Trump Administration Appeals Ruling Rejecting His Pick As Acting U.S. Attorney

By Dana DiFilippo, New Jersey Monitor

August 28, 2025

The Trump administration is appealing a judge’s recent ruling that Alina Habba has unlawfully served as New Jersey’s top federal prosecutor since July 1.

Attorney General Pamela Bondi vowed last week to challenge U.S. District Judge Matthew Brann’s ruling, just hours after it was filed, and she officially did so in a one-page notice of appeal Monday.

Habba, President Donald Trump’s former personal lawyer, didn’t wait for things to be official. She went on the offensive Sunday on Fox News, bashing a U.S. Senate tradition known as “blue slips,” which allows senators to block judicial and U.S. attorney nominees in their home states from advancing. Trump on Monday threatened to sue to end the century-old practice.

New Jersey’s two U.S. senators, Democrats Cory Booker and Andy Kim, have criticized Trump’s pick of Habba as U.S. attorney.

“Senator Booker and Senator Kim had absolutely every right to vote no for me for the U.S. Attorney position, but I had the right as the nominee to get in front of the Senate and to be voted on, to be vetted. I never even got there. Of course not. I was, according to them, unqualified,” Habba said. “Why? Look at (Dem Rep.) Hakeem Jeffries’ tweet. I arrested a congresswoman for a charge of assaulting a police officer. And you know what? I stand by my work as the U.S. attorney, and I won’t be intimidated by this type of political rhetoric.”

She repeated that message on social media Monday, calling on Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), who chairs the Senate’s Judiciary Committee, to end the blue-slip tradition.

“Remember, President Trump nominates individuals that he knows can get the job done. Your job is to work with your committee to advance their nominations. Doing the dirty work of Thom Tillis, Corey (sic) Booker and Andy Kim is NOT what America voted for,” she wrote. “Now New Jersey is becoming a playground for criminals because of partisan Federal Judges.”

Sen. Thom Tillis (R-North Carolina) also sits on the judiciary committee and has said he would honor blue slips.

It’s not clear whether opposition from Booker and Kim is all that has kept Habba from receiving confirmation from the U.S. Senate. Grassley on Monday said when Trump withdrew her name as a nominee for U.S. attorney — part of a series of legal and personnel moves the Trump administration undertook to keep Habba in the job past a statutory deadline — the judiciary committee had not received any of the paperwork needed for it to vet her nomination.

Habba has had a turbulent tenure since Trump named her to the post in an acting capacity in March, most rooted in her prosecutions of Newark Mayor Ras Baraka and U.S. Rep. LaMonica McIver, both Democrats, stemming from their May visit to an immigrant jail in Newark. Her office has reportedly subpoenaed Gov. Phil Murphy, also a Democrat, over comments he made in February that suggested he might hide an undocumented immigrant in his home.

After the Senate did not act to confirm her, a federal panel of judges in New Jersey in July declined to extend her tenure and chose her top deputy, Desiree Leigh Grace, for the post. Trump officials, though, fired Grace and reinstalled Habba, setting off the legal battle that ended up before Brann.

Brann voided all Habba’s actions as acting U.S. attorney since July 1, but he stayed his decision pending appeal. He also called on her to recuse herself from prosecutions until the ongoing court battle ends, because federal prosecutions in New Jersey have largely ground to a halt, with questions about her authority unresolved. But she has refused to do so.

The case’s next stop will be the U.S. 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals.

New Jersey Monitor, the Garden State’s newest news site, provides fair and tough reporting on the issues affecting New Jersey, from political corruption to education to criminal and social justice. The Monitor is part of States Newsroom, a national 501(c)(3) nonprofit supported by grants and a coalition of donors and readers.