The Justice Department on Thursday cleared the way for Alina Habba to remain in her role as the top federal prosecutor in New Jersey.
Ms. Habba’s tenure as interim U.S. attorney was set to expire on Friday. But she announced on social media on Thursday that she would be New Jersey’s acting U.S. attorney.
The decision will allow Ms. Habba to lead the New Jersey office for at least the next 210 days.
President Trump had previously nominated Ms. Habba to be U.S. attorney in a permanent capacity, which under the law would have precluded her from serving as acting U.S. attorney. But a spokesman for the Justice Department said Thursday that the White House had withdrawn her nomination, allowing her to serve as acting U.S. attorney.
A White House spokesman, Harrison Fields, said in a statement that, “President Trump continues to have full confidence in Alina Habba and her commitment to serve the people of New Jersey.”
The sudden announcement for now ends a days-long standoff between officials in Washington and federal judges in New Jersey that had caused chaos in the prosecutor’s office, with each abrupt development leaving it more unclear who would lead in the weeks to come.
Ms. Habba is among the most high-profile of the new U.S. attorneys appointed by a president who has taken closer control of the Justice Department than any other in the past half century. And the weeks of drama could have national implications.
The Trump administration, according to Jennifer Selin, a professor at Arizona State University Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law, is using these unconventional appointments to “push the boundaries” and “set their own precedent.”
Earlier this week, the judges appointed their own choice for U.S. attorney, an experienced prosecutor named Desiree Leigh Grace. But shortly after Ms. Grace was named, Justice Department officials announced that she had been fired, attacking the judges as political agents and declaring their support for Ms. Habba.
On Wednesday, Ms. Grace said in her own social media post that despite the firing she was prepared to take on the role of U.S. attorney, noting that it would “forever be the greatest honor” that the judges had selected her “on merit.”
But Ms. Habba’s announcement the following day seems to eliminate the possibility that Ms. Grace would lead the office. In her own post on Thursday, Ms. Habba seemed to refer to the week’s turbulence.
“I don’t cower to pressure,” she wrote. “I don’t answer to politics. This is a fight for justice. And I’m all in.”
About a half-hour after her post, Ms. Habba emailed prosecutors in the office.
“There has been enough noise the past four months,” she wrote. “Let’s keep our focus and get back to the important work ahead for the District of New Jersey.”
She signed the email as the acting U.S. attorney for the District of New Jersey.
Ms. Habba, a former lawyer to President Trump who previously had no prosecutorial experience, was first named to a 120-day term as interim U.S. attorney in late March. Since then, her tenure has been defined by a series of high-profile investigations of Democrats and her stated desire to use the traditionally nonpartisan role to help “turn New Jersey red.”
Ms. Habba has not been seen in the office over the past few days and until Thursday afternoon prosecutors had remained uncertain as to who would lead them in the coming weeks.
The leadership confusion has affected the office’s work. In the latter half of the week, prosecutors suspended grand jury presentations and plea hearings out of concern that defense lawyers might challenge the validity of the U.S. attorney’s signature on official documents, according to two people with knowledge of the matter.
A similar unraveling took place last week in a federal prosecutors’ office in Albany, N.Y., after judges there declined to extend the interim term of John A. Sarcone III, another of Mr. Trump’s embattled U.S. attorneys. Mr. Sarcone was named a “special attorney to the attorney general,” and given the powers of a U.S. attorney.
Ms. Habba resigned on Thursday as interim U.S. attorney, according to a Justice Department spokesman. And by a quirk of the law, she briefly held the role of first assistant. That job previously belonged to Ms. Grace, who was selected by Ms. Habba to be the top deputy soon after she began leading the office.
On paper, Ms. Grace, a registered Republican, would appear to be a model prosecutor for the second Trump administration.
Robert Scrivo, a former special counsel to the New Jersey U.S. attorney who is now a partner at Mandelbaum Barrett, said that he had worked with Ms. Grace in the office’s violent crimes unit in 2018 and was impressed by her intelligence and work ethic.
“She was a big part of what the office has accomplished in her attention to violent crimes and gang prosecutions,” he said. “I don’t know that anyone did it at a higher level and brought more significant cases than her.”
The first member of her family to go to college, Ms. Grace made her name taking on gang violence, becoming recognized within the Justice Department for her expertise and quickly rising through the ranks of the New Jersey office.
In 2021, she won a conviction of three members of the gang MS-13, whom a jury had found guilty of murder, extortion, witness tampering and drug trafficking. Last year, while chief of the criminal division, she won the conviction of another three gang members, for numerous crimes including three murders.
It is highly unusual to try cases as a criminal division chief — or as a first assistant, the top deputy to the U.S. attorney.
Nonetheless, before she was fired, Ms. Grace was preparing for a September trial of two men who had been accused of staking out a rival gang member’s home, then killing the man, his pregnant 25-year-old girlfriend and an associate who had helped them gain access to the home.
In May, Ms. Habba told a crowd of current and former prosecutors at an office alumni event that having made Ms. Grace her top deputy was the best decision she had made in the job. The crowed erupted in applause.
Tracey Tully is a reporter for The Times who covers New Jersey, where she has lived for more than 20 years.
Jonah E. Bromwich covers criminal justice in the New York region for The Times. He is focused on political influence and its effect on the rule of law in the area’s federal and state courts.
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