Some US attorneys feel slighted by abrupt dismissals by Sessions

WASHINGTON - Two days before US Attorney General Jeff Sessions ordered dozens of the country's top federal prosecutors to clean out their desks, he gave those political appointees a pep talk during a conference call.

The seemingly abrupt about-face Friday left the affected US attorneys scrambling to brief the people left behind and say goodbye to colleagues.

The quick exits aren't expected to have a major impact on ongoing prosecutions.

The request for resignations from the 46 prosecutors who were holdovers from the Obama administration wasn't extraordinary. It's fairly customary for the 93 US attorneys to leave their posts once a new president is in office, and many had already left or were making plans for their departures. Sessions himself was asked to resign as a US attorney in a similar action by Attorney General Janet Reno in 1993.

But the abrupt nature of the dismissals - done with little explanation and not always with the customary thanks for years of service - stunned some of those left behind in offices around the country.

Former prosecutors, friends and colleagues immediately started reaching out to each other to express condolences and support.

"All of these US attorneys know they serve at the pleasure of the president. No one complains about that," said John Walsh, an Obama-era appointee as US attorney in Colorado who resigned in July. "But it was handled in a way that was disrespectful to the US attorneys because they were almost treated as though they had done something wrong, when in fact they had not."

Much of the public attention since Friday has focused on Preet Bharara, the high-profile Manhattan federal prosecutor who said he was fired despite meeting with then-President-elect Donald Trump and saying he was asked to remain.

Trump did apparently make an attempt to speak with Bharara before the demand for resignations. The White House on Sunday said the president reached out to thank Bharara for his service and to wish him good luck.

Maryland Representative Elijah Cummings, the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee, suggested on Sunday that Trump might have fired Bharara to thwart a potential corruption investigation.

AP