of a polarizing, race-focused ideology” from the Smithsonian Institution.

Whatever your opinion of that record, it clearly did not equip Halligan for her new role. TheComey indictment, which she deliveredonly three days into his position, it was a brief, two-page document that washazyRegarding precisely how he is said to have lied to Congress. And when she submitted the indictment to U.S. Magistrate Judge Lindsey Vaala, Halligan mistakenly provided two different versions.

“This has never occurred before,” VaalaremarkedWhen Halligan filed the indictment on September 25, he stated, “I have received two documents that contradict each other. There appears to be a conflict. Both are signed by the [grand jury] foreperson.”

One indictment outlined the two charges approved by the grand jury, whereas the other included a third charge that the grand jury had considered.rejectedThe latter document, Vaala pointed out, mentioned “a failure to agree on an indictment” but did not indicate which specific charge was rejected, so “it appears they did not agree on all three charges.” The judge stated she was “a bit puzzled about why I received two documents with the same case number that contradict each other.”

Halligan appeared even more puzzled. She stated that she had “only reviewed” one of the indictments, “had not seen the other one,” and didn’t “know where that came from.” When Vaala mentioned that the document Halligan said she never saw “has your signature on it,” the inexperienced prosecutor was taken aback. “Okay,” she said. “Well.”

It turned outthat the grand jurors, other than the foreperson, had not viewed the updated indictment—the one Halligan claimed was the accurate version. As U.S. Magistrate Judge William E. FitzpatricknotedIn a ruling on November 17, that change sparked the question of whether the indictment Halligan was using had been correctly authorized by the grand jury.

A week later, Currie identifiedanother issue with the indictment—one that turned out to be critical. “I concur with Mr. Comey that the Attorney General’s effort to appoint Ms. Halligan as Interim U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia was unlawful,” shewroteAnd since Ms. Halligan lacked legal authority to present the indictment, I will approve Mr. Comey’s motion and dismiss the indictment without prejudice.

That choice depended on Trump and Bondi’s resistance to thefederal statutethat outlines what is supposed to occur when a U.S. attorney position becomes empty. The law allows the attorney general to select an interim replacement, who may serve for no longer than 120 days unless the district’s judges approve an extension. Siebert’s temporary appointment was set to end on May 21. However, on May 9, the district’s judges decided to allow him to stay in that role until a permanent U.S. attorney is appointed.

Because Siebert had already reached the 120-day limit, Currie decided, Trump and Bondi could not reset the clock by selecting a different person. According to the law, she stated, only the district’s judges had the authority to appoint a replacement. She pointed out that allowing otherwise would interfere with the legislative branch’s constitutional power under theAppointments Clause.

For the same s, Currie alsodismissedthe indictment of James, which Halligan haddelivered on October 9. That four-page document, which accused James of mortgage fraud, was twice as long as the Comey indictment, but it also lacked strong evidence, which may explain why two separate grand juries laterdeclined to approvea replacement accusation. Those consecutive rejections were notable because grand jurors, who only listen to the government’s perspective, typically endorse charges suggested by federal prosecutors.

Importantly, both the Comey indictment and the initial James indictment were signed exclusively by Halligan, indicating internal doubts about the strength of the cases. This is why Currie decided to drop both charges.

Even following Currie’s statement that Halligan wasnotThe U.S. attorney, she kept up the pretense, causing frustration among judges in the district. “Even with Judge Currie’s decisions, Ms. Halligan has kept referring to herself as the United States Attorney for this District in legal documents, including the Indictment and other filings in this case,” Novak mentions in yesterday’s statement.orderSome of my colleagues have verbally challenged the incorrect title, while others have written notes showing their disagreement with Ms. Halligan’s designation as the United States Attorney. I decided to allow Ms. Halligan a chance to clarify her stance.

On January 6, Novak orderedHalligan plans to submit “a statement detailing the reasoning behind Ms. Halligan’s claim of being the United States Attorney, despite Judge Currie’s opposing decision.” Inresponse, Halligan, along with Bondi and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, stated that Novak’s investigation “demonstrates a basic misinterpretation of Judge Currie’s directives” and “disregards at least three distinct areas of Supreme Court rulings concerning fundamental concepts such as the function of federal courts, the impact of district court decisions, and the characteristics of our adversarial process.” According to their account, Novak had committed one “basic legal mistake” following another.

Novak was “adding insult to injury,” according to Halligan and others, by implying that Halligan’s ongoing self-identification as the U.S. attorney could constitute “a factual misrepresentation that might lead to disciplinary action against an attorney.” That “barely concealed threat”

To employ attorney discipline to force the Executive Branch to align its legal stance in all criminal prosecutions with the opinion of one district judge,” they stated, “constitutes a serious misuse of authority and violates the principle of separation of powers.” Halligan “has not ‘misrepresented’ anything,” they added, “and the Court is entirely incorrect in implying that any modification to the Government’s signature block is necessary in this case or any other.”

Novak appeared clearly irritated by the tone of that reply. He states, “it includes a degree of hostility more suitable for a cable news program and is far below the standard of advocacy one would expect from parties appearing before this Court, especially the Department of Justice.” “The Court will not respond in kind and will instead examine the limited arguments that Ms. Halligan presents to support her continued reference to her role as United States Attorney before the Court.”

Novak points out that Currie was “acting under the guidance” of 4th Circuit Chief Judge Albert Diaz when she “determined that Ms. Halligan was improperly appointed as the United States Attorney for this District.” He states that “Ms. Halligan’s ongoing claim of being the United States Attorney for this District disregards a mandatory court order and cannot continue; otherwise, Ms. Halligan and any individual who supports her in a filing using the incorrect title [may] face possible disciplinary measures from this Court.”

Even though Currie concluded that Halligan’s appointment as U.S. attorney was illegal, Halligan, Bondi, and Blanche maintained that this did not require her to cease referring to herself as the U.S. attorney. After all, they pointed out, Currie never explicitly instructed her to stop. Moreover, even if Currie had, they contended, such a directive would not be legally valid underTrump v. CASA, the 2025 ruling in which the Supreme CourtsaidInjunctions issued by federal judges should only apply to the plaintiffs participating in the case. Novak argues that this perspective incorrectly describes the essence of Currie’s decision.

Chief Judge Diaz assigned Judge Currie to handle a specific motion in a

specific instance, but a distinct matter: the legitimacy of Ms. Halligan’s appointment,” Novak writes. “With language that was unmistakable, Chief Judge Diaz instructed Judge Currie to address any and all motions, ‘current and upcoming,’ related to the appointment of the United States Attorney, both in theComey case and [in] other instances “involving comparable difficulties”Regarding Ms. Halligan’s appointment. In this regard, Chief Judge Diaz, in his role as Chief Judge of the Fourth Circuit, gave Judge Currie the power to address the question of the validity of Ms. Halligan’s appointment on behalf of all judges who regularly serve in the Eastern District of Virginia.

Halligan, Bondi, and Blanche further stated that Novak did not wait for a defense motion before requesting her to clarify her decision to keep her job title. “It is still firmly within the authority of every federal judge to ‘maintain the integrity of the judicial process’ in support of the rule of law,” Novak writes. “Judges also bear”

An unambiguous obligation to act when confronted with threats to that integrity arising from the conduct of lawyers appearing before them.” Given these responsibilities, he states, “the Court’s recognition of possible ethical breaches by Ms. Halligan, who appears before this Court as an attorney of record, and its communication of these concerns to Ms. Halligan are clearly within its Article III authority.”

At heart, Halligan “claims she is free to act in an unlawful manner because she believes she is not acting unlawfully,” Novak notes. “But that’s not how our legal system functions.” By persisting in “holding a position she was unconstitutionally appointed to,” he states, Halligan “exercised ‘power that [she] did not legally hold.’ In the words of Justice Gorsuch, since Ms. Halligan was ‘unconstitutionally placed in office,’ she ‘cannot exercise executive power except as outlined in Article II.'”Efforts to accomplish this are invalid.'”

Even with “all her schemes,” Novak concludes that Halligan “has no legal grounds to claim she holds the position” of U.S. attorney. “Any further claims of this nature can only be considered false statements made in open violation of court orders.”

Novak chose not to request penalties against Halligan for her previous false statements. “The Court acknowledges that Ms. Halligan does not have the prosecutorial background that has traditionally been expected for individuals nominated for the role of United States Attorney in this district,” he stated. “Considering her lack of experience, the Court gives Ms. Halligan the benefit of the doubt and decides not to refer her for additional investigation or disciplinary action concerning her misrepresentations to this Court at this time.” It seems that Halligan’s absence of relevant experience ultimately worked in her favor in at least one way.

On the same day that Novak criticized Halligan, M. Hannah Lauck, chief judge of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, released anoticeLooking for candidates for the job that Halligan said was hers. Lauck mentioned that her court is using its legal power to “appoint an Interim United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia until the position is filled by someone confirmed by the Senate.” She then added, “No experience in prosecution required.” Just joking.

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