Today, the club of DQ\u2019d federal prosecutors got a little bigger with the addition of the Northern District of New York\u2019s John Sarcone III<\/a>. After getting the interim appointment from Trump, Sarcone served his 120 days then a panel of judges declined to extend his role. Trump tried to hand wave this snafu with some appointment shenanigans \u2014 Pam Bondi called him a\u00a0\u201cspecial attorney\u201d<\/a>\u00a0with an \u201cindefinite\u201d term.<\/p>\n But that didn\u2019t fool U.S. District Judge Lorna Schofield. In evaluating subpoenas Sarcone\u00a0issued to Trump foe<\/a> New York Attorney General Letitia James, Schofield found Sarcone was illegally squatting in the role. \u201cWhen the Executive branch of government skirts restraints put in place by Congress and then uses that power to subject political adversaries to criminal investigations,\u201d she wrote, \u201cit acts without lawful authority.\u201d<\/p>\n It\u2019s yet another lesson for the Department of Justice on how appointments work, let\u2019s see if this one sticks.<\/p>\n Read the order below. <\/p>\n The post *Another* U.S. Attorney Disqualified After Failing The \u2018Actually Appointed\u2019 Test<\/a> appeared first on Above the Law<\/a>.<\/p>\n Before 2025, fake U.S. attorneys weren\u2019t a thing. But in his second term in office, Donald Trump has been attempting to circumvent Senate confirmation along with the requirements of 28 USC \u00a7 546 for lackeys in various U.S. Attorneys roles and now it\u2019s a full-blown MAGA trend.<\/p>\n Judges have repeatedly ruled that federal law allows the president to make only one interim appointment (lasting 120 days) as U.S. Attorney in any given federal district, after which the position may only be filled by a Senate-confirmed nominee or a judicially installed placeholder.\u00a0That basic of statutory interpretation has led to the disqualification of New Jersey \u201cU.S. Attorney\u201dAlina Habba<\/a>, Eastern District of Virginia\u2019s Lindsey Halligan<\/a> (no matter what her signature line currently say<\/a>s), Sigal Chattah<\/a> in Nevada, and Bill Essayli <\/a>in Southern California.<\/p>\n Today, the club of DQ\u2019d federal prosecutors got a little bigger with the addition of the Northern District of New York\u2019s John Sarcone III<\/a>. After getting the interim appointment from Trump, Sarcone served his 120 days then a panel of judges declined to extend his role. Trump tried to hand wave this snafu with some appointment shenanigans \u2014 Pam Bondi called him a\u00a0\u201cspecial attorney\u201d<\/a>\u00a0with an \u201cindefinite\u201d term.<\/p>\n But that didn\u2019t fool U.S. District Judge Lorna Schofield. In evaluating subpoenas Sarcone\u00a0issued to Trump foe<\/a> New York Attorney General Letitia James, Schofield found Sarcone was illegally squatting in the role. \u201cWhen the Executive branch of government skirts restraints put in place by Congress and then uses that power to subject political adversaries to criminal investigations,\u201d she wrote, \u201cit acts without lawful authority.\u201d<\/p>\n It\u2019s yet another lesson for the Department of Justice on how appointments work, let\u2019s see if this one sticks.<\/p>\n Read the order below. <\/p>\n gov.uscourts.nynd.149556.50.0<\/a>Download<\/a><\/p>\n Before 2025, fake U.S. attorneys weren\u2019t a thing. But in his second term in office, Donald Trump has been attempting to circumvent Senate confirmation along with the requirements of 28 USC \u00a7 546 for lackeys in various U.S. Attorneys roles and now it\u2019s a full-blown MAGA trend. Judges have repeatedly ruled that federal law allows […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":141276,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-141275","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-above_the_law"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/xira.com\/p\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/IMG_5243-1-scaled-e1623338814705-620x568-tmV4kz.jpg?fit=620%2C568&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/141275","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=141275"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/141275\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/141276"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=141275"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=141275"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=141275"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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Kathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, host of The Jabot podcast<\/a>, and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer<\/a>. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email her<\/a> with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter @Kathryn1<\/a>\u00a0or Mastodon @Kathryn1@mastodon.social.<\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/abovethelaw.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2026\/01\/GettyImages-2226649168-300x208.jpg?resize=300%2C208&ssl=1\" "\\"\\"")
\nKathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, host of The Jabot podcast<\/a>, and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer<\/a>. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email her<\/a> with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter @Kathryn1<\/a>\u00a0or Mastodon @[email\u00a0protected].<\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"