A GOP U.S. Attorney Does the Right Thing in Eric Adams' Corruption Case

 https://www.usnews.com/opinion/articles/2025-02-14/nyc-mayor-eric-adams-danielle-sassoon

The standoff over an administration seeking to use the Justice Department for political ends is an even more alarming transgression than President Richard Nixon’s interference with the Justice Department during the Watergate scandal more than 50 years ago.

These early actions by Trump’s appointees are alarming. As Robert Jackson, who served as President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s attorney general before he joined the Supreme Court, warned, “The most dangerous power of a prosecutor … [is] that he will pick people that he thinks he should get, rather than pick cases that need to be prosecuted.”

Trump and his Justice Department appointees are eviscerating a nonpartisan workforce that is essential to preserving the rule of law. By firing government lawyers, pressuring others and intimidating those who remain, Trump is seeking to stack the government with lawyers who will be beholden to him personally and who will do his bidding.

The order from Washington to stop the prosecution of Adams reveals a worrisome effort to create a compliant corps of government lawyers who can wield the threat of prosecution (or the promise of dropping charges) to enforce a party boss’s will. If his case is dropped, Adams is no longer beholden to New York City voters but rather to Trump. The same could occur with corporations, wealthy individuals and other officials.

The best hope is that lower-level lawyers will follow the lead of principled prosecutors like Sassoon by doing their jobs in the tradition that Robert Jackson articulated so well. That means declining to follow directions that are improper and resigning in protest if necessary.