Steps down is a funny way of saying she got her ass kicked out for being an unqualified hack.
this post was submitted on 23 Jan 2026
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This is why journalism is dead. I’m annoyed at reading their headline, but yours says, “Let’s read all about it!”
For being improperly appointed, but she is an unqualified hack.
Fair enough.
The article is paywalled but even in the short summary the WSJ is misreporting in favor of the Trump administration.
Halligan was not serving and did not step down because her 120-day appointment expired, and she ceased to be a US Attorney but kept impersonating one anyway. Then Bondi tried to create a "special counsel" role that did the US Attorney's job but skirted the time limit. The court rejected this and ordered Halligan to stop acting like a US Attorney, so she stopped instead of being held in contempt.
Halligan couldn't step down. She was already down. The court didn't "question her appointment." They judged she was not properly appointed. This performative action didn't "cap a fraught tenure" because her appointment was already nullified by the court.
Not surprising with a Murdoch rag, but I hate subtle propaganda like this.
MSN has a copy of the article.
Which is what the article says. Maybe don't start your critique of the article and the "rag" with an admission that you didn't even read it.
My commentary wasn't meant to be an insult to you, but it sounds like you're taking it personally? My statement wasn't an "admission," it was a disclaimer.
The comments I made continue to apply, because that is the characterization in those paragraphs. The fact that the article gives more context doesn't obviate the propaganda effect of the framing characterizations.
That said, the same issue appears in the full article:
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The federal judges of eastern Virginia didn't "question" the legitimacy of her role (4th ¶), they ruled it was illegitimate.
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Alina Habba didn't "resign" ((8th ¶) as both characterized here and in the WSJ's linked prior reporting), she was likewise an invalid appointment.
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The story also ends with a takeaway quote from Bondi making her look reasonable and sad about the departure, rather than leaving with the truth as found by the courts. That end quote has no value except to both-sides/normalize Bondi and the DOJ's contemptuous and unconstitutional conduct.
"First let me insult you, but then I'd like to say yeah I didn't read it but I was right anyway"
Vomiting your opinion without even reading the source is the reason some of us left other platforms, please stop.
Buddy, I mean you no injury as I said, but what exactly are you trying to do here?
I stated that the article was behind a paywall to disclaim, and it was to be honest. If you look at my comment history, you'll see I'm not like a Reddit karma farmer, just posting superficial headline hot takes. I tried to access the article, saw enough to comment, you responded rudely, so I did what you didn't - I reflected and thought, sure, better to see all of it, and tracked down the archive link (it's easy to include that in your post, but sure, I can look it up).
But no, after reading the article, I stand by my comments for the reasons I already gave.
I don't know who hurt you or why you're so aggressive, but you're being very belligerent, and you're digging in deeper making even more personal attacks. I mean this genuinely: what's your problem? Really don't get it.
Dude, I posted an article. You said it was trash but also that you didn't read it. I said I hate it when people already have an opinion before they read the article. Everything else is in your head
Text: Lindsey Halligan, the former Trump White House aide who went on to spearhead short-lived criminal cases against a pair of the president’s perceived adversaries, is stepping down from her Justice Department position.
Halligan’s departure was announced Tuesday night by Attorney General Pam Bondi, capping a fraught four-month tenure during which she served as the driving force behind the Justice Department’s prosecutions of former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James.
A former personal lawyer for Trump, Halligan was installed as the top federal prosecutor in eastern Virginia after her predecessor was forced out. Soon after, she almost single-handedly secured indictments against Comey and James that the president had demanded. Both cases were later dismissed by a judge who ruled she was unlawfully appointed. The Justice Department has appealed those rulings.
Her departure came as the federal judges of eastern Virginia increasingly questioned the legitimacy of her role within the Justice Department.
Earlier on Tuesday, the chief judge of the federal district court in eastern Virginia issued an order soliciting applicants to replace Halligan, noting that her interim appointment expired after 120 days and that the Senate hadn’t voted to confirm her.
Another judge separately excoriated Halligan for continuing to identify herself as U.S. attorney, despite the November ruling that found her appointment unlawful. “In short, this charade of Ms. Halligan masquerading as the United States Attorney for this District in direct defiance of binding court orders must come to an end,” wrote Judge David Novak, a Trump appointee who was confirmed in 2019.
Novak also criticized the tone of a recent filing, cosigned by Bondi and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, in which Halligan accused him of abusing his power. That response, Novak wrote, “contains a level of vitriol more appropriate for a cable news talk show and falls far beneath the level of advocacy expected from litigants in this Court, particularly the Department of Justice.”
Before Halligan’s appointment, the Trump administration had taken similar steps to install handpicked prosecutors atop offices from New Jersey to California by sidestepping the customary confirmation process. Among them was another former personal lawyer for Trump, Alina Habba, who resigned in December as the top federal prosecutor in New Jersey after an appeals court ruled she was unlawfully serving in the role.
Bondi called Halligan’s departure a “significant loss for the Department of Justice” and said the “circumstances that led to this outcome are deeply misguided.”
“Despite multiple, unnecessary legal obstacles placed in her path, Lindsey stepped forward at a critical juncture for our Nation and fulfilled her responsibilities with courage and resolve,” the attorney general said.