Judge posts job opening for top prosecutor spot that DOJ claims Lindsey Halligan occupies
Source: NBC
WASHINGTON A top federal judge in the Eastern District of Virginia has posted a job opening for a top federal prosecutor position that the Trump administration claims is occupied by Trump loyalist Lindsey Halligan.
Chief Judge M. Hannah Lauck entered an order on Tuesday ordering the clerk of the court to post a vacancy announcement, soliciting applications from attorneys interested in filling the position of Interim U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia.
In the exercise of the authority conferred by 28 U.S.C. § 546(d) to appoint an Interim United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia until the position is filled by a Senate confirmed person, the Court is soliciting expressions of interest in serving in that position, the order read.
Under the law, when the position is vacant as the chief judge declared it was the court can appoint a United States Attorney to serve until the vacancy is filled" by a Senate-confirmed candidate. The application deadline is listed as Feb. 10, 2026.
A judge previously ruled that Halligan was unlawfully serving in the role and dismissed cases against former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James. After President Donald Trump urged Attorney General Pam Bondi to prosecute James and Comey, frequent targets of the president's ire, Halligan who had no prior prosecutorial experience presented the cases against them to federal grand jurors.
Read more: https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/justice-department/judge-posts-job-opening-top-prosecutor-spot-doj-claims-lindsey-halliga-rcna254982
NEW: Judge posts job opening for top prosecutor spot that DOJ claims Lindsey Halligan occupies
— Ryan J. Reilly âpaints a vivid and urgent portrait of⦠disarrayâ (@ryanjreilly.com) 2026-01-20T18:26:26.993Z
www.nbcnews.com/politics/jus...
LetMyPeopleVote
(175,619 posts)GB_RN
(3,518 posts)Now this is the kind of pushback we should have seen/been seeing from Roberts, et al., on the (Not so) Supreme Court. But noooooo! We have to make Cantaloupe Caligula the Corpulent a king!
LetMyPeopleVote
(175,619 posts)This makes me smile
ð¨BREAKING: Federal judges in eastern Virginia have moved to strip Lindsey Halligan, the embattled loyalist lawyer President Donald Trump handpicked to prosecute his enemies last year, of her alleged U.S. attorney title more than a month after a court formally disqualified her from the role.
— Marc Elias (@marcelias.bsky.social) 2026-01-20T17:37:42.990Z
https://www.democracydocket.com/news-alerts/federal-judges-strip-lindsey-halligan-us-attorney-title/
On Tuesday, M. Hannah Lauck, the chief judge of the Eastern District of Virginia, said in a court notice that since Halligans 120-day appointment which was found to have been unlawful formally ends Tuesday, the U.S. attorney title in the district would be vacant. Lauck also asked for qualified attorneys to apply to fill the role.
The move represents the latest development in the monthslong struggle between the Department of Justice (DOJ) and federal judges over who should lead the U.S. Attorneys Office for the Eastern District of Virginia.
The notice and job posting come just days after Trump, in a desperate attempt to keep Halligan at the helm of the key U.S. attorneys office, nominated her to the position for a second time.
In the court notice, Lauck said that because the Senate had not confirmed Halligan, federal judges in the district now had the authority to appoint someone to replace her.
MarineCombatEngineer
(17,798 posts)I expect the DoJ to open an investigation into mortgage fraud against this Federal Judge in
3..2..1...

