United States Attorney General | |
---|---|
United States Department of Justice | |
Style | Mr. Attorney General (informal) The Honorable (formal) |
Member of | Cabinet National Security Council Homeland Security Council |
Reports to | President |
Seat | Robert F. Kennedy Department of Justice Building Washington, D.C. |
Appointer | President with Senate advice and consent |
Term length | No fixed term |
Constituting instrument | 28 U.S.C. § 503 |
Formation | September 26, 1789 |
First holder | Edmund Randolph |
Succession | Seventh [1] |
Deputy | Deputy Attorney General |
Salary | Executive Schedule, Level I [2] |
Website | www |
The United States attorney general (AG) is the head of the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) and is the chief law enforcement officer of the federal government of the United States. The attorney general serves as the principal advisor to the president of the United States on all legal matters. The attorney general is a statutory member of the Cabinet of the United States.
Under the Appointments Clause of the United States Constitution, the officeholder is nominated by the president of the United States, then appointed with the advice and consent of the United States Senate. The attorney general is supported by the Office of the Attorney General, which includes executive staff and several deputies.
Merrick Garland has been the United States attorney general since March 11, 2021. [3] [4]
On November 21, 2024, President-elect Donald Trump named former Florida attorney general Pam Bondi as his nominee to run the Justice Department. [5]
The title, "attorney general" is an example of a noun (attorney) followed by a postpositive adjective (general). [6] "General" is a description of the type of attorney, not a title or rank in itself (as it would be in the military). [6] Even though the attorney general (and the similarly titled solicitor general) is occasionally referred to as "General" or "General [last name]" by senior government officials, this is considered incorrect in standard American English usage. [6] [7] For the same reason, the correct American English plural form is "attorneys general" rather than "attorney generals". [7]
Congress passed the Judiciary Act of 1789 which, among other things, established the Office of the Attorney General. The original duties of this officer were "to prosecute and conduct all suits in the Supreme Court in which the United States shall be concerned, and to give his advice and opinion upon questions of law when required by the president of the United States, or when requested by the heads of any of the departments". [8] Some of these duties have since been transferred to the United States solicitor general and the White House counsel.
The Department of Justice was established in 1870 to support the attorneys general in the discharge of their responsibilities.
The secretary of state, the secretary of the treasury, the secretary of defense, and the attorney general are regarded as the four most important Cabinet officials in the United States because of the size and importance of their respective departments. [9]
Attorney General is a Level I position in the Executive Schedule, [2] thus earning a salary of US$221,400, as of January 2021. [10]
It is the practice for the attorney general, along with the other Cabinet secretaries and high-level political appointees of the president, to tender a resignation with effect on the Inauguration Day (January 20) of a new president. The deputy attorney general is also expected to tender a resignation, but is commonly requested to stay on and act as the attorney general pending the confirmation by the Senate of the new attorney general.
For example, upon the inauguration of President Donald Trump on January 20, 2017, then-Attorney General Loretta Lynch left her position, so then-Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates, who had also tendered her resignation, was asked to stay on to serve as the acting attorney general until the confirmation of the new attorney general Jeff Sessions, who had been nominated for the office in November 2016 by then-President-elect Donald Trump. [11] [a]
Federalist (4) Democratic-Republican (5) Democratic (34) Whig (4) Republican (40)
No. | Portrait | Name | State of residence | Took office | Left office | President(s) | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Edmund Randolph | Virginia | September 26, 1789 | January 26, 1794 | George Washington (1789–1797) | ||
2 | William Bradford | Pennsylvania | January 27, 1794 | August 23, 1795 | |||
3 | Charles Lee | Virginia | December 10, 1795 | February 19, 1801 | |||
John Adams (1797–1801) | |||||||
4 | Levi Lincoln Sr. | Massachusetts | March 5, 1801 | March 2, 1805 | Thomas Jefferson (1801–1809) | ||
5 | John Breckinridge | Kentucky | August 7, 1805 | December 14, 1806 | |||
6 | Caesar Augustus Rodney | Delaware | January 20, 1807 | December 10, 1811 | |||
James Madison (1809–1817) | |||||||
7 | William Pinkney | Maryland | December 11, 1811 | February 9, 1814 | |||
8 | Richard Rush | Pennsylvania | February 10, 1814 | November 12, 1817 | |||
9 | William Wirt | Virginia | November 13, 1817 | March 4, 1829 | James Monroe (1817–1825) | ||
John Quincy Adams (1825–1829) | |||||||
10 | John Macpherson Berrien | Georgia | March 9, 1829 | July 19, 1831 | Andrew Jackson (1829–1837) | ||
11 | Roger B. Taney | Maryland | July 20, 1831 | November 14, 1833 | |||
12 | Benjamin Franklin Butler | New York | November 15, 1833 | July 4, 1838 | |||
Martin Van Buren (1837–1841) | |||||||
13 | Felix Grundy | Tennessee | July 5, 1838 | January 10, 1840 | |||
14 | Henry D. Gilpin | Pennsylvania | January 11, 1840 | March 4, 1841 | |||
15 | John J. Crittenden 1st term | Kentucky | March 5, 1841 | September 12, 1841 | William Henry Harrison (1841) | ||
John Tyler (1841–1845) | |||||||
16 | Hugh S. Legaré | South Carolina | September 13, 1841 | June 20, 1843 | |||
17 | John Nelson | Maryland | July 1, 1843 | March 4, 1845 | |||
18 | John Y. Mason | Virginia | March 5, 1845 | October 16, 1846 | James K. Polk (1845–1849) | ||
19 | Nathan Clifford | Maine | October 17, 1846 | March 17, 1848 | |||
20 | Isaac Toucey | Connecticut | June 21, 1848 | March 4, 1849 | |||
21 | Reverdy Johnson | Maryland | March 8, 1849 | July 21, 1850 | Zachary Taylor (1849–1850) | ||
22 | John J. Crittenden 2nd term | Kentucky | July 22, 1850 | March 4, 1853 | Millard Fillmore (1850–1853) | ||
23 | Caleb Cushing | Massachusetts | March 7, 1853 | March 4, 1857 | Franklin Pierce (1853–1857) | ||
24 | Jeremiah S. Black | Pennsylvania | March 6, 1857 | December 16, 1860 | James Buchanan (1857–1861) | ||
25 | Edwin Stanton | Pennsylvania | December 20, 1860 | March 4, 1861 | |||
26 | Edward Bates | Missouri | March 5, 1861 | November 24, 1864 | Abraham Lincoln (1861–1865) | ||
27 | James Speed | Kentucky | December 2, 1864 | July 22, 1866 | |||
Andrew Johnson (1865–1869) | |||||||
28 | Henry Stanbery | Ohio | July 23, 1866 | July 16, 1868 | |||
29 | William M. Evarts | New York | July 17, 1868 | March 4, 1869 | |||
30 | Ebenezer R. Hoar | Massachusetts | March 5, 1869 | November 22, 1870 | Ulysses S. Grant (1869–1877) | ||
31 | Amos T. Akerman | Georgia | November 23, 1870 | December 13, 1871 | |||
32 | George Henry Williams | Oregon | December 14, 1871 | April 25, 1875 | |||
33 | Edwards Pierrepont | New York | April 26, 1875 | May 21, 1876 | |||
34 | Alphonso Taft | Ohio | May 22, 1876 | March 4, 1877 | |||
35 | Charles Devens | Massachusetts | March 12, 1877 | March 4, 1881 | Rutherford B. Hayes (1877–1881) | ||
36 | Wayne MacVeagh | Pennsylvania | March 5, 1881 | December 15, 1881 | James A. Garfield (1881) | ||
Chester A. Arthur (1881–1885) | |||||||
37 | Benjamin H. Brewster | Pennsylvania | December 16, 1881 | March 4, 1885 | |||
38 | Augustus Garland | Arkansas | March 6, 1885 | March 4, 1889 | Grover Cleveland (1885–1889) | ||
39 | William H. H. Miller | Indiana | March 7, 1889 | March 4, 1893 | Benjamin Harrison (1889–1893) | ||
40 | Richard Olney | Massachusetts | March 6, 1893 | April 7, 1895 | Grover Cleveland (1893–1897) | ||
41 | Judson Harmon | Ohio | April 8, 1895 | March 4, 1897 | |||
42 | Joseph McKenna | California | March 5, 1897 | January 25, 1898 | William McKinley (1897–1901) | ||
43 | John W. Griggs | New Jersey | January 25, 1898 | March 29, 1901 | |||
44 | Philander C. Knox | Pennsylvania | April 5, 1901 | June 30, 1904 | |||
Theodore Roosevelt (1901–1909) | |||||||
45 | William Henry Moody | Massachusetts | July 1, 1904 | December 17, 1906 | |||
46 | Charles Bonaparte | Maryland | December 17, 1906 | March 4, 1909 | |||
47 | George W. Wickersham | New York | March 4, 1909 | March 4, 1913 | William Howard Taft (1909–1913) | ||
48 | James McReynolds | Tennessee | March 5, 1913 | August 29, 1914 | Woodrow Wilson (1913–1921) | ||
49 | Thomas Watt Gregory | Texas | August 29, 1914 | March 4, 1919 | |||
50 | A. Mitchell Palmer | Pennsylvania | March 5, 1919 | March 4, 1921 | |||
51 | Harry M. Daugherty | Ohio | March 4, 1921 | April 6, 1924 | Warren G. Harding (1921–1923) | ||
Calvin Coolidge (1923–1929) | |||||||
52 | Harlan F. Stone | New York | April 7, 1924 | March 1, 1925 | |||
53 | John G. Sargent | Vermont | March 7, 1925 | March 4, 1929 | |||
54 | William D. Mitchell | Minnesota | March 4, 1929 | March 4, 1933 | Herbert Hoover (1929–1933) | ||
55 | Homer Stille Cummings | Connecticut | March 4, 1933 | January 1, 1939 | Franklin D. Roosevelt (1933–1945) | ||
56 | Frank Murphy | Michigan | January 2, 1939 | January 18, 1940 | |||
57 | Robert H. Jackson | New York | January 18, 1940 | August 25, 1941 | |||
58 | Francis Biddle | Pennsylvania | August 26, 1941 | June 26, 1945 | Harry S. Truman (1945–1953) | ||
59 | Tom C. Clark | Texas | June 27, 1945 | July 26, 1949 | |||
60 | J. Howard McGrath | Rhode Island | July 27, 1949 | April 3, 1952 | |||
61 | James P. McGranery | Pennsylvania | April 4, 1952 | January 20, 1953 | |||
62 | Herbert Brownell Jr. | New York | January 21, 1953 | October 23, 1957 | Dwight D. Eisenhower (1953–1961) | ||
63 | William P. Rogers | New York | October 23, 1957 | January 20, 1961 | |||
64 | Robert F. Kennedy | Massachusetts | January 20, 1961 | September 3, 1964 | John F. Kennedy (1961–1963) | ||
Lyndon B. Johnson (1963–1969) | |||||||
65 | Nicholas Katzenbach | Illinois | September 4, 1964 [b] | January 28, 1965 | |||
January 28, 1965 | November 28, 1966 | ||||||
66 | Ramsey Clark | Texas | November 28, 1966 [b] | March 10, 1967 | |||
March 10, 1967 | January 20, 1969 | ||||||
67 | John N. Mitchell | New York | January 20, 1969 | February 15, 1972 | Richard Nixon (1969–1974) | ||
68 | Richard Kleindienst | Arizona | February 15, 1972 | April 30, 1973 [13] | |||
69 | Elliot Richardson | Massachusetts | May 25, 1973 [13] | October 20, 1973 | |||
– | Robert Bork [c] Acting | Pennsylvania | October 20, 1973 | January 4, 1974 | |||
70 | William B. Saxbe | Ohio | January 4, 1974 | February 2, 1975 | |||
Gerald Ford (1974–1977) | |||||||
71 | Edward H. Levi | Illinois | February 2, 1975 | January 20, 1977 | |||
– | Dick Thornburgh [d] Acting | Pennsylvania | January 20, 1977 | January 26, 1977 | Jimmy Carter (1977–1981) | ||
72 | Griffin Bell | Georgia | January 26, 1977 | August 16, 1979 | |||
73 | Benjamin Civiletti | Maryland | August 16, 1979 | January 19, 1981 | |||
74 | William French Smith | California | January 23, 1981 | February 25, 1985 | Ronald Reagan (1981–1989) | ||
75 | Edwin Meese | California | February 25, 1985 | August 12, 1988 | |||
76 | Dick Thornburgh | Pennsylvania | August 12, 1988 | August 15, 1991 | |||
George H. W. Bush (1989–1993) | |||||||
77 | William Barr 1st term | Virginia | August 16, 1991 [b] | November 26, 1991 | |||
November 26, 1991 | January 20, 1993 | ||||||
– | Stuart M. Gerson [e] Acting | Washington, D.C. | January 20, 1993 | March 12, 1993 | Bill Clinton (1993–2001) | ||
78 | Janet Reno | Florida | March 12, 1993 | January 20, 2001 | |||
– | Eric Holder [f] Acting | Washington, D.C. | January 20, 2001 | February 2, 2001 | George W. Bush (2001–2009) | ||
79 | John Ashcroft | Missouri | February 2, 2001 | February 3, 2005 | |||
80 | Alberto Gonzales | Texas | February 3, 2005 | September 17, 2007 | |||
– | Paul Clement [g] Acting | Washington, D.C. | September 17, 2007 | September 18, 2007 | |||
– | Peter Keisler [g] Acting | Washington, D.C. | September 18, 2007 | November 9, 2007 | |||
81 | Michael Mukasey | New York | November 9, 2007 | January 20, 2009 | |||
– | Mark Filip Acting | Illinois | January 20, 2009 | February 3, 2009 | Barack Obama (2009–2017) | ||
82 | Eric Holder | Washington, D.C. | February 3, 2009 | April 27, 2015 | |||
83 | Loretta Lynch | New York | April 27, 2015 | January 20, 2017 | |||
– | Sally Yates [h] Acting | Georgia | January 20, 2017 | January 30, 2017 | Donald Trump (2017–2021) | ||
– | Dana Boente Acting | Virginia | January 30, 2017 | February 9, 2017 | |||
84 | Jeff Sessions | Alabama | February 9, 2017 | November 7, 2018 | |||
– | Rod Rosenstein Acting [i] | Maryland | November 7, 2018 | November 7, 2018 | |||
– | Matthew Whitaker Acting [j] | Iowa | November 7, 2018 | February 14, 2019 | |||
85 | William Barr 2nd term | Virginia | February 14, 2019 | December 23, 2020 | |||
– | Jeffrey A. Rosen Acting | Massachusetts | December 24, 2020 | January 20, 2021 | |||
– | John Demers Acting [k] | Massachusetts | January 20, 2021 | January 20, 2021 | Joe Biden (2021–2025) | ||
– | Monty Wilkinson Acting | Washington, D.C. | January 20, 2021 | March 11, 2021 | |||
86 | Merrick Garland | Maryland | March 11, 2021 | Incumbent |
U.S.C. Title 28, §508 establishes the first two positions in the line of succession, while allowing the attorney general to designate other high-ranking officers of the Department of Justice as subsequent successors. [28] Furthermore, an Executive Order defines subsequent positions, the most recent from March 31, 2017, signed by President Donald Trump. [29] The current line of succession is:
The solicitor general of the United States, the fourth-highest-ranking official within the United States Department of Justice (DOJ), represents the federal government in cases before the Supreme Court of the United States. The solicitor general is appointed by the president and reports directly to the United States attorney general.
The Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) is an office in the United States Department of Justice that supports the attorney general in their role as legal adviser to the president and all executive branch agencies. It drafts legal opinions of the attorney general and provides its own written opinions and other advice in response to requests from the counsel to the president, the various agencies of the executive branch, and other components of the Department of Justice. The office reviews and comments on the constitutionality of pending legislation. The office reviews any executive orders and substantive proclamations for legality if the president proposes them. All proposed orders of the attorney general and regulations that require the attorney general's approval are reviewed. It also performs a variety of special assignments referred by the attorney general or the deputy attorney general.
The director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation is the head of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, a United States federal law enforcement agency, and is responsible for its day-to-day operations. The FBI director is appointed for a single 10-year term by the president of the United States and confirmed by the Senate. The FBI is an agency within the Department of Justice (DOJ), and thus the director reports to the attorney general of the United States.
Matthew George Whitaker is an American lawyer, lobbyist and politician who served as acting United States attorney general from November 2018 to February 2019. He was appointed to that position by President Donald Trump after Jeff Sessions resigned at Trump's request. Whitaker had previously served as Chief of Staff for Jeff Sessions from October 2017 to November 2018.
Patrick F. Philbin is an American lawyer who served as Deputy Counsel to the President and Deputy Assistant to the President in the Office of White House Counsel in the Donald J. Trump administration. He previously served in the Department of Justice during the George W. Bush administration.
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Steven Gill Bradbury is an American lawyer and government official who served as the General Counsel of the United States Department of Transportation. He previously served as Acting Assistant Attorney General from 2005 to 2007 and Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General from 2004 to 2009, heading the Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) in the U.S. Department of Justice during President George W. Bush's second term.
Stuart Michael Gerson is an American politician who served as the acting United States Attorney General during the Clinton Administration, serving in the early months of 1993.
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Dana James Boente ( Bent-Ë) is an American attorney who served as General Counsel of the FBI from January 2018 to 2020, United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia from September 2013 to January 2018, and as the Acting United States Attorney General from January to February 2017. He also served as acting assistant attorney general for the National Security Division of the United States Department of Justice. On October 27, 2017, Boente announced he would resign from the Department of Justice after a successor is in place. On January 23, 2018, Boente was named general counsel to the FBI by the director Christopher A. Wray, filling the vacancy after James Baker's reassignment to another part of the bureau.
Executive Order 13775 is the eleventh executive order signed by U.S. President Donald Trump. Signed on February 9, 2017, the order changes the line of succession for the Department of Justice (DOJ). This order specifically reverses changes made to the DOJ line of succession that former President Barack Obama made in executive order 13762.
Steven Andrew Engel is an American lawyer. He served as the United States assistant attorney general for the Office of Legal Counsel in the first Trump administration. Engel, who previously worked in the George W. Bush administration as deputy assistant attorney general in the Office of Legal Counsel, was nominated by President Donald Trump on January 31, 2017, and confirmed on November 7, 2017.
Noel John Francisco is an American lawyer who served as Solicitor General of the United States from 2017 to 2020. He was the first Asian American confirmed by the United States Senate to hold the position. Francisco is now a partner at the law firm Jones Day.
Jeffrey Adam Rosen is an American lawyer who served as acting United States attorney general from December 2020 to January 2021 and as United States deputy attorney general from 2019 to 2020. Before joining the Department of Justice, he was a senior partner at the law firm Kirkland & Ellis and was the United States deputy secretary of transportation.
Makan Delrahim is an Iranian-American attorney and lobbyist. From 2017 to 2021, Delrahim served under President Donald Trump as Assistant Attorney General for the Department of Justice Antitrust Division.
Jeffrey Bossert Clark is an American lawyer who was Assistant Attorney General for the Environment and Natural Resources Division from 2018 to 2021. In September 2020, he was also appointed acting head of the Civil Division. In 2020 and 2021, Clark allegedly helped then-president Donald Trump attempt to overturn the 2020 presidential election. Clark's actions in that endeavor were reviewed by the District of Columbia Bar – the entity authorized by law to pursue attorney discipline and disbarment in the District of Columbia – which recommended discipline to the DC Court of Appeals in July 2022, and in August 2024 its Board on Professional Responsibility recommended a two year suspension of his law license. He was identified as an unindicted co-conspirator in the federal prosecution of Donald Trump over attempts to overturn the 2020 election. On August 14, 2023, he was indicted along with 18 other people in the prosecution related to the 2020 election in Georgia.
John Charles Demers is an Italian-born American lawyer who served as United States Assistant Attorney General for the National Security Division (NSD) from 2018 to 2021. Following the resignation of Jeffrey A. Rosen, Demers also served as acting United States Attorney General for a few hours on January 20, 2021 until President Joe Biden signed an executive order naming Monty Wilkinson as acting United States Attorney General later that day.
Brandon Joseph Fremin is an American attorney who served as the United States Attorney for the Middle District of Louisiana from 2018 to 2021.
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Richard Donoghue is an American attorney and prosecutor who served as the acting United States deputy attorney general from December 2020 to January 2021. Previously, he served as the principal associate deputy attorney general in 2020 and as United States attorney for the Eastern District of New York from 2018 to 2020. Donoghue was appointed interim U.S. Attorney by Jeff Sessions in January 2018.
Trump's new AG pick: President-elect Donald Trump has named former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi as his new pick to run the Justice Department.
As supporters of the Brady gun-control bill prepare to introduce it in Congress yet again this week, they find a welcome, if unlikely, ally in Stuart Gerson, the Acting Attorney General. Because President Clinton has had so many problems finding a new Attorney General, Mr. Gerson remains in office ...
She will replace Acting Attorney General Stuart M. Gerson, a holdover appointee from the Bush Administration. Ms. Reno said he resigned today.