Donald Trump has changed the appearing U.S. attorneys in Manhattan and Brooklyn with temps as his nominees for the distinguished posts await Senate affirmation — after a cadre of Home Republicans final month urged the president to fill prime federal prosecutor jobs with loyalists shortly.
The Trump administration tapped Danielle Sassoon to quickly lead the Southern District of New York federal prosecutor’s workplace in Manhattan and John Durham to go Brooklyn’s Japanese District of New York.
The posts have been beforehand held by former Deputy U.S. Lawyer Edward Kim and First Assistant Carolyn Pokorny, who took over when Damian Williams and Breon Peace, appointed by former President Joe Biden, resigned forward of Trump’s inauguration.
The transfer follows a December letter by a number of GOP Congress members urging Trump to take away all of the 93 holdover U.S. attorneys, together with first assistants to the earlier prime prosecutors, and hand-pick their interim replacements.
Sources informed Bloomberg Legislation final month that Trump’s transition group apprehensive that the interim U.S. attorneys promoted after their Biden-appointed bosses stepped down would possibly nonetheless be loyal to the previous president’s politics.
“The First Assistant is always an ideological protégé of the U.S. Attorney, and thus the transition does not typically result in a change of judicial policy or practice,” the GOP congress members wrote, in keeping with TheHill.com.
Shortly after his election, Trump introduced he’d title Jay Clayton, his former chairman of the Securities and Alternate Fee and frequent {golfing} buddy, to interchange Williams, who initiated a number of high-profile prosecutions throughout his three years in workplace — together with the pending public corruption case in opposition to Mayor Adams and the intercourse trafficking case in opposition to Sean “Diddy” Combs.
In contrast to Williams and all others who held the submit, Clayton has by no means labored on the SDNY and has no expertise with prison prosecutions. Earlier than serving as chair of the SEC, he spent 17 years at Sullivan & Cromwell representing banks, hedge funds, main firms, and buyers. He’s at present employed there as a senior coverage adviser and counsel.
Trump’s decide for the Brooklyn job is Joseph Nocella, a Nassau County choose the Federalist Society not too long ago feted. The Senate should verify each.
On this courtroom sketch, FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried, background heart, is cross examined by U.S. Assistant Lawyer Danielle Sassoon, left, whereas Choose Lewis Kaplan listens, in Manhattan federal court docket, Oct. 30, 2023, in New York. Members of the jury are seated at proper. (Elizabeth Williams through AP)
Each Sassoon and Durham are veteran prosecutors.
She additionally prosecuted the case in opposition to Sarah Lawrence Faculty cult chief Lawrence Ray, who was sentenced to a 60-year time period in January 2023 after a jury discovered him responsible of sexually and psychologically abusing classmates and buddies of his daughter.
Sassoon, 41, who attended Harvard and Yale, in keeping with her DOJ bio web page, clerked for the late staunch conservative Supreme Courtroom Justice Antonin Scalia and is a member of the Federalist Society, an influential authorized community for conservatives.
Durham, who sources aware of the workplace stated was at one level into consideration for the Brooklyn prime federal prosecutor job, began within the Japanese District’s Lengthy Island workplace in 2005 and has been a key participant within the federal authorities’s MS-13 prosecutions. He grew to become the Lengthy Island workplace chief final 12 months.
He graduated from the Faculty of the Holy Cross in 1998 and from the College of Connecticut College of Legislation in 2001 and clerked for U.S. District Choose Stephen C. Robinson in Manhattan, in keeping with his DOJ bio.
The White Home didn’t instantly return a message looking for remark.
Initially Printed: January 21, 2025 at 1:01 PM EST
