Ed Martin, Republican operative and “Stop the Steal” mouthpiece who was a regular guest on Russian state TV, was named acting U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia in January. In mid February, Donald Trump nominated him to take the role on a permanent basis.
Martin was initially announced as the choice for OMB chief of staff, according to media reports, but was suddenly “redeployed” by Trump to fill the D.C. attorney role instead.
Notably, Martin did not disclose to the Senate that he was a regular guest on propaganda channels operated by the Russian government. From Spencer Hsu and Aaron Schaffer at Washington Post:
Nominee Ed Martin did not initially disclose his RT and Sputnik appearances from 2016 to 2024 to the Senate. The State Department has said the networks act like arms of Russian intelligence. Hours before Donald Trump announced U.S. missile strikes on Syria in response to a chemical attack that killed 90 civilians in April 2017, Ed Martin said on the Russian state television network RT America that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad might not be to blame. Instead, Martin told viewers, the situation was ‘engineered’ in Washington ‘by the people that want war in Syria.’
via Washington Post
Questions from media about whether Martin was compensated by either network went unanswered, according to Steve Benen writing for MaddowBlog.
Martin is reportedly receiving notable pushback from Democrats in the Senate, along with fierce criticism from former prosecutors who signed a letter stating their opposition to his serving in that role. From Ryan J. Reilly at NBC News:
In a letter sent to the Senate Judiciary Committee this week and obtained by NBC News, more than 100 former assistant U.S. attorneys who worked in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia signed a ‘Statement of Conscience and Principle’ laying out why they see Martin as unfit. ‘We are determined that the values and norms that were birthed during the tenure of John Thomson Mason and his successors—a commitment to the rule of law, the absence of partisanship in the pursuit of justice, the presence of civility, decency, and fairness—continue unabated now and hereafter,’ the statement reads, calling Martin ‘unworthy of the position.’
via NBC News
AUTHOR FOOTNOTE
Setting aside Martin’s reliably crazy assertions; attempting to rewrite history pertaining to January 6th insurrection; and speaking gigs at “Stop the Steal” events, my dude also has the distinction of being cartoonishly unqualified for such a pivotal position. According to WaPo, it’s the first time in 50 years an attorney named to oversee D.C. has no experience either as a judge or federal prosecutor.
As such, it’s safe to assume Donald wants to install him not as capable hand at “attorney-ing” but as pugnacious operative who will go to bat for, and apparently prosecute, whatever his superiors demand.
“The U.S. attorney in the District of Columbia is particularly powerful,” writes James Pearce in Lawfare (which I highly recommend you read cover-to-cover). Pearce adds:
In his two months on the job in an acting capacity, Martin has not shown himself ready to take on a position that demands a capable and serious attorney. More than that, Martin has aggressively suggested he would—inconsistently with the Justice Manual that establishes prosecutorial principles for the Justice Department—prosecute conduct he views as ‘unethical’ even if not unlawful. He has picked public fights with figures he seems to view as antithetical to Trump, with little regard for evidence or any plausible theory of criminal liability.
What Pearce describes is a(nother) Trump Bodyman, not a skilled adult with U.S. attorney bona fides. But perhaps that’s the point of this personnel gambit—just like all the other sycophants installed in positions that are way above their pay grades.
SOURCES
- Washington Post
- NBC News
- Anna Bower on Twitter/X
- James Pearce in Lawfare
- MaddowBlog
