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By Andrew Goudsward
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Donald Trump on Wednesday named a lawyer who represented several of his top aides in criminal probes to a senior post in the U.S. Justice Department.
Trump picked Stanley Woodward, who has been serving as a White House lawyer to Trump, to be associate attorney general, the third-highest ranking post at the Justice Department that oversees civil rights, antitrust and environmental enforcement. It also oversees the Civil Division, which is defending Trump's policy agenda against legal challenges.
If Woodward is confirmed, the top three officials at the Justice Department would all be attorneys who personally defended either Trump or his close associates.
Trump has prized loyalty in his Justice Department nominations despite a tradition of independence between the department and the White House.
Attorney General Pam Bondi defended Trump in his first impeachment trial in 2020, and her top deputy, Todd Blanche, was a lead lawyer to Trump in three criminal cases he faced during his years out of office.
Woodward represented several people in Trump's orbit, including now-FBI Director Kash Patel, as Special Counsel Jack Smith pursued investigations of Trump over his retention of classified documents and attempts to overturn his 2020 election defeat.
He defended Trump valet Walt Nauta, who was charged alongside Trump and another associate in the documents case. All three pleaded not guilty.
Prosecutors dropped the case against Trump after he won last year's election and dropped the case against Nauta after Trump's return to office in January.
Woodward was also part of a team of lawyers defending Peter Navarro, a Trump trade adviser, against a contempt charge for defying a subpoena from the congressional committee that investigated the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. Navarro was found guilty and served a four-month prison sentence.
Woodward also defended Connie Meggs, a member of the far-right Oath Keepers who took part in the Capitol riot. Meggs was pardoned by Trump on his first day in office, alongside nearly all roughly 1,600 people charged in the attack.
(Reporting by Andrew Goudsward in Washington; Editing by Matthew Lewis)
