Washington Post: DOJ watchdog investigates resignation of US attorney in Atlanta

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The newspaper, citing people familiar with the matter, reported that Inspector General Michael Horowitz’s investigation appears to be nascent, noting that investigators had not spoken to Pak and that the boundaries of the investigation remain unclear.

A spokesperson for the Inspector General’s office declined to comment when contacted by CNN. Pak declined to comment on the Post.

Pak, a Trump-appointed person who had held the post since 2017, quit his job abruptly on Jan.4 as a US attorney for the Northern District of Georgia, which includes Atlanta and Fulton County, citing “unforeseen circumstances” in a note to staff. Pak’s departure follows fallout from a phone call the previous weekend in which Trump pressured Georgia Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to “find” votes to cancel the election in the state, which he lost to President Joe Biden.
In the audio of the phone call obtained by CNN and first reported by the Post, Trump is also heard making unsubstantiated claims about the state election and at one point, during the handover. Question of auditing the ballots, he told Raffensperger, “You’ve got your ever-Trumper American Lawyer out there,” without mentioning a name. The comment seems to refer to Pak.

Trump, in turn, ordered an American attorney from southern Georgia to take over the Atlanta office, in an unusual move. The Justice Department said U.S. Southern Georgia District attorney Bobby Christine, who is also appointed by Trump and has held the post since 2017, will take the interim lead in Atlanta, assuming both roles. The principal deputy attorney in the Atlanta office, Kurt Erskine, would normally have taken on the role of acting U.S. attorney, but was left out.

Two people familiar with the matter told the Post in Thursday’s article that a call from a senior Justice Department official in Washington told Pak he had to resign. Trump was angry at what he saw as the ministry’s insufficient pursuit of its baseless allegations about Georgia’s elections and the nation as a whole, people familiar with the matter told the newspaper at the time.

As CNN previously reported, there were no credible allegations of voting issues impacting the election, as claimed by dozens of judges, governors, election officials, the Electoral College, the Department of Justice, the Department of Homeland Security and the Supreme Court of the United States.

Law firm Alston & Bird announced Thursday that Pak will return to the firm in February as an associate in its litigation and trial practice group in Atlanta. Pak was previously a litigation partner at Alston & Bird and began his private practice career there in 2000, according to a press release from the firm.
In the Department of Justice statement announcing his resignation earlier this month, Pak said he was grateful to Trump for the opportunity to serve and thanked former Attorneys General William Barr and Jeff Sessions.

“It has been the greatest honor of my professional career to have been able to serve my fellow citizens as the United States Attorney for the Northern District of Georgia,” he said. “I have done my best to be thoughtful and consistent, and to do justice to my fellow citizens in a fair, effective and efficient manner.”

CNN’s Katelyn Polantz, Evan Perez, Chandelis Duster and Kelly Mena contributed to this report.

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