Director of US Attorneys’ Support Office Removed by Trump DOJ

The Trump Justice Department has forced out the career head of an office that oversees and supports all 93 US attorneys.

Stephanie Hinds, a 30-year DOJ veteran promoted last October to director of the Executive Office for United States Attorneys, has left her post after being reassigned to the new sanctuary cities enforcement working group, four people briefed on the move told Bloomberg Law. Her name was removed from the EOUSA website Thursday, which now lists the director position as vacant.

The EOUSA director has previously played a significant problem-solving role whenever US attorneys encounter thorny situations, including by connecting them with the appropriate contact at department headquarters and advocating for their needs with the attorney general. However, in recent weeks the office has been frozen out as US attorneys have been tasked with various initiatives from Washington-based leadership.

A DOJ spokesman said the office’s principal deputy director Norm Wong has assumed leadership functions.

An email sent to Hinds’ government address returned with an out-of-office message noting she’s out on extended leave.

It’s not clear if Hinds will retire, but several individuals—all of whom spoke on condition of anonymity to divulge private conversations—expected her to leave the department.

She’d recently served as an acting US attorney in San Francisco and a counsel to former Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco, before then-Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed her to lead EOUSA last fall. Hinds held leadership roles under San Francisco’s prior US attorneys, including as a deputy and first assistant to the district’s Trump-appointed chief prosecutor in his prior term.

Prior attorneys general have preferred to appoint their own director as the liaison to the nation’s chief law enforcement officials. But the removal of Hinds comes as part of a broader Trump administration effort to force out longtime career officials by assigning them to a sanctuary cities office that doesn’t align with their past experiences.