Acting New Jersey U.S. Attorney Alina Habba blamed Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) on Thursday for some of her struggles to keep her job due to his refusal to end a bipartisan tradition on judicial nominees.
Habba said during an appearance on Fox News that Grassley had helped stall her nomination “by holding up a traditional blue slip, not a law, and not allowing a lot of the president’s picks to go through and be voted on by Senate.”
The “blue slip” refers to a practice that allows senators from the minority party to essentially veto nominees for U.S. attorney and district court judges from their home state. Because both of the state’s Democratic senators — Sens. Cory Booker (D-NJ) and Andy Kim (D-NJ) — oppose Habba’s nomination, it was doomed for failure due to the power of the blue slips.
As the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, Grassley holds power over changing the blue slip policy and advancing judicial nominations, including Habba, whom President Donald Trump tapped to be New Jersey’s permanent chief prosecutor last month.
Grassley drew Trump’s ire last month when he refused the president’s request to do away with the Senate Judiciary Committee’s blue slip tradition. The president argued Democrats have used the provision to block “Great Republican candidates.”
Habba’s nomination has now become mired in court battles amid the Senate process, leading her to blame Grassley, Booker, and Kim for holding up her confirmation.
“I was the nominee to become the U.S. attorney. And Cory Booker and Andy Kim — who I have never, to this day, spoken to in my life, despite my attempts to meet them — have truly, truly done us a disservice,” Habba said.
“And frankly, same with Sen. Grassley by holding up a traditional blue slip, not a law, and not allowing a lot of the president’s picks to go through and be voted on by Senate,” she added. “I didn’t even get to that point.”
”[They] have truly done us a disservice by … not allowing a lot of the president’s picks to go through and be voted on by [the] Senate,” she concluded.
Habba was first appointed to the position on an interim basis in March. On July 1, roughly three weeks before her 120-day term was set to end on July 26, Trump nominated her to serve in the capacity on a permanent basis.
Confirmation of the full-time appointment required approval either by the Senate or New Jersey’s U.S. District Court judges. As the Senate continued to stall judicial nominations, the matter went to the district court, where judges on July 22 blocked Habba’s appointment and named Desiree Leigh Grace as the state’s new full-time chief prosecutor.
The Trump administration, led by Attorney General Pam Bondi, promptly removed Grace from office, accusing “politically minded” judges of “threatening the President’s core Article II powers.” Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche alleged the judges’ actions amounted to a “backroom vote” and that they were “colluding” with New Jersey lawmakers in an attempt to “override the authority of the Chief Executive.”
Days later, Bondi announced a technical workaround to the legal disputes that hinged on the White House withdrawing her Senate nomination and appointing her “first assistant,” a position that allows her to essentially remain New Jersey’s interim lead prosecutor.
On Thursday, U.S. District Judge Matthew Brann ruled that the Trump administration’s maneuvering exceeded legal bounds and that she had been serving without legal authority since July 1.
Bondi pledged to appeal Brann’s ruling, praising Habba for doing “incredible work in New Jersey,” and to “protect her position from activist judicial attacks.”
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Habba pledged to battle to the end.
”We will not fall to rogue judges, we will not fall to people trying to be political when they should just be doing their job: respecting the president,” she said during her Fox News interview.
