Trump's Pick for Justice Department's No. 3 Job Withdraws

President Donald Trump's pick for the Justice Department's No. 3 position has withdrawn her name from consideration after encountering opposition on the Republican-led Senate Judiciary Committee, the department said Thursday.

Jessie Liu will instead stay on in her current position as the United States attorney for the District of Columbia.

A person familiar with the process said Liu's selection was jeopardized by her involvement more than a decade ago in a legal organization, the National Association of Women Lawyers, that filed legal briefs in support of abortion rights and that opposed the Supreme Court nomination of Samuel Alito, a conservative justice.

Though Liu was a senior official of the lawyers' group at the time of Alito's nomination, her name was not on the letter opposing Alito's nomination and she signed a separate Yale Law School alumni letter in support of him, according to the person, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the process. Liu said in interview with the National Journal published this month that she "was then and am now a huge admirer of Justice Alito" and that she resigned from the group because of its left-leaning positions.

Sen. Mike Lee, a Utah Republican, made clear his opposition, according to the person and the senator's office. Other Republicans on the committee opposed to abortion likely would have raised similar concerns.

"Jessie Liu is one of the finest, most impressive people serving in the Department of Justice," Attorney General William Barr said in a statement. "She has been an outstanding United States Attorney and would have made an outstanding Associate Attorney General. I have zero doubt she would have faithfully executed my priorities and advanced my rule-of-law agenda."

Barr also announced that Liu would serve as chairwoman of an advisory committee of U.S. attorneys.

As top federal prosecutor in the nation's capital, Liu will continue overseeing some of the matters referred to her office by special counsel Robert Mueller during his recently concluded investigation into possible ties between the Trump campaign and Russia. Those include a subpoena that was issued to an unidentified company owned by a foreign government.