'Hard to reconcile': Florida Bar throws cold water on idea that Trump lawyer's humiliating pretend US attorney stint is under 'pending' investigation

Update: The Florida Bar has done a 180, stating Friday that there "is no such pending Bar investigation" of Lindsey Halligan, despite earlier reported statements that there was an "open file" and "investigation pending."

The Florida Bar's previous confirmation of a pending investigation was erroneous, the statement said.

The Campaign for Accountability's executive director Michelle Kuppersmith, whose group brought complaints against Halligan, called the reversal "hard to reconcile."

"CfA has not heard directly from the Florida Bar, but it's hard to reconcile this latest statement with the bar counsel's previous letter saying there is an investigation pending," Kuppersmith said in a statement to Law&Crime. "If there is no longer an investigation into Halligan, the question is why not, given that three judges indicated she engaged in conduct that appears to violate ethics rules."

The original story appears below.

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At least one state bar organization confirmed it is investigating Lindsey Halligan's whirlwind stint purporting to be the top federal prosecutor in Virginia, leaving the door open for massive prosecutorial failures of President Donald Trump's rivals to boomerang on her professionally.

When Trump faced resistance from career prosecutors in the Eastern District of Virginia (EDVA) against the idea of indicting former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James in September, he posted a message on Truth Social addressed to "Pam" — U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi — calling Halligan a "really good lawyer [who] likes you, a lot."

"We can't delay any longer, it's killing our reputation and credibility," Trump urged. "They impeached me twice, and indicted me (5 times!), OVER NOTHING. JUSTICE MUST BE SERVED, NOW!!!"

An insurance lawyer by trade with no prosecutorial experience, Halligan's time serving in the White House as a special assistant and as one of Trump's criminal defense attorneys in the dismissed Mar-a-Lago classified documents prosecution boosted her prospects.

As career prosecutors dragged their feet, Bondi selected Halligan, and she did not hesitate to jump right into the fray, presenting cases against Comey and James on her own in front of the grand jury and penning the lone signature on the indictments.

While the two cases were dogged from the start by defense claims of vindictive or selective prosecution and grand jury and Fourth Amendment abuses, the criminal actions did not get close to putting the merits of the Trump administration's allegations before a jury.

Halligan's decisions to argue with a reporter on Signal about the evidence against AG James and to pick a fight with the judge for calling her a "puppet" — when he didn't actually do so — weren't helpful to her cause either.

In November, Senior U.S. District Judge Cameron Currie found that Bondi unlawfully appointed Halligan as interim U.S. attorney and then failed to retroactively cure that defect on Halloween by adding on a supervisory special attorney title.

It meant that the Comey and James prosecutions were dismissed, an outcome that the DOJ continues to appeal to this day — even though Halligan is no longer in the picture.

The situation came to a head in January, when a Trump-appointed judge in Virginia demanded answers as to why Halligan was still "masquerading" in court documents as the interim U.S. attorney despite "binding precedent in this district [that] is not subject to being ignored."

In a subsequent order, Chief U.S. District Judge M. Hannah Lauck barred Halligan from holding herself out as U.S. attorney, struck her title from the signature block of an indictment, and noted that DOJ employment is "no safe haven from the ethical rules of this Court, regardless of her state bar membership."

Around the same time, the district court's judges started the process for replacing Halligan, soliciting applicants through newspaper ads, so she stepped aside. Her eventual court-appointed replacement was quickly fired, however.

The question now is whether Halligan could be disciplined for her conduct, whether through a reprimand, suspension, or disbarment. Law&Crime reported months ago that the left-leaning watchdog group Campaign for Accountability (CfA) brought ethics complaints in both Virginia and Florida.

"Once in office, Ms. Halligan reportedly disregarded the conclusions of numerous experienced career prosecutors who had thoroughly investigated [Mr.] Comey's statements and found prosecution unsupportable. She then rushed to indict Mr. Comey in just four days, apparently failing to properly analyze the testimony at issue, the result of which was that she failed to recognize Mr. Comey's statements were literally true or at least not provably false," the complaint said in part. "Similarly, it has been reported that Ms. Halligan disregarded the conclusions of numerous experienced career prosecutors who had thoroughly investigated Ms. James's mortgage documents and found prosecution unsupportable. She nevertheless rushed to indict Ms. James soon after she was installed as Interim U.S. Attorney, again apparently failing to properly analyze the documents at issue[.]"

The Virginia Bar said it could not "initiate an investigation" unless the "court determines that Ms. Halligan made false statements to the court and sanctions her for the conduct[.]"

"Whether criminal indictments were obtained through material misrepresentations of fact and done for political purposes falls within the authority of the court to determine and not this office," a letter said.

The Florida Bar, which lists Bondi and Halligan both as active members in good standing, has since confirmed that it "already" has an "investigation pending" into Halligan.

"Thank you for your recent correspondence. We are aware of these developments and have been monitoring them closely," the early February letter said.

The group said it made the Florida Bar's letter public after news of Bondi's attempt to assert control over state bar investigations of current or former DOJ lawyers made waves. Halligan's is a case in point of how Bondi's proposed rule could be used to lean on state bars and take over investigations the feds would like to go away.