By MICHAEL KUNZELMAN
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump said Thursday that he is naming Fox News host Jeanine Pirro, a former county prosecutor and elected judge, to be the top federal prosecutor for the nation’s capital after abandoning his first pick for the job.
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Pirro, who joined Fox News in 2006, co-hosts the network’s show “The Five” on weekday evenings. She was elected as a judge in New York’s Westchester County Court in 1990 before serving three terms as the county’s elected district attorney.
Trump tapped Pirro to at least temporarily lead the nation’s largest U.S. Attorney’s office after pulling his nomination of conservative activist Ed Martin Jr. for the position. Trump withdrew Martin from consideration after a key Republican senator said he could not support Martin for the job due to his defense of rioters who stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
“He’s a terrific person, and he wasn’t getting the support from people that I thought,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office on Thursday. He later added: “But we have somebody else that will be great.”
Broadcaster Jeanine Pirro attends the Paley Center for Media’s 2024 Paley Honors at Cipriani 42nd Street on Thursday, June 13, 2024, in New York. (Photo by Andy Kropa/Invision/AP)
Pirro is the latest in a string of Trump appointments coming from Fox News — a list that includes Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who co-hosted “Fox & Friends Weekend.”
Martin has served as acting U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia since Trump’s first week in office. But his hopes of keeping the job faded amid questions about his qualifications and background. Martin had never served as a prosecutor or tried a case before taking office in January.