It looks like the Trump administration is expecting to defend – or litigate – some election wins or losses following the November midterms.
Ed Martin — U.S. Pardon Attorney, former Director of the Weaponization Working Group, and the man who served as interim U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia from the first day of President Trump’s second term until Jeanine Pirro was confirmed — is departing the administration to lead legal efforts for the 2026 midterms and the 2028 presidential election.
Trump’s Truth Social announcement said everything that needed to be said: “Ed is now leaving to go outside to fight Legal Battles for the upcoming Midterm Election, and the Presidential Election of 2028. I know he will do an outstanding job, ensure Free, Fair, and Honest Elections, and strongly advance our Constitutional Rights.”
Martin’s response was three words: “Proud to serve. Fight Fight Fight.” That’s the assignment in its entirety.
Martin served in three distinct and consequential roles during his time in the administration. As interim D.C. U.S. Attorney, he was the man the administration trusted to prosecute the most politically sensitive cases in Washington — including the Reflecting Pool vandalism indictments, the federal arson case from 26 Federal Plaza, and the broader effort to restore law and order in a city that had become a showcase for progressive governance’s failure. As Pardon Attorney, he ran the office that processes presidential clemency — including the Anti-Weaponization Fund compensation for Americans targeted by Biden’s DOJ. And as Director of the Weaponization Working Group, he was at the center of the administration’s effort to document and dismantle the institutional corruption that Trump’s primetime address began to expose publicly.
The move to election legal work outside the administration is strategically significant. The 2026 midterms are 77 days away. Democrats are already running 22 state attorneys general in a coordinated legal war machine — the “Project for Federal Accountability” coordination agreement that was signed before Trump even won the election. Courts across the country are being used as a second front in the political battle, with left-wing activist judges issuing injunctions, stays, and blockades on every Trump and Republican priority from the SAVE America Act to the White House Ballroom.
Having someone of Martin’s caliber — who knows the DOJ’s own operations from the inside, who ran the Weaponization Working Group, and who understands how to fight legal battles in an adversarial environment — working on election legal defense and integrity litigation is exactly what this moment requires.
The wave of personnel transitions — Karoline Leavitt to outside advisor, James Braid departing legislative affairs at end of September, Martin to election legal work — reflects a deliberate shift as the administration reconfigures for the midterm sprint. Some of the best people go where they’re needed most.
With 77 days until November and Democratic lawyers already positioned in courtrooms across the country, Ed Martin is going where the fight is. “Fight Fight Fight.” He means it.
