By Sadie Gurman, Lindsay Wise and Jess Bravin

WASHINGTON -- Ed Martin, President Trump's nominee to be the top prosecutor in Washington, is teetering toward failure after Republican senators signaled they couldn't support him, citing concerns over his advocacy for the pro-Trump mob that stormed the U.S. Capitol.

Sen. Thom Tillis (R., N.C.) told the White House he would oppose Martin, saying the nominee's defense of the Jan. 6, 2021, rioters made him a poor fit to lead the U.S. attorney's office in D.C. His opposition stalls Martin's nomination in the Senate weeks before his temporary appointment to the post expires.

"The U.S. attorney that I want to support in D.C. needs to send a message that if you ever come into this building illegally, you are going to be prosecuted. Period, full stop, no rationalization," Tillis said Tuesday after meeting with Martin the night before.

Without the senator's support, it is unlikely Martin's nomination can secure approval in the Senate Judiciary Committee. At least a half-dozen other GOP senators have privately expressed opposition, people familiar with the discussions said.

Martin, 54, has been a lightning rod from the outset. A Missouri lawyer and former chair of the state's Republican Party, Martin has been among the most vocal advocates for Trump supporters who rioted at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. He served on the board of the nonprofit Patriot Freedom Project, a group that supported Jan. 6 defendants and led efforts to overturn Trump's 2020 election loss.

A spokesman for Martin didn't respond to requests for comment.

Trump in January named him to lead the Washington U.S. attorney's office on an interim basis and later nominated him for the role. Martin's early leadership has brought turmoil to the office, which has led some of the country's most politically charged prosecutions in recent years, including those of several Trump allies, which had put it squarely in the president's crosshairs.

Within days of taking the job in a temporary capacity, Martin fired or demoted veteran attorneys who had prosecuted Jan. 6 defendants and began reviewing the department's decision to charge hundreds of them with felony offenses for obstructing an official congressional proceeding. Trump granted clemency to all of the more than 1,500 people charged in the attack, and Martin, who had defended some of the rioters while in private practice, oversaw the dismissal of prosecutions that were pending.

Martin also started marshaling the office's resources toward investigations of people opposed to Trump and his administration. He launched -- and then abandoned -- plans to investigate Sen. Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) over comments he made about conservative Supreme Court justices in 2020. He opened an inquiry into allegations brought to his attention by Elon Musk that unidentified individuals had threatened staffers with the Department of Government Efficiency. In March, Martin sent the dean of the Georgetown University Law Center a "letter of inquiry" saying the U.S. attorney's office would no longer consider hiring candidates associated with the law school unless it immediately ended "unacceptable" diversity and inclusion initiatives.

Martin's nomination has appeared further in jeopardy after revelations of his ties to Timothy Hale-Cusanelli, a Jan. 6 rioter known to espouse white supremacist and antisemitic views. The two appeared together on podcasts, and Martin called Hale-Cusanelli a friend and a "great guy" but has since backed away from his comments.

Trump began calling Republican senators directly to try to shore up Martin's support when it became clear some of them were wavering, people familiar with the matter said. "Ed is coming up on the deadline for Voting and, if approved, HE WILL NOT LET YOU DOWN," Trump said in a social-media post late Monday.

The White House has given no indication it intends to pull Martin's nomination. "Ed Martin is a fantastic U.S. Attorney for D.C. and will continue to implement the President's law-and-order agenda in Washington, " spokesman Alex Pfeiffer said.

Twenty-three Republican state attorneys general sent a letter to the committee Monday urging senators to move forward on Martin. A bipartisan group of more than 100 former federal prosecutors was among those working to scuttle Martin's nomination. Dan Toomey, a past president of D.C.'s Assistant U.S. Attorneys Association, said the group was motivated first by Martin's firing and demoting career prosecutors who had worked on Jan. 6 cases.

"We saw U.S. attorneys being fired for doing their jobs," by a political operative who had never himself served as a prosecutor, Toomey said. The group, he said, reached out to Republicans on the Judiciary Committee, and through March and April met with staffers for six of them.

"I think they really understand the grave difficulties with this particular nominee," Toomey said.

Judiciary chairman Sen. Chuck Grassley, (R., Iowa) didn't include Martin on the agenda this week. "I want to put people on the agenda that I can help the president be successful in his nominees, and that's all I can say at this point," Grassley said Tuesday.

Martin's interim appointment afforded him 120 days, or until May 20, to lead the U.S. attorney's office without Senate confirmation. If his appointment expires, federal law would allow the district court in Washington to fill the vacancy until the Senate confirms a replacement. The court could elect to keep Martin, though that is considered unlikely. The Trump administration also could install a different interim leader.

Others continued to express support for Trump's pick.

"I intend to support him," Sen. John Cornyn, (R., Texas) said Tuesday. "I tend to defer to the president on his choices."

Write to Sadie Gurman at sadie.gurman@wsj.com, Lindsay Wise at lindsay.wise@wsj.com and Jess Bravin at Jess.Bravin@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

May 06, 2025 16:33 ET (20:33 GMT)

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