A lawyer loyal to President Trump was sworn in as the top federal prosecutor in eastern Virginia on Monday, as the president becomes increasingly impatient for the indictments of two people he despises: the former F.B.I. director James B. Comey and Attorney General Letitia James of New York.
The lawyer, Lindsey Halligan, a White House adviser and former Trump defense attorney with no prosecutorial experience, was tapped as the interim U.S. attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia, whose office has been conducting separate investigations of Mr. Comey and Ms. James. In a sign of how rushed the replacement process was, the internal Justice Department email announcing Ms. Halligan’s arrival misspelled her first name.
Ms. Halligan replaces Erik S. Siebert, who was forced out of the job late last week amid rising dissatisfaction from Mr. Trump and his top advisers that Mr. Siebert had not delivered indictments in the two high-profile cases.
Days before he resigned, Mr. Siebert conveyed to his Justice Department superiors that the cases against Mr. Comey and Ms. James were quite weak and not likely to result in any charges, according to people familiar with the interactions.
On Thursday night, a senior Justice Department official warned Mr. Siebert that the White House wanted him gone, one of the people said. The next day, Mr. Trump forced him out.
The switch in leadership comes amid a time crunch in the case of Mr. Comey, as one of the areas under investigation is his congressional testimony on Sept. 30, 2020, according to people familiar with the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity about a sensitive investigation. The five-year statute of limitations for any charges arising out of that testimony expires in eight days, barring a novel legal interpretation by prosecutors.
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The post Trump’s Handpicked Prosecutor Takes Over Comey and James Cases appeared first on New York Times.
