Live updates: Trump appoints Ed Martin to new Justice roles, including pardon attorney

Washington Post

09-05-2025

President Donald Trump has appointed Ed Martin, whom he replaced as interim U.S. attorney for D.C. on Thursday, to new roles within the Justice Department. Trump said he is moving Martin to serve as the new director of the department's 'Weaponization Working Group,' which Pam Bondi established on her first day as attorney general. Martin will also be associate deputy attorney general and pardon attorney. On Friday, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt is scheduled to brief reporters. She is likely to face questions about Trump's controversial pick to succeed Martin in the U.S. attorney's office, Fox News host Jeanine Pirro, whose misstatements about the 2020 election were cited in two defamation lawsuits against the network. Trump, meanwhile, plans to sign more executive orders Friday.
As Republicans work to pass their catchall legislation that could include cuts to Medicaid, Democrats are preparing to use the vote as a cudgel against vulnerable GOP members in midterms next year.
That is one of the takeaways from a piece The Washington Post published Friday, which examines how Republicans, aware of the political peril of cutting a program like Medicaid, have curbed their plans, while Democrats see even the flirtation with Medicaid cuts as a salient campaign attack in 2026.
President Donald Trump said he's appointing Ed Martin, whom he replaced as interim U.S. attorney for D.C. earlier Thursday, to three new roles within the Justice Department.
The president said he's moving Martin to serve as the new director of the department's 'Weaponization Working Group,' which Pam Bondi established on her first day as attorney general. He will also be appointed associate deputy attorney general and pardon attorney.
President Donald Trump on Thursday fired Carla Hayden as librarian of Congress — the first woman and first African American to hold the position. She was informed of the decision in a terse, two-sentence email.
Hayden was appointed in 2016 by President Barack Obama and her renewable 10-year term was set to expire next year. Hayden was also the first librarian by profession to be appointed to the job in decades. (Typically, historians and scholars have led the Library of Congress.)
On no issue has the clash between the Trump administration and the courts been as intense and consequential as it has been on deportations.
The administration has repeatedly flouted and possibly defied court orders. The resolutions in these cases will say a lot about how much the courts can constrain a president who is clearly trying to wield an extraordinary amount of power — and whether the United States could drift into a constitutional crisis.