A grand jury in Alexandria, Va., on Thursday rejected the Trump administration’s effort to bring new charges against Letitia James, the New York attorney general, according to people familiar with the matter, exactly one week after another set of jurors did the same.
The back-to-back failures by prosecutors to secure an indictment amounted to a striking rejection of the administration’s retribution campaign. It highlighted the Justice Department’s unusual strategy of pursuing second indictments despite earlier failures in court and suggested the department would face major hurdles in bringing charges against President Trump’s foes.
A former White House aide whom Mr. Trump had named U.S. attorney in Eastern Virginia, Lindsey Halligan, succeeded in securing charges against Ms. James in October. But late last month, a judge ruled that Ms. Halligan’s appointment had violated a federal law that dictates the procedure of filling high-level federal vacancies.
That ruling led to the dismissal of the case against Ms. James, as well as another against the former F.B.I. director James B. Comey.
A spokesman for the Eastern District of Virginia did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The grand jury’s rejection of the charges on Thursday was reported earlier by ABC.
The rejection on Thursday was particularly remarkable given that it was the third time in just over two months that prosecutors had sought to lodge charges against Ms. James. It is vanishingly rare for grand juries to decline to indict a case, but in cases involving Mr. Trump’s broader immigration crackdown, grand jurors have repeatedly refused to do so.
Mr. Trump and Ms. James have clashed for years, in part because of the civil suit she brought against him, his company and his family members. The suit led to a trial at which a judge found Mr. Trump had conspired to exaggerate his net worth to garner favorable treatment from lenders. The case is being considered by New York’s highest court.
Mr. Trump has vowed revenge. In September, he pushed out his U.S. attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia, Erik S. Siebert, after Mr. Siebert told Justice Department officials he believed that the evidence did not support criminal charges against Ms. James or Mr. Comey.
In Mr. Siebert’s place, the president installed Ms. Halligan, who had no prosecutorial experience. The following month, Ms. James was indicted on charges of lying to financial institutions to secure better terms for a mortgage on a home in Virginia.
A judge has yet to review the substance of the case against Ms. James.
Devlin Barrett covers the Justice Department and the F.B.I. for The Times.
The post A Grand Jury Again Declines to Re-Indict Letitia James appeared first on New York Times.
