He had the creation of a significant news event: the first public appearance of a former American prosecutor who resigned in protest after challenging the Trump administration. But the panel with Danielle Sassoon proved to be more notable because of how careful she and a famous former Prosecutor from New York to avoid any direct comment about the president or his department of justice.
The New York City Association Event of the City of New York stressed the restlessness, public silence and caution that was around the legal community four months in the second mandate of Donald Trump as president. A former federal prosecutor who now works in a large law firm summed up the dynamics in a word: “fear.”
“People keep their heads down,” said the lawyer, who asked not to be appointed due to the fear of Trump’s reprisals. “Scared to be audited. Scared to be investigated. The federal government is very powerful.”
Sassoon was the main federal prosecutor in Manhattan until February, when he resigned instead of orders from Trump’s appointed in the Department of Justice to withdraw federal corruption charges against the mayor of New York City, Eric Adams. Subsequently, half a dozen other federal prosecutors in New York and Washington, refused to withdraw the charges and resigned in one of the highest profile of a president from a president from Watergate.
On Tuesday, a dozen reporters and a handful of camera teams descended in the majestic neoclassical headquarters of the New York City Bar Association. A continuous legal education event centered on lawyers specialized in white collar crimes caught attention for a reason: Sassoon.
In a blue carpet meetings lined with mahogany walls and portraits of judges of the Supreme Court, Sassoon had scheduled a “45 -minute fire talk” with Mary Jo White, the first woman to serve as the usader for the Southern District of New York. Known as an aggressive prosecutor with an independent streak, White supervised the prosecutions of the leader of organized crime John Gotti and the leaders of the Bombing of the World Trade Center in 1993.
Jenna Dabbs, former federal prosecutor at Manhattan, presented Sassoon and White and thanked Sassoon for attending the session weeks after giving birth to her third child. Sassoon, dressed in black pants and a black vest, thanked him.
Dabbs was later the closest to any speaker to directly address the unprecedented events that occur in the Department of Justice under the second Trump administration. He praised Sassoon’s brief mandate as an acting American prosecutor for the Southern District of New York, which manages cases in Manhattan, Bronx and part of Westchester County, such as “principles, brave and brave.”
In a protest letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi, Sassoon had said that Adams’s lawyer had proposed what was equivalent to a “Quid Pro quo.” Federal prosecutors would eliminate graft charges against ADAMS in exchange for Adams cooperation in the repression of Trump administration immigration. After Bondi refused to meet her, Sassoon resigned.
Dabbs said that Sassoon had “confirmed the oath” he had done to defend the Constitution. “It became reflected in a reflected way of the best traditions of that office, unfortunately at a certain personal cost,” Dabbs said.
After a warm round of applause, Sassoon asked White about the role that the mentors had played in his career. White replied that Sassoon herself was now a model to follow. “You’re that right now,” White said. “You are an extraordinary lawyer and you are the epitome of integrity and strength.”
White then thanked Sassoon for his behavior in the case of Adams without appointing Adams, Bondi or Trump. “He didn’t choose to deal with what he had to deal with,” White said. “But how you handled that was exceptional, and I thank you.”
Sassoon asked White if he was under political pressure during his term in the 1990s.
“Obviously, there is a focus of attention at this time about the relationship between the White House, the Department of Justice, SDNY, after what happened in the SDNY when I was there, the relationship between politics and prosecution,” said Sassoon. “How is it different from when you were the US prosecutor?”
White responded carefully and again did not appoint Trump, Bondi or Adams. “It has always been a problem,” he said. Speaking in broad blows, he said that the independence of the South District, which earned the nickname the “sovereign district”, had “served very well to the public interest.”
When Sassoon asked him if he had any advice for people who serve as American prosecutors, White was blunt but vague. “You should be prepared to give up two or three times,” he said, causing the laughter of the crowd. But White refused to say exactly why he had threatened to resign.
In response to a Sassoon question about what kind of investigations could the white collar defense lawyers expect, White expressed concern about the “Weapon’s Weapon Working Group” of the Department of Justice established by Bondi, which critics say it is a Trump effort to take revenge on their perceived enemies.
Again speaking in general terms, White invoked a famous 1940 speech by Attorney General Robert Jackson, where he warned federal prosecutors to never abuse their “immense power” by attacking people for political or personal reasons. “If you ever focus on a person and try to find a crime, you have lost course,” White said.
When Sassoon asked the audience questions, it was quickly clear that White, no Sassoon, would answer. White answered several questions in general terms and again avoided mentioning Trump by name.
Asked by a journalist if he had any comment about Bondi’s mandate as attorney general, White replied: “I do not.” With that, the event ended.
