Roger Rogoff was sworn in as U.S. attorney for the Western District of Washington before 8 a.m. Wednesday. He was fired by email while sitting in the office lobby, before he could even meet with the first assistant U.S. attorney. The whole thing took less than an hour.
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche announced the dismissal on X, writing that the district court judges who appointed Rogoff had "abandoned the time-honored process of consultation with the administration so that the selected U.S. Attorney is qualified to serve in the administration." He added flatly: "Roger Rogoff has been fired by the President."
The firing marks the latest clash between the Trump administration and federal judges over who controls U.S. attorney vacancies, a fight that has now spread across at least five judicial districts, produced conflicting court rulings, and left major federal prosecutorial offices in legal limbo. But the speed and bluntness of Wednesday's move in Seattle raises a harder question: if federal judges appoint prosecutors the administration never asked for, what exactly did anyone expect to happen?
The Western District of Washington has not had a Senate-confirmed U.S. attorney since mid-2023, during the Biden administration. When President Trump took office in January 2025, he fired Tessa Gorman, who had been appointed to the post by district judges in May 2024. That firing was consistent with the administration's broader approach to reshaping the federal law enforcement apparatus, a pattern of removing officials across multiple agencies to align personnel with the president's priorities.
After Gorman's removal, the administration tapped Charles Neil Floyd, the first assistant U.S. attorney, as an interim replacement. Under 28 U.S.C. § 546, the attorney general may appoint an interim U.S. attorney, but that appointment expires after 120 days. Floyd's clock ran out in February.
Once the interim appointment lapses, federal law gives district court judges the authority to appoint their own U.S. attorney to serve until the Senate confirms a permanent replacement. The court in Seattle announced in January that it intended to exercise that authority. And on July 15, all 17 active and senior judges in the district, appointed by five different presidents, unanimously selected Roger Rogoff.
Their appointment order highlighted Rogoff's "deep ties" to the region and said he had "devoted his career to serving its citizens." His résumé backed that up: local and federal prosecutor, judge on the King County Superior Court, and director of the Washington State Office of Independent Investigation.
None of it mattered. The president fired him the next morning.
Blanche's post on X was characteristically direct. "District court judges can appoint a temporary U.S. Attorney, and POTUS can fire them," he wrote. The legal logic is straightforward: the statute gives judges appointment power when a vacancy persists, but it does not strip the president of his constitutional authority to remove executive branch officers. The president's removal power over U.S. attorneys is well established and has been exercised by administrations of both parties.
The administration's complaint is not that the judges lacked statutory authority to appoint someone. It is that they did so without consulting the executive branch on whether the appointee was someone the administration could work with. Blanche called this a departure from "the time-honored process of consultation." Whether or not that consultation is legally required, skipping it guaranteed a collision.
And the collision came fast. Fox News reported that Blanche announced the firing on X while simultaneously testifying at his own Senate confirmation hearing, a detail that underscores both the administration's confidence in its legal position and its willingness to move without hesitation.
Seattle is not an isolated case. The Trump administration has been engaged in similar disputes over U.S. attorney appointments in New Jersey, northern New York, Nevada, and the Eastern District of Virginia. In several of those districts, federal judges ruled that Trump-appointed acting U.S. attorneys were not validly serving.
In New Jersey, the administration appointed Alina Habba, described as Trump's personal lawyer, as interim U.S. attorney. Judges there declined to keep her. At least one federal appeals court agreed, ruling that she was serving unlawfully. In Albany, New York, judges similarly declined to retain John Sarcone, another Trump appointee. In both cases, the administration maneuvered to keep its chosen prosecutors in place under a different federal law.
The most consequential fallout came in the Eastern District of Virginia. There, Lindsey Halligan, another personal defense lawyer for the president, was appointed interim U.S. attorney. A federal judge concluded her appointment was invalid and dismissed criminal charges against former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James. The Justice Department has appealed that ruling, and several other appeals courts are now considering the legality of U.S. attorney appointments in their own jurisdictions.
The legal landscape remains unsettled. But the administration's core position, that the president retains the power to fire U.S. attorneys regardless of who appointed them, has not been overturned by any final appellate ruling described in available reporting.
Washington Senator Patty Murray wasted no time. In a statement, she called Rogoff "eminently qualified" and said he "should have never been fired."
"This administration doesn't want to deal with advice and consent, they just want to install cronies to carry out a corrupt political agenda."
Murray also said "the people of Washington state deserve someone in this role who will enforce the law fairly and responsibly, not some Trump administration sock puppet." The rhetoric was sharp, but it danced around a basic fact: the reason the Western District of Washington has no Senate-confirmed U.S. attorney is that nobody, not the Biden administration, not the Trump administration, has successfully shepherded a nominee through the confirmation process since mid-2023.
That is a three-year vacancy. Three years in which the Senate, the institution Murray belongs to, has failed to fulfill its advice-and-consent role. If the vacancy is the root cause of the standoff, then the Senate shares the blame, regardless of which party controls the chamber or the White House.
Trump has not yet announced a nominee for the position. That silence is worth noting. If the administration wants to end the cycle of court appointments and swift firings, the straightforward path is to nominate someone and let the Senate do its job. Until that happens, the standoff will continue, and the district's federal law enforcement will keep operating under a cloud of uncertainty, the kind of institutional friction that benefits no one except those who prefer dysfunction to accountability.
The New York Post reported that Rogoff is now consulting lawyers about a potential lawsuit over his firing. Whether he has standing to challenge the president's removal authority is an open question, and one that could produce yet another ruling in the growing web of litigation over U.S. attorney appointments.
Rogoff himself, in remarks reported by Breitbart, expressed gratitude for the judges' confidence in him:
"The fact that the judges of this district, most of whom I've spent my career appearing in front of, or trying cases against, or working with, believed that I was the right person to do this work is just really humbling and amazing."
That may be true. But humility and amazement do not override the president's authority over executive branch officers. If Rogoff files suit, the case will test whether 28 U.S.C. § 546 creates a protected appointment that limits the president's removal power, a question no court has definitively resolved in this context.
A federal appeals court panel had already expressed doubt about the legality of the administration's approach to the Seattle vacancy, specifically regarding Floyd's continued service after his 120-day term expired. That skepticism may have emboldened the district judges to move forward with Rogoff's appointment. But skepticism from a panel is not a final ruling, and the administration clearly calculated that firing Rogoff was worth the legal risk.
Lost in the political noise is a practical problem. The U.S. Attorney's Office in Seattle handles federal criminal prosecutions, civil enforcement, and national security cases across western Washington. It needs stable leadership. The revolving door, Gorman fired, Floyd's appointment expired, Rogoff appointed and fired within an hour, serves nobody well. Not the prosecutors in the office, not the agents who work with them, and certainly not the public that depends on federal law enforcement to function.
The administration has every right to insist on a U.S. attorney who shares its enforcement priorities. That is not overreach, it is how the executive branch works. Presidents appoint U.S. attorneys. The Senate confirms them. Judges fill gaps when the process stalls. But the gap-filling mechanism was never designed to become a permanent arrangement, and it was never designed to produce prosecutors the president cannot remove.
The judges in Seattle may have acted within the letter of the statute. But appointing someone without consulting the administration, knowing the administration's position on these appointments, was a choice that guaranteed exactly the outcome it produced. That is not a vindication of judicial independence. It is an exercise in futility that left Roger Rogoff holding a title for less time than it takes to get through airport security.
The broader power struggles between the administration and its critics will continue to play out in courtrooms and confirmation hearings. But the fix for this particular mess is simple and has been available for three years: nominate a qualified prosecutor, hold a confirmation vote, and fill the vacancy the way the Constitution intended.
Until someone actually does that, the revolving door in Seattle will keep spinning, and the only people who lose are the ones waiting for federal justice to show up and do its job.
