Attorney General Barr says Trump fires U.S. Attorney Berman, at his request

In a letter to Berman, Barr said he was "surprised and quite disappointed" by Berman's late-night public statement in which he refused to quit his job, saying Berman had made a "public spectacle over public service." "I have asked the President to remove you as of today, and he has done so," Barr said, adding that the Deputy United States Attorney Audrey Strauss for the Southern District on New York, will become the Acting United States Attorney until a permanent replacement is installed.

U.S. Attorney General William Barr said on Saturday that President Donald Trump had fired Geoffrey Berman, the top federal prosecutor in Manhattan whose office is investigating Trump's attorney Rudolph Giuliani after Berman publicly refused late on Friday to step down from his post. In a letter to Berman, Barr said he was "surprised and quite disappointed" by Berman's late-night public statement in which he refused to quit his job, saying Berman had made a "public spectacle over public service."

"I have asked the President to remove you as of today, and he has done so," Barr said, adding that the Deputy United States Attorney Audrey Strauss for the Southern District on New York, will become the Acting United States Attorney until a permanent replacement is installed. Berman's termination marks another remarkable development in an escalating crisis at the Justice Department that started on Friday night when Barr unexpectedly announced that Berman was stepping down and would be replaced by U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Jay Clayton.

Berman, however, issued a statement of his own, saying he had no intention of stepping down until the Senate confirms his successor.