Senate confirms former Trump personal attorney for lifetime post

Michael Macagnone, CQ-Roll Call on Jul 29, 2025

By clicking submit, I authorize Arcamax and its affiliates to: (1) use, sell, and share my information for marketing purposes, including cross-context behavioral advertising, as described in our Privacy Policy , (2) add to information that I provide with other information like interests inferred from web page views, or data lawfully obtained from data brokers, such as past purchase or location data, or publicly available data, (3) contact me or enable others to contact me by email or other means with offers for different types of goods and services, and (4) retain my information while I am engaging with marketing messages that I receive and for a reasonable amount of time thereafter. I understand I can opt out at any time through an email that I receive, or by clicking here

The Senate confirmed President Donald Trump’s controversial former personal attorney to a lifetime federal appeals court post Tuesday on a narrow party-line vote.

Emil Bove, who has served as a Justice Department official in the first few months of Trump’s second term, will take a lifetime post on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit despite Democrats’ concerns about his efforts to reshape the department in Trump’s image.

Those concerns included reported comments contemplating defying court orders and dropping a corruption case against New York City Mayor Eric Adams for Adams’ support of Trump’s immigration policies.

In floor speeches, Democrats argued that Bove was not fit for a lifetime appointment to a court which hears cases from Delaware, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and the Virgin Islands.

Sen. Richard J. Durbin, D-Ill., criticized Republicans for proceeding with Bove’s nomination in the face of whistleblower claims about his conduct and testimony to the committee. Durbin called Bove’s nomination “an alarming departure” from nominees in Trump’s first term.

“Mr. Bove’s primary qualification appears to be his blind loyalty to this president,” Durbin said.

The vote to confirm Bove was 50-49. Sens. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, and Susan Collins, R-Maine, were the only Republicans to vote against him.

Durbin and other Democrats said multiple whistleblowers had come forward alleging that Bove misled the committee during his confirmation hearing last month.

During his confirmation hearing, Bove faced questions about his role in the DOJ as well as a whistleblower allegation that he told department attorneys to consider defying court orders that would stop planned deportations.

Bove denied ever having instructed Justice Department staff to ignore a court order, which was not an accusation made by the whistleblower. In his own floor speech, Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles E. Grassley said that at the March meeting key to the allegations, no one was directed to ignore court orders.

Grassley said that Democrats “wanted a one-sided media campaign” rather than a serious whistleblower process and that his staff was repeatedly stonewalled trying to substantiate the latest whistleblower accusations.

On the original whistleblower accusation, Grassley said that it’s not unusual for attorneys to discuss different legal strategies, and that 10 days after the meeting the whistleblower signed a court filing that the government had complied with court orders in the case.

“Even if you accept most of the claims as true there is no scandal,” Grassley said.

Grassley said that he received a letter from Bove denying allegations that he had misled the panel. Grassley further accused Democrats of withholding information “until a politically opportune time” to hurt the nominee’s chances and urged Republicans to vote for him.

A former federal prosecutor, Bove was defense counsel for Trump in several criminal cases. That included the federal criminal cases against Trump and the New York state case in which Trump was convicted of 34 felony counts tied to falsified business records for hush money payments during his 2016 presidential campaign.

Since joining the Justice Department as a principal associate deputy attorney general, Bove participated in the firing or reassignment of prosecutors involved in working on cases tied to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol.

Bove also personally intervened in the Justice Department’s effort to drop a public corruption case against Adams. Several prosecutors resigned rather than attempt to drop the case, and after the presiding judge eventually agreed to drop the charges, he said it “smacks of a bargain” between Adams and prosecutors.

After the confirmation hearing, Democrats on the panel said multiple whistleblowers had come forward saying that Bove had misled the committee about his conduct. In a letter published Monday, Democratic Sens. Adam B. Schiff of California and Cory Booker of New Jersey asked the DOJ inspector general to disclose whether it was investigating Bove.

“Each of these allegations are alarming. Taken together, they paint a picture that Mr. Bove likely violated laws and Department regulations, and abused his authority while acting as one of the Department’s most senior officials,” the letter said.