(Updated) Trump admin has signaled that Habba won’t get full term as U.S. Attorney, Booker says

This story was updated at 11:39 a.m. on May 4 after the White House publicly denied Booker’s claims.

Interim U.S. Attorney for the District of New Jersey Alina Habba has courted controversy since arriving in office, announcing a new “Election Integrity Task Force” that could target local election laws in New Jersey and hinting that she may use her role to assist Republicans in state elections. But Habba’s term is limited as long as she remains the interim U.S. Attorney – and Senator Cory Booker says that she may not end up being President Donald Trump’s pick for a full term in the job.

Booker told the New Jersey Globe earlier this week that he has been in contact with the White House counsel’s office about Habba, and they have indicated to him that someone else will be nominated to serve as permanent U.S. Attorney.

“[The counsel’s office] has pledged to us that they want to work cooperatively to find somebody for that position,” Booker said on Tuesday. “I was told that she is temporarily there, and I feel like I’ve gotten assurances that we’re going to work to find a different person for permanency. That’s the good faith I’m working in right now.”

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, however, said after this story was initially published that no such promises on Habba have been made.

“Fake News,” Leavitt said. “No such assurances were ever given to Senator Booker from the White House Counsel’s Office. President Trump proudly appointed Alina Habba to serve, and he believes she is doing a tremendous job cleaning up New Jersey.”

Notably, however, Leavitt’s statement does not definitively say whether or not Trump intends to nominate Habba for a full term. Trump and Habba similarly have not said anything one way or another about Habba’s long-term status.

On March 24, Trump announced that Habba, a Summit native and his own former personal defense lawyer and campaign advocate, would take over the interim U.S. Attorney post from acting incumbent John Giordano. Giordano himself had only been in the role for around a month; Trump’s initial pick for the job, State Sen. Doug Steinhardt (R-Lopatcong), turned the offer down for an interim appointment, forcing the White House to scramble for alternatives.

But because Habba was only picked to be the interim U.S. Attorney, her stay will be capped at 120 days unless Trump nominates her, and the Senate confirms her, to a full term. (Her term could also be extended by a vote of New Jersey’s 17 District Court judges.)

If Trump does nominate Habba for the job, she’s likely to face an uphill confirmation battle in the Senate. Senators remain deferential to their colleagues when it comes to judicial nominations from their home states, and Senator Andy Kim has already made it clear that he opposes Habba’s nomination, calling her an “unacceptable partisan choice.”

Such battles are also playing out in other U.S. Attorney districts around the country. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer has worked to block two U.S. Attorney nominees from his home state of New York, while Sigal Chattah, the controversial interim U.S. Attorney in Nevada, faces strong opposition from her home-state Democratic senators as well.