Trump's Trials - Disqualification of New Jersey's top federal prosecutor could upend dozens of cases

Episode Date: December 2, 2025

Alina Habba, President Trump's ex-lawyer who was tapped to be New Jersey's top federal prosecutor, was disqualified by a federal appeals court Monday, potentially upending dozens of cases.Then, a former federal prosecutor weighs in on the ruling.Support NPR and hear every episode of Trump's Terms sponsor-free with NPR+. Sign up at plus.npr.org.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

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If you're not going to protect your citizens, President Trump will. We all serve at the pleasure of the president. The golden age of America is upon us. We are in the golden age. Every episode, we bring you one of NPR's latest stories about the 47th president and how he is trying to remake the federal government. Today's story starts right after this. I'm Leila Faldon. And I'm A May Martinez. A federal appeals court has this qualified President Trump's appointee for U.S. attorney in New Jersey, Alina Haba.

The unanimous Monday ruling is from a court based in Philadelphia and has the potential to upend dozens of cases in New Jersey. Kenneth Burns with member station W. HYY reports on how we got here. Haba was a member of the president's personal legal team when she joined the administration as White House counselor. Here she is addressing reporters at the White House about being picked for the New Jersey role last March. I look forward to working with Pam Bondi with the Department of Justice and making sure that we further the president's agenda of putting America first. Haba has limited court experience. Many say she brought politics to a role that is traditionally seen as nonpartisan. Haba was criticized for bringing charges against a Democratic congresswoman who challenged Trump's immigration enforcement policy at a detention center.

Federal judges in New Jersey chose a different route as Haba's 120-day term was about to end. They chose to appoint a career prosecutor over extending Haba's time. Haba blasted that decision when she spoke on Hannity on Fox News Channel last August. I am the pick of the president. I am the pick of Pam Bondi, our attorney general, and I will serve this country like I have for the last several years in any capacity. Bondi eventually renamed Haba as acting U.S. attorney. A three-judge panel ruled yesterday to uphold a lower court decision that disqualified Haba. As part of their decision, they said, quote,

the citizens of New Jersey and the loyal employees in the U.S. Attorney's Office deserves some clarity and stability. That line grabbed the attention of Jake Elberg, a professor at Seton Hall Law School. There are a lot of hardworking, nonpartisan career people there. Hobba's disqualification raises lots of questions. Her name appears on dozens of cases, which could potentially be challenged. I'd expect that there are lots of defense attorneys, lots of defendants who are sitting there today saying, well, what does this mean for my client?

Am I going to be filing something and try to have work of the administration undone? It is not clear whether the Trump administration will appeal her disqualification to the Supreme Court. For NPR News, I'm Kenneth Burns. For more on the appeals court ruling, we're joined by four. former federal prosecutor Ellie Honig. He's also a legal analyst for CNN and the author of the book, When You Come at the King, Inside DOJ's Pursuit of the President from Nixon to Trump. Ellie, good morning, and welcome back to the program.

Morning, Layla. He's happy to be with you. So as we just heard, there are lots of questions after this ruling. First off, what happens to Haba's cases? Good question. For now, the cases, the dozens or even hundreds that have been indicted during Haba's term in charge of the U.S. Attorney's Office in New Jersey, they do remain intact. One of the options that the Court of Appeals could have gone with is to say

Haba is disqualified and all the indictments are thrown out. The court did not quite go that far. However, they said she is disqualified, but they said we do not need to dismiss this cases. And interestingly, the Court of Appeals actually doesn't specify in its order why it doesn't take that extra step. I think based on my experience, I could tell you, we generally don't like to give alleged criminal defendants a windfall. We don't like to say, okay, all these people charge with guns and drugs and robbery.

You get to go free because there was a technical error that had nothing to do with your actual guilt or innocence. The other reason I think that this court did not dismiss all of those cases is there was a fallback. In New Jersey, now it turns out Alina Haba was not acting properly as U.S. attorney, but there was always some other proper AUSA, assistant U.S. attorney prosecutor on the papers. That's in contrast to the Lindsay Halligan issue in the Eastern District of Virginia in the Jim Comey and Letitia James cases where she was the only signatory. So when a court found she was acting improperly, there was no one left, hence the dismissal of the Comey and James and Diamond. It's a little bit of a difference there. Okay, so the decision was unanimous from judges appointed by President George W. Bush and Obama.

Was there a particular passage of the decision that stuck out to you? Yeah, there were a couple. So, yeah, there were two Bush judges. here and one Obama appointee, so not some sort of political screed either way. There's one passage where the judges go out of their way to talk about the importance of the U.S. attorney's offices. You know, so much of our focus when we talk about the Justice Department, is on the bosses in D.C., the attorney general and the solicitor general.

But I know, from my own experience, having served in one of the U.S. attorney's offices in New York, that's where the real action is. That's where 99% of the prosecutions are. And the court goes out of its way to say these offices are vital. and the head of them, the U.S. attorney, is supposed to be appointed in accordance with certain specific rules. There's another passage where I think the judges sort of pointedly note that the administration basically just panicked here, that they put in Haba, they didn't have a plan, when it turned out that her appointment probably violated the law, they started scrambling

around looking for back doors around this, and the court just said that doesn't work. You only get to appoint the president under law only gets to appoint a temporary replacement once for 120 days. That was done with HABA. After that, you don't get to serially reappoint the same person for 120 days, then another 120 days. Otherwise, the president could just keep doing that without ever having to go to the Senate for confirmation. Are there larger implications to the decision in this case here? I mean, it's very similar to the one in the Eastern District of Virginia, where Lindsay Halegan was also disqualified. So do you expect this to be an example of how other courts will rule in other states where the Trump

administration has tried to do the same thing. So this issue about the proper or improper, as it turns out, appointment of U.S. temporary U.S. attorneys has arisen in four federal districts. There's New Jersey and Eastern District of Virginia, also the Central District of California, which is where Los Angeles is, and the District of Nevada. All four of those district court trial-level judges have said these appointments were improper for roughly the same reasons. Now, yesterday's opinion was the first one we got from a federal court of appeal.

This one's the Third Circuit, which covers Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Delaware. So it's the highest up decision we've seen yet. But again, reaching the same conclusion. So we've now seen seven federal judges four at the trial court level, three at the Court of Appeals level, all reach the same conclusion. But yes, all four of those U.S. attorney's offices are in some degree of chaos and flux. Who exactly is in charge? What's the chain of command?

Are the cases that those person supervised and signed in jeopardy? And I think we will continue to see this case work its way through the other circuit courts of appeals and potentially land at the U.S. Supreme Court. So you expect the administration to appeal? I would think so. I mean, this administration, and not unlike any other administration, has appealed all of its substantial losses. This is a major loss. We know the administration has a lot of stock in Alina Haba and feels loyal to her. So don't be surprised if today or tomorrow you see a motion for the Supreme Court to take a look.

Ali Honeg is a former federal prosecutor and a legal analyst for CNN. Thank you for your time. Thanks, Leva. Before we wrap up, a reminder, you can find more coverage of the Trump administration on the NPR Politics Podcast, where you can hear NPR's political reporters break down the day's biggest political news with new episodes every weekday afternoon. And thanks, as always, to our NPR Plus supporters who hear every episode of the show without sponsored. sponsor messages. You can learn more at plus.npr.org. I'm Scott Detrow. Thanks for listening to Trump's terms from NPR.