Alina Habba, ex-Trump lawyer and media personality, chosen as NJ federal prosecutor
President Donald Trump selected his former personal defense lawyer Alina Habba, a pro-Trump media personality who was repeatedly chided last year by a judge who believed she didn't understand trial evidentiary rules, to serve as interim U.S. attorney for the District of New Jersey.
"Alina will lead with the same diligence and conviction that has defined her career, and she will fight tirelessly to secure a Legal System that is both 'Fair and Just' for the wonderful people of New Jersey," Trump said in a Truth Social post announcing his selection.
Trump's current U.S. attorney in New Jersey, John Giordano, who was appointed by Attorney General Pam Bondi and sworn in only on March 3, will be nominated to serve as the ambassador to Namibia, Trump said. Unlike Habba, Giordano has significant experience as a federal government litigator, including serving as an assistant attorney general on environmental issues and as a prosecutor in a Virginia U.S. attorney’s office.
Habba is currently serving as counselor to the president. Speaking to reporters outside the White House Monday, she emphasized her personal ties to New Jersey, where she was born and is now raising her children, and said she would be "cleaning up" what she said was a mess tied to state Democrats such as U.S. Sen. Cory Booker and Gov. Phil Murphy.
"There is corruption, there is injustice and there is a heavy amount of crime right in Cory Booker’s backyard and right under Gov. Murphy, and that will stop," Habba said.
Habba declined to answer when asked why it's an interim appointment or how long the appointment is for.
Habba was questioned on her trial skills
Habba has built an increasing media profile, frequently appearing on FOX News to defend both the Trump administration and Trump personally.
She made headlines in February when she described herself as a "big fan" of Andrew Tate, who has characterized himself as a misogynist and been charged with rape and human trafficking by Romanian authorities. Tate has denied the charges. Habba later appeared to revise her stance on Tate, saying he faces "stomach-churning" accusations that a court should handle.
The New Jersey native sometimes appeared theatrical when representing Trump in court in the past couple years. When she was making a closing argument in Trump's civil fraud trial in early 2024, she turned away from the judge several times to address the courtroom onlookers in the public seating area. Lawyers typically address either a judge or a jury during those remarks.
Also in early 2024, while representing Trump in a trial against E. Jean Carroll, federal Judge Lewis Kaplan repeatedly chided or reproached Habba in ways that suggested he doubted her trial skills.
"It's evidence 101," Kaplan said to Habba at one point, as he explained why a question she asked a witness was improper.
"This is not my law school examination," Kaplan told Habba another time, after she asked him to explain why he sustained an objection from Carroll's legal team to one of her questions.
Habba one of many ex-Trump defense lawyers in new administration
Habba is at least the fifth former Trump defense lawyer to be chosen for positions in his new administration.
Habba represented Trump in his New York civil fraud case, in which he was ordered to pay hundreds of millions of dollars after a state judge concluded he fraudulently inflated the value of his assets to get better loan terms for years. Trump has appealed that judgment.
Habba also represented Trump in his second trial with New York writer E. Jean Carroll, in which a jury determined Trump should pay Carroll $83.3 million in compensatory and punitive damages for defaming her after she accused him of sexually assaulting her in a dressing room in the 1990s. Trump has appealed the judgment.
Attorney General Pam Bondi represented Trump during his first impeachment trial, in which he was acquitted by the Senate in a vote largely on party lines over whether he withheld aid to Ukraine in an abuse of power to pressure its government to investigate Joe Biden.
Trump has chosen two of his defense attorneys from his New York criminal trial, Todd Blanche and Emil Bove, for the number two and number three spots at the Justice Department, under Bondi. And he has nominated his frequent appellate litigator John Sauer as U.S. solicitor general, a role that involves representing the presidential administration at the Supreme Court.
'We’re going to do a bang-up job'
Habba said Monday that, as the interim New Jersey U.S. attorney, she planned to go after "the people that we should be going after, not the people that are falsely accused."
Asked by the media who precisely she planned to target and whether it would be politicians, she said people would see when she gets there, but complained about the state's Democratic Sen. Cory Booker and Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy, claiming they had "failed the state."
"If you look at what happened in crime, at what’s going on in Newark, what’s going on in Camden, this has been a neglected state," Habba said.
"We’re going to do a bang-up job. I cannot wait," she added.