Obama's U.S. Attorneys

The Baltimore Sun has an interesting article this morning about how the Obama Administration is handling the selection of U.S. Attorneys.  Although centered around the U.S. Attorney for the District of Maryland, there’s quite a bit of information applicable across the board:

“We have made the determination that we are not going to replace wholesale all of the U.S. attorneys in the way that was done, I guess, in the Clinton administration,” [Attorney General Eric] Holder told an audience of [state] attorneys general. Two or three districts have been told they can keep their federal attorneys, he added, including Chicago’s Patrick Fitzgerald, who is prosecuting former Illinois Gov. Rod. R. Blagojevich.

The story shares, though, that nearly a third of the 93 U.S. Attorneys had resigned before Obama took office, and another 12 since.  So, this isn’t quite the difference that it might appear to be.  Additionally, they’re not saying that they’ll be keeping the 50 remaining, but just that they aren’t wholesale up and firing them.

Sounds more like a procedural change than a substantive one, at the end of the day.

Also, the article, via a senator, makes clear that the U.S. Attorneys just aren’t the focus.  The priority is on judicial vacancies: “Barbara A. Mikulski, the state’s senior senator charged with recommending judicial replacements, is focused first on filling longer-term vacancies like judgeships, per White House instructions.”

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