The federal judges in the Northern District of New York have declined to appoint John Sarcone, the Trump administration’s temporary US attorney pick, to permanently serve as their district’s top prosecutor.
The court made the announcement in a notice, posted on its website Monday, stating the court won’t exercise its authority to appoint a US attorney once Sarcone’s interim term expires. The Times-Union first reported the announcement.
It’s the first time a federal district court has publicly declined to permanently tap one of the administration’s picks as US attorney during his second term. Federal law permits the federal district court to appoint a US attorney to serve until a vacancy is filled, once the attorney general’s pick for its temporary leader has served 120 days. Sarcone had not been formally nominated to serve in the position full-time.
Still, the Trump administration may be able to tap another temporary leader of the office, as it did in Washington, D.C, under the statute governing interim US attorney appointments. The administration picked former Fox News host Jeanine Pirro to lead the nation’s largest US attorney’s office after it became clear that Ed Martin, a Trump loyalist then temporarily leading the office, didn’t have enough support in the Senate to be confirmed.
President Donald Trump could theoretically also select a temporary leader, or even give Sarcone another term, under a separate law governing federal vacancies, said Jennifer Selin, an associate professor at the Arizona State University Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law who researches US attorney appointments.
Selin said there is ambiguity in how those two statutes interact with each other when it comes to successive temporary appointments.
“This is where the Trump administration has been creative, and I don’t think we really know legally how this all works,” Selin said. “They’re sort of creating their own precedent here.”
Attorney General Pam Bondi appointed Sarcone as temporary US attorney for the Albany-based office in March, and his 120-day term is set to expire this week. Before becoming the district’s top prosecutor, Sarcone served as a regional administrator for the US General Services Administration and a town attorney in Westchester County, according to a DOJ announcement of his appointment.
The possibility of back-to-back temporary appointments comes as Senate Democrats have moved to slow the administration’s Justice Department picks. Senators have veto power over US attorney nominees in their home states under the chamber’s blue-slip custom, teeing up a battle between the White House and New York’s two Democratic senators over the state’s top prosecutor positions.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) announced in May that he would put a hold on all Justice Department political nominees over Trump’s plans to accept a gifted jet from Qatar. The month prior, he announced he wouldn’t return his blue slip — an action that blocks them from moving forward — for Trump’s picks for the top prosecutors in the Manhattan and Brooklyn US attorney’s offices.
Spokesperson for Schumer’s office and for the US attorney’s office for the Northern District of New York didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.
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