A federal appeals court ruled that the Trump administration unlawfully installed Sigal Chattah as Nevada's top federal prosecutor, the latest in a string of judicial setbacks over the White House's strategy of placing allies in U.S. attorney seats without Senate confirmation.

The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a lower court's disqualification of Chattah on August 18, 2026, finding that the Department of Justice could not use either the Federal Vacancies Reform Act or an attorney general delegation to keep her in the role after her interim term expired. The unanimous panel included U.S. Circuit Judge Eric Miller, himself a Trump appointee, who wrote the opinion striking down the arrangement.

The ruling means Chattah, a prominent Nevada conservative who previously served as the state's Republican National Committeewoman, can no longer oversee federal prosecutions in the District of Nevada. It also raises fresh questions about whether the administration will take the fight to the Supreme Court, or quietly accept a pattern of losses on the same legal theory in multiple states.

DOJ cycled Chattah through two titles to keep her in the seat

The Trump administration first appointed Chattah as interim U.S. attorney in March. When her 120-day term under the Vacancies Reform Act expired, she resigned the interim title, and the DOJ immediately reappointed her as first assistant U.S. attorney, a maneuver designed to let her continue running the office without a Senate-confirmed appointment. AP News reported that the workaround drew a legal challenge from four Nevada defendants whose cases Chattah's office was prosecuting.

Judge Miller's opinion dismantled both legs of the DOJ's argument. The Vacancies Reform Act did not authorize an extension beyond the statutory window, the panel found. And the attorney general could not simply delegate every function and duty of the U.S. attorney to someone who had already been disqualified from holding the position.

"Nor can the Attorney General create a de facto Acting U.S. Attorney by delegating all of the functions and duties of the U.S. Attorney to someone else."

That line, from a judge the president himself put on the bench, undercuts any suggestion that the ruling was driven by partisan hostility. The court applied the statute as written.

The administration has faced similar defeats elsewhere. A comparable ruling previously disqualified Alina Habba, a former personal lawyer for Trump, from serving as acting U.S. attorney in New Jersey. The DOJ has not sought Supreme Court review of those earlier decisions, a choice that leaves the legal precedent standing in multiple circuits.

That pattern of losses without appeal is worth noting. If the administration believed its appointment mechanism was lawful, the logical step would be to seek a definitive ruling from the high court. Its silence suggests either a strategic calculation that the justices would not be sympathetic, or that the White House has moved on to other personnel arrangements.

A temporary reprieve arrived before the appeals court shut the door

Before the Ninth Circuit issued its final ruling, U.S. District Judge David Campbell had briefly stayed his own disqualification order, giving Chattah a temporary reprieve while the DOJ pursued its appeal. That stay allowed her to remain involved in active cases her office was prosecuting.

Campbell acknowledged the tension between the branches in careful language, noting that his court "recognizes the deference and respect it should have for the Executive Branch, just as the Executive Branch should have deference and respect for the Judiciary." The appeals court's subsequent decision rendered that stay moot.

The legal dispute is narrow, but the practical consequences are not. Federal prosecutors in Nevada handle drug trafficking, public corruption, immigration fraud, and organized crime cases that affect residents across the state. Every day the U.S. attorney's office operates under a cloud of legal uncertainty is a day defendants can challenge the authority of the person bringing charges against them, which is exactly what four defendants did here, successfully.

The episode also fits a broader pattern of court setbacks for the Trump administration on questions of executive authority. Federal judges have repeatedly drawn lines around what the White House can accomplish without congressional cooperation, and the Chattah case adds another data point.

Chattah's removal joins a wave of high-profile departures from Trump's orbit

The forced exit lands at a moment when the administration has already absorbed several notable personnel changes. Karoline Leavitt recently stepped down as White House press secretary to serve as an outside advisor, and Tulsi Gabbard left her post as intelligence chief to care for her husband after a rare cancer diagnosis.

Those departures were voluntary. Chattah's was not. A court ordered her out, and the legal reasoning applies to every similarly structured appointment the DOJ has made or might attempt in the future.

The core problem is straightforward. The Senate confirmation process exists for a reason: it forces the executive branch to defend its choices in public and win bipartisan (or at least majority) support. Workarounds that let an administration skip that step invite exactly the kind of legal challenge Chattah now faces. The Vacancies Reform Act provides a narrow window for interim appointments. When that window closes, the law expects a confirmed nominee, not a title swap.

Conservatives who value constitutional order and separation of powers should welcome clarity on that point, even when the immediate result is inconvenient. The same legal guardrails that prevent this administration from installing prosecutors without Senate approval would prevent a future Democratic administration from doing the same.

Newsmax first flagged the story involving Chattah and Nevada, and Just The News reported that the administration retains the option to petition the Supreme Court, though its track record of declining to do so in parallel cases makes that outcome unlikely.

The ongoing friction over Trump administration personnel decisions shows no sign of easing. Each contested appointment that collapses in court makes the next one harder to defend, and gives opponents a longer list of precedents to cite.

If the administration wants its people in these seats, there is a proven way to get them there. It runs through the United States Senate, not through a revolving door of job titles designed to dodge the Constitution's advice-and-consent requirement.