# Ed Martin Conservative activist and lawyer who served as interim U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia in 2025, then in three simultaneous Justice Department roles — **pardon attorney**, **associate deputy attorney general**, and director of the **[[Weaponization Working Group]]** — none of them Senate-confirmed. He left the Department in August 2026. > [!important] What is adjudicated, what is on the record, and what is pending > This page separates three categories, because they are routinely blurred in coverage of him. > - **Adjudicated:** one civil finding against him — defamation and false light, from litigation following his ouster from [[Eagle Forum]]. > - **On the record:** the actions below that he took in office and that are documented by his own filings, letters and posts. > - **Pending and unadjudicated:** a District of Columbia attorney-discipline petition filed 6 March 2026. **No finding of violation and no sanction.** He has not been criminally charged in any matter. > Reporting of a further internal Justice Department review rests on a single outlet and is therefore not recorded here. ## Before the Justice Department Missouri background: Holy Cross, the Pontifical Gregorian University, and Saint Louis University for law and a master's in healthcare ethics. Chief of staff to Missouri Governor Matt Blunt in 2006–07, departing amid a records-destruction controversy. He lost a congressional race in 2010 and the Missouri attorney general race in 2012, and chaired the Missouri Republican Party from January 2013 to February 2015. He was [[Phyllis Schlafly]]'s protégé and co-author — *The Conservative Case for Trump* (2016) — and **president of [[Eagle Forum]] in 2015–16**, until he was ousted amid the post-Schlafly succession litigation, in which he was **found liable for defamation and false light**. After 2020 he promoted "Stop the Steal," organized rallies, and sat on the board of the Patriot Freedom Project, which raised money for January 6 defendants. He was subpoenaed by the [[House January 6 Committee]] and did not testify. ## Interim U.S. Attorney, District of Columbia Appointed **20 January 2025**; served until mid-May. What he did in the role, on the record: - Fired or demoted prosecutors who had worked January 6 cases and wound down the Capitol Siege Section. - Launched a "1512 Project" reviewing the obstruction charges used in those prosecutions. - **Signed a dismissal motion for a January 6 defendant he had personally represented** — the central documented conflict of interest. - Wrote to the dean of Georgetown Law stating his office would not hire from a school teaching DEI. - Launched "Operation Whirlwind," sending inquiry letters to Senator Chuck Schumer, Representative Robert Garcia and others over alleged threats, and separate letters to the *New England Journal of Medicine* and the Wikimedia Foundation. - Posted on X as "**Eagle Ed**," including: "As President Trumps' lawyers, we are proud to fight." More than a hundred former D.C. federal prosecutors signed a public statement saying he had "butchered the position." ⭐ **The nomination collapsed on one Republican vote.** [[Thom Tillis]], on the Judiciary Committee and decisive in a narrowly divided one, said he would not support Martin, and said exactly why: *"If Mr. Martin were being put forth as a U.S. attorney for any district, except the district where Jan. 6 happened, I'd probably support him."* Trump withdrew the nomination on **8 May 2025** and named [[Jeanine Pirro]] interim U.S. Attorney the same day. ## The three roles, and their limits Announced 8 May 2025, with pardon-attorney service from about 15 May. **Clemency.** The role was structurally weak. The operative channel ran through the White House, where [[Alice Marie Johnson]] — pardoned by Trump in 2018 and named "pardon czar" in February 2025 — presented cases to Trump directly alongside the White House Counsel's office. Deputy Attorney General [[Todd Blanche]] layered Martin's role, leaving him substantially with paperwork. Martin publicly urged a "no MAGA left behind" clemency posture and pushed for Stewart Rhodes and Proud Boys figures. The administration's clemency output over the period included more than 1,500 January 6 pardons and a set of white-collar grants. **Investigations.** He was deputized as a special assistant U.S. attorney in August 2025 to pursue mortgage-fraud theories against Senator Adam Schiff, New York Attorney General [[Letitia James]], and Federal Reserve Governor [[Lisa Cook]]. **No charges were brought against Schiff or Cook.** > [!note] A correction worth carrying > James *was* indicted in the Eastern District of Virginia in October 2025, and on **24 November 2025** a federal judge dismissed that indictment along with the Comey indictment — **because interim U.S. Attorney [[Lindsey Halligan]] had been unlawfully appointed, not because of anything to do with Martin's appointment.** Several secondary summaries conflate the two. The Department's appeal was pending in the Fourth Circuit. **Removal and departure.** Martin was **removed as head of the [[Weaponization Working Group]]** around the turn of 2026 — reporting gives both 1 January and 2 February 2026, a discrepancy this page does not resolve — and relocated away from Main Justice. Trump announced on **21 August 2026** that Martin would step down to "fight Legal Battles for the upcoming Midterm Election, and the Presidential Election of 2028." His successor as pardon attorney was not identified in available reporting. ## The disciplinary matter Complaints urging investigation were filed through 2025 by Senate Judiciary Democrats, the Society for the Rule of Law and others. Then a formal step: the **D.C. Office of Disciplinary Counsel filed a specification of charges received by the Court of Appeals Board on Professional Responsibility on 6 March 2026**, alleging that Martin used his office coercively against Georgetown Law — demanding curricular change and threatening a hiring boycott while invoking risk to the school's nonprofit status and federal funding — and that he attempted to interfere with the disciplinary investigation itself. Martin sought to move the case to federal court. The Justice Department filed a statement of interest supporting him in early May 2026, and on **13 May 2026 the Department filed its own complaint against the D.C. Disciplinary Counsel, the Office of Disciplinary Counsel and the Board on Professional Responsibility**, framed as advancing the executive order on "Ending the Weaponization of the Federal Government." ⭐ **That last move is the part with structural significance.** A federal executive department sued a state-equivalent attorney-licensing body over its discipline of a department official. Bar discipline has been the residual check on government lawyers precisely because it sits outside the executive branch and survives changes of administration. Whatever the merits for Martin personally, the Department's suit tests whether that check is reachable. **Status as of 27 September 2026:** the disciplinary matter is **pending and unadjudicated** — no finding, no sanction. No criminal charge exists against him on the public record. ## See Also - [[Weaponization Working Group]] · [[Office of the Pardon Attorney]] — the roles - [[Public Integrity Section]] — the career corruption unit, running the opposite direction over the same period - [[Jeanine Pirro]] — who replaced him in D.C. - [[Lindsey Halligan]] — the appointment defect that actually voided the James and Comey indictments - [[Alice Marie Johnson]] · [[Elizabeth Oyer]] — the clemency pipeline - [[Eagle Forum]] · [[Phyllis Schlafly]] — the movement lineage - [[Thom Tillis]] — the vote that ended the nomination