Requiem for a Terrible Nominee
Some lighter Friday fare
Happy Friday. We often serve up lighter fare at the end of the week. Yesterday, Trump withdrew the nomination of Ed Martin Jr. to be the United States Attorney for the District of Columbia. Martin was, authentically, the single worst nominee I have ever seen—combining zero relevant experience, an instinct for overbearing mistreatment of Assistant United States Attorneys, a trail of ethical violations, and, above all, a slavish devotion to the political interests of Trump over the legal and constitutional interests of the United States.
The list below could have been twice as long, and I had to pass on some candidate reasons and combine others. But there’s something round and classic about 10…
So here you have:
Top 10 reasons it’s a very good thing that Trump withdrew the nomination of Ed Martin Jr.:
10. Martin was deeply involved in the “Stop the Steal” movement and repeatedly promoted false claims that the election was rigged and fraudulent.
9. He failed to disclose on his Senate questionnaire over 150 paid appearances on Russian state-funded media outlets, even though the questionnaire has a special section for all media interviews. He further failed to report about 20% of his writings.
8. He described the Assistant United States Attorneys in his office as “President Trump’s lawyers.”
7. He strongly supported the January 6th marauders—representing them as a lawyer, helping raise funds for their defense, and calling them “patriots.”
6. As Acting United States Attorney, he dismissed a case against a defendant whom he had previously represented as a defense attorney.
5. He publicly praised an avowed white supremacist and antisemite—a man who has a long trail of statements such as “Hitler should have finished the job”—presenting him with an award and calling him his friend, an extraordinary guy, and an extraordinary leader.
4. He has literally no prosecutorial or judicial experience, unlike every previous U.S. Attorney in the Washington D.C. office, which is the largest in the country.
3. He regularly abused power as Acting United States Attorney—harassing Trump enemies with inappropriate letters, firing or demoting career prosecutors who worked on January 6th cases, and seeking to convene a grand jury without adequate predication (which caused the resignation of the Chief of his Criminal Division).
2. Did you not hear me?! As Acting United States Attorney, he dismissed a case against a defendant whom he had previously represented as a defense attorney. That’s as rank an ethical violation as it gets.
1. He is a royal jerk.
Talk to you later.
and he found someone even worse to fill the position. Every time you think he's found the bottom of the barrel...
Yeh, but now we got Jeanine Pirro as the nominee.