Why Trump Has So Few Justice Dept. Allies

Source: Daily Beast | March 6, 2017 | Betsy Woodruff

President Trump is blaming the Senate for slow walking his DOJ nominees—and maybe they would, if they were nominated in the first place.

President Donald Trump spent this weekend baselessly accusing federal law enforcement of secretly colluding with the Obama administration to undermine his campaign, ushering in what could be a week of significant tension between the White House and the Department of Justice.

The fact that Trump has hardly bothered to nominate anyone to top DOJ positions won’t exactly help ease the strain.

Besides choosing cabinet secretaries, every president is responsible for naming hundreds of lower-level officials throughout the sprawling executive branch, including the Justice Department. The president can appoint a dozen assistant attorneys general who head the department’s various divisions. All those appointments must go through the Senate confirmation process before assuming their new positions.

They are critical leaders at the Justice Department—and Trump has hardly named any of them.

According to the Senate’s list of Nominations in Committee, Trump has only sent one assistant attorney general nomination to the Senate for confirmation: Steven Engel, on Feb. 1, to head the Office of Legal Counsel. In the meantime, career Justice Department officials—who have less clout and prestige than attorneys general appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate—are leading the various divisions.

A White House spokesperson did not provide comment on the timing of the president’s DOJ’s nominations.

Perhaps most importantly, the president has yet to nominate the head of the National Security Division. That division has drawn significant attention since the president tweeted on Saturday alleging then-President Barack Obama had his campaign wiretapped. Lawyers in the DOJ’s National Security Division are responsible for helping the FBI file affidavits to the secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which provides the legal authorization for surveillance of U.S. persons. And the assistant attorney general for the National Security Division usually signs off on those affidavits. But since that person hasn’t been named yet, any legal surveillance requests have to be signed off by Attorney General Jeff Sessions.

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