NEW YORK (TIP): Preet Bharara, the United States attorney in Manhattan, said after meeting the President-elect at Trump Tower on November 30 that he would remain in office under Donald Trump‘s administration.
Speaking to reporters after the meeting, Bharara said, “The President-elect asked, presumably because he’s a New Yorker and is aware of the great work that our office has done over the past seven years, asked to meet with me to discuss whether I’d be prepared to stay on as the United States attorney to do the work as we have done it, independently, without fear or favor for the last seven years.”
Bharara said that he had already talked to Senator Jeff Sessions, Republican of Alabama, who is Trump’s choice for attorney general. “He also asked that I stay on, and so I expect that I will be continuing,” he said.
Senator Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York, for whom Bharara served as chief counsel, issued a statement after Bharara made his announcement, saying, “President-elect Trump called me last week and asked me what I thought about Preet Bharara continuing his role as U.S. attorney.” “I told him I thought Preet was great,” Mr. Schumer added, “and I would be all for keeping him on the job and fully support it. I am glad they met, and am glad Preet is staying on.”
Indian Americans are happy that Bharara, has agreed to stay in his current role under the Trump administration and hailed President elect Donald Trump for his effort to ‘Reaching across the party lines’ and expressed hope that in near future ‘President Trump will appoint Preet to become a justice of the United States Supreme Court.’
Rajiv Khanna, President, India-America Chamber of Commerce and a prominent lawyer said in a brief comment, “I am glad that President-elect Trump is reaching across the party lines to pick his team.”
Ravi Batra, renowned Indian American lawyer said in a statement, “President elect Trump after meeting with the fearless United States attorney Preet Bharara, in a move more poignant then any before, declared that America, a nation of laws, will enjoy law enforcement without regard to political party labels: Republican or Democrat. After all, as has been said before, there is no democratic or republican way to lock up a criminal.
That Preet shared, within the confines of the law, his areas of interest with POTUS45 resulted in, as I had publicly hoped and urged, Trump offering Preet four more years. To our great benefit, Preet who can do anything he wants and go anywhere he wants, chose to remain the “Horatio Hornblower” of the United States Attorneys for the Southern District of New York and continue to battle against those who play checkers while Preet plays chess.
The fumigation and disinfectant of Albany and City hall is far from over, because those in dire need of being indicted, convicted and severed from their arrogant corrupt roots of power were playing the “run the clock out game” – suddenly find themselves checkmated by President elect Trump. I know that all hard-working New Yorkers are celebrating with unexpected joy that they have Preet back on their side to eviscerate the casual and comfortable corruption that has taken residence in the great state of New York.
Given Preet Bharara’s exceptional service to the people of these United States, meeting, and I believe well exceeding, the power that emanates from the chair of the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York – I hope that then-president Trump will appoint Preet to become a justice of the United States Supreme Court when the next vacancy occurs – beyond the one created by the untimely demise of the great Nino Scalia.
There is inherent greatness and Preet, much like the America we love and the Constitution we cherish and protect from enemies foreign and domestic.”
As U.S. Attorney, Bharara oversees the investigation and litigation of all criminal and civil cases brought on behalf of the United States in the Southern District of New York, which encompasses New York, Bronx, Westchester, Dutchess, Orange, Putnam, Rockland and Sullivan counties. He supervises an office of more than 220 Assistant U.S. Attorneys, who handle a high volume of cases that include domestic and international terrorism, narcotics and arms trafficking, white collar crime, public corruption, gang violence, organized crime, and civil rights violations.
Since his appointment as U.S. Attorney, the office successfully extradited and prosecuted one of the most notorious arms traffickers in the world, Viktor Bout, who is now serving a 25-year sentence. The office also obtained a life sentence for Faisal Shahzad, the Times Square bomber, and for one of the Al Qaeda plotters of the 1998 bombings of two American embassies in East Africa. In addition, the office has convicted scores of insider trading defendants, including Raj Rajaratnam, who was sentenced to 11 years, and Rajat Gupta.
Bharara was born in 1968 in Ferozepur, Punjab, India, to a Sikh father and Hindumother. He grew up in Eatontown in suburban Monmouth County, New Jersey and attended Ranney School in Tinton Falls, New Jersey, where he graduated as valedictorian in 1986. He received his B.A magna cum laude from Harvard College in 1990 and his J.D. from Columbia Law School in 1993, where he was a member of the Columbia Law Review.