Jay Clayton, the heavily conflicted former SEC chairman in Donald Trump’s first term, is the apparent nominee for U.S. attorney in Southern District of New York. From Reuters:
Clayton is likely to be seen as a somewhat unconventional pick for the office known for high-profile financial crime and public corruption prosecutions, as he does not have any criminal law experience. The SEC and Southern District typically work closely together on financial crimes enforcement… The choice of Clayton to lead the office is likely to draw less opposition from Trump’s critics than other picks, like former U.S. Representative Matt Gaetz as attorney general.
As The New York Times noted back in 2017, Clayton’s corporate clients made his role at FCC complicated: “After spending years cultivating an elite roster of Wall Street and corporate clients, Jay Clayton will now be responsible for policing some of those same types of companies.”
AUTHOR COMMENT
What’s fascinating about how this news broke is, with almost complete uniformity, media treated the Clayton announcement as a procedural-news item and made absolutely no mention that Billy Barr used Clayton (at behest of donald no doubt) in an attempted coup of his own in 2019.
Geoffrey Berman, then the top prosecutor at SDNY, was apparently getting too close to Former Guy and his folks in his probes, which is the only explanation for why Barr would undertake such a hasty, and exceedingly clumsy, operation to oust him. (Berman’s deputy, Audrey Strauss, ultimately succeeded him.)
What’s more, Clayton is not just a “veteran” “operative” from Trump Regime One: he’s also done a whole lot of favors for Donald’s new bestie Elon Musk. Which will be a huge help if and when Musk ever gets in legal trouble inside SDNY.
