Welcome back, Deadline: Legal Newsletter readers. President-elect Donald Trump is rolling out picks for top government posts in his second term. Beyond the laughable (if it weren’t real) choice of Matt Gaetz for attorney general, other Justice Department names are familiar to those of us who follow Trump’s criminal cases — they’re the lawyers who’ve been defending him. Meanwhile, Trump’s federal criminal cases took another step toward winding down this week, as we head into next week with more anticipation in the New York state case.
Remember the trial in that one? A memorable moment was when Trump lawyer Todd Blanche began his cross-examination of key state witness Michael Cohen, by asking whether he had recently gone on TikTok and called Blanche a “crying little s—.” Despite losing that trial, Blanche’s work across multiple Trump cases earned him a planned nomination for deputy attorney general, the DOJ’s second-ranking official. Blanche’s co-counsel, Emil Bove, is Trump DOJ-bound, too, named as principal associate deputy AG.
And for the top cop job? Gaetz stands out in a sea of absurd Trump picks to date. The best that could be said for him is that he’s inexperienced. Indeed, his main criminal justice experience is being investigated in a sex trafficking probe that ended last year without him being charged (he denied any criminality). Gaetz resigned from his congressional seat this week, ahead of what was set to be a House Ethics Committee vote to release what’s been reportedly described as a “highly damaging” report on him. It’s unclear whether or when we’ll see it, but even some Republicans have expressed disapproval of Gaetz, though it remains to be seen if their confirmation votes back that up — that is, unless Trump tries to ditch the normal process with a recess appointment that even The Wall Street Journal’s editorial board has pre-emptively come out against.
Another important DOJ post is the solicitor general, who represents the federal government at the Supreme Court. That role is currently occupied by Elizabeth Prelogar, who’s been valiantly battling for the Biden administration against the Supreme Court’s GOP majority. Trump’s pick is John Sauer, who argued the immunity appeal in the case that led the Roberts Court to bestow broad criminal protections for Trump as he campaigned for the White House again — successfully, as it turned out, thanks partly to Chief Justice John Roberts and co.
In the latest criminal case fallout from that victory, special counsel Jack Smith and his team are reportedly planning to resign before Trump takes office. After getting U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan to pause the federal election interference case last week, Smith asked the federal appeals court this week to halt his pending appeal of U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon’s documents case dismissal. In both cases, Smith said he’d tell the courts by Dec. 2 of the government’s plans for how it wants to proceed — or, perhaps, not proceed. Whatever Smith says, the demise of the federal cases was inevitable once Trump won the presidency. The only question is when and how they’re buried.
Getting back to New York, we were supposed to learn this week whether Judge Juan Merchan would throw out Trump’s guilty verdicts based on the immunity ruling. But before that could happen, the parties — that is, Manhattan prosecutors and future DOJ leaders Blanche and Bove — asked Merchan to hold off, while District Attorney Alvin Bragg decides how the state wants to move forward ahead of Trump’s return to the White House. Bragg has until Tuesday to update the judge, so we should know by next week’s newsletter if the president-elect has a chance of being sentenced before he takes office for falsifying business records to cover up a hush money scheme in the 2016 election. Elsewhere in the Trump legal world, Rudy Giuliani’s lawyers want out of defending his quest to avoid enforcement of the massive defamation judgment won by former Georgia election workers Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss. And the Supreme Court rejected former Trump White House chief of staff Mark Meadows’ bid to move his Georgia state election interference charges to federal court. That case — in which Trump is also charged — has the notable distinction of not being crushable by virtue of his White House return, as well as for the fact that his defense counsel in that case, Steve Sadow, won’t become a top DOJ official. Congratulating his fellow Trump lawyers’ political promotions, Sadow said he’s “never been a prosecutor and never will be.” Subscribe to the Deadline: Legal Newsletter for expert analysis on the top legal stories of the week, including updates from the Supreme Court and developments in Donald Trump’s legal cases.
Jordan Rubin is the Deadline: Legal Blog writer. He was a prosecutor for the New York County District Attorney’s Office in Manhattan and is the author of “Bizarro," a book about the secret war on synthetic drugs. Before he joined MS NOW, he was a legal reporter for Bloomberg Law.
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