Trump Says He’s Dropping Controversial Nominee Ed Martin

WASHINGTON ― President Donald Trump said Thursday that he’s dropping his controversial pick for U.S. attorney in D.C., Ed Martin.

“We have somebody else that will be great,” Trump told reporters at the White House. “I was disappointed. A lot of people were disappointed, but that’s the way it works sometimes.”

It’s an early defeat for Trump, though Martin’s nomination was already looking like it was over. Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) said Tuesday that he wouldn’t support him in the Senate Judiciary Committee. It only takes one Republican in the committee to sink a nominee, assuming all Democrats vote no. In this case, they were all certainly going to oppose Martin, given his extreme background.

Martin, a far-right MAGA supporter who previously had no prosecutorial experience, has been serving as the interim U.S. attorney for D.C. since Trump appointed him to the temporary post in January. He’s essentially spent the last few months proving his fealty to Trump: He fired more than a dozen federal prosecutors involved in criminal cases tied to the Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection. He dropped cases against Jan. 6 defendants. He launched probes into Trump’s political enemies.

Time was running out for Martin to get confirmed before his interim post expires on May 20. After that, judges on the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia can appoint someone else to the spot until the Senate confirms someone. They would not have picked Martin.

Trump suggested he was too busy with other things to keep fighting to try to get Martin confirmed. He said he plans to announce someone else for the job in the next two days.

“I have so many different things that I’m doing now, with the trade, you know,” he told reporters. “One person, I can only make – boom – I can only lift that little phone so many times in a day.”

Tillis said he specifically opposed Martin because he was nominated to be U.S. attorney in the district where the Jan. 6 insurrection happened ― where Martin was dropping cases against people who participated in it.

“I’m thinking about future January 6ths,” Tillis told HuffPost earlier this week. “If there is, we got to make it very clear, you come into the Capitol, you’re going to get fined. You’re going to prison. You made a bad mistake.”

His comments appeared to leave the door open to him potentially supporting Martin in a different role, and on Thursday, Trump suggested he has other plans for Martin.

“Hopefully we can bring him into, whether it’s [the Justice Department] or whatever, in some capacity,” the president said.

Progressive advocacy groups, which have been loudly opposing Martin’s nomination to this job, signaled they’ll be keeping an eye on him going forward.

“Ed Martin is a grave threat to civil liberties and the rule of law, so any news indicating that he will no longer be President Trump’s legal pointman in D.C. is good news for the nation,” Emily Peterson-Cassin, director of corporate power at Demand Progress, said in a statement.

“But this threat is far from over,” she said. “Martin’s long, documented history of shamelessly playing politics with the rule of law should disqualify him from working anywhere in government, let alone the Justice Department. We call on President Trump to keep Martin far away from any position of power.”