JUST IN: Controversial Trump Attorney Demoted and Expected to Leave DOJ

(AP Photo/Amanda Andrade-Rhoades, File)

Ed Martin, the controversial lawyer whose nomination to serve as U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia was withdrawn by President Donald Trump after it became clear he would be voted down by the Republican-led Senate, has been demoted at the Department of Justice and is expected to leave in short order.

According to The Washington Post, Martin, who also serves as the department’s pardon attorney, has been stripped “of the bulk of his expansive responsibilities, leaving the staunch ally of President Donald Trump on the sidelines of many of the controversial investigations he has championed, according to two people familiar with the personnel move.”

“Martin will no longer chair the department’s Weaponization Working Group, which was tasked with reviewing special counsel Jack Smith’s prosecutions of Trump and other perceived examples of ‘prosecutorial abuse,’ according to the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a personnel move that has not been made public,” reported the Post, which added that his office has been moved out of DOJ headquarters.

CNN, meanwhile, reported that Martin is “expected to leave the department in the coming weeks.”

Martin was a key figured in the “Stop the Steal” movement, which claimed that Trump had actually won the 2024 presidential election, and subsequently helped raise money for criminal defendants associated with the January 6 Capitol riot.

The 55-year-old was widely criticized last February for using the official X account for the D.C. U.S. attorney’s office — he was serving in the office in an interim capacity at the time — to declare that “As President Trumps’ [sic] lawyers, we are proud to fight to protect his leadership as our President and we are vigilant in standing against entities like the AP that refuse to put America first.”

https://twittter.com/USAO_DC/status/1894119675786621225?s=20

“I’m sounding the alarm. I’m sounding the alarm bells here, and I don’t do that often. Ed Martin brings a toxic blend of traits to the job,” remarked CNN’s Elie Honig at the time. “Most problematically, he is explicitly political. He is bringing a political agenda to seek out and seek vengeance on those who have wronged Donald Trump and Elon Musk.”

This is a developing story.

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