Ex-NJ US Attorney Grace Fired by Trump Joins McCarter & English

An attorney who was briefly the top federal prosecutor in New Jersey before being fired by President Donald Trump has joined McCarter & English as a litigation partner.

Desiree Grace will join the firm in Newark, New Jersey after a tumultuous summer in which she was appointed by federal judges to be the US Attorney for the state, only to be fired hours later. The judges selected Grace for the position after determining that Trump’s pick, Alina Habba, could no longer serve on an interim basis without Senate approval.

At her new job at McCarter & English, one of the oldest law firms in the Garden State, Grace will be working on trials, criminal defense, and internal investigations, she said. She previously worked at the firm as a litigation associate in the product liability and business litigation practices.

“I had a job to do at the Department of Justice,” Grace said in an interview. “I’ll have a job to do now and I just plan to do my work to the best of my ability.”

Desiree Grace

Grace, who previously worked as a clerk in the US Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit and in the Supreme Court of New Jersey, served in the New Jersey US Attorney’s office since 2016. She was named head of its criminal division last year and became Habba’s top deputy in April shortly after the Trump administration named Habba its interim US Attorney.

US District Judge Matthew Brann ruled Aug. 21 that Habba is not “lawfully performing” the duties of US attorney. He then put his ruling on hold pending a US Justice Department appeal.

After her firing, Grace filed an appeal to the Merit Systems Protection Board in which she called the move “completely unjustified,” according to documents obtained by Bloomberg Law through a Freedom of Information Act request. Grace said her appeal is pending.

Grace said she didn’t get the sense from any of the firms she interacted with after her firing that they were wary of bringing her on for fear of angering the president. “I don’t see myself as an enemy of the administration in any way,” she said.

-- With assistance from David Voreacos and Justin Wise.