Ed Martin on June 13, 2023. Photo by Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images

By Jacob Kornbluh April 6, 2025

A Trump-nominated prosecutor is facing backlash over past remarks praising a Nazi sympathizer involved in the Jan. 6 riot as “extraordinary,” and citing biblical Jews in Egypt to defend slavery. Ed Martin, currently serving as interim U.S. Attorney for D.C., is up for Senate confirmation — and top Democrats are demanding a rare hearing to scrutinize his record.

Last year, Martin praised Timothy Hale-Cusanelli, described by the Department of Justice as a Nazi sympathizer and white supremacist, as an “extraordinary man, extraordinary leader” during an award ceremony held at President Donald Trump’s golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey. Trump faced backlash from Jewish leaders for allowing the event to take place at his property.

Hale-Cusanelli would show up to work at a naval weapons station with a “Hitler mustache” and tell coworkers that “Hitler should have finished the job.” He also has a history of trafficking in antisemitism. In 2020, Hale-Cusanelli posted an online video railing against what he called a “Hasidic Jewish invasion” of Lakewood, New Jersey, and compared the Orthodox community there to a “plague of locusts.” He also harassed online a Jewish man in Ocean County, New Jersey, before Jan. 6 and threatened to visit his home on Shabbat. No charges were filed in that incident.

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Hale-Cusanelli was later sentenced to four years on felony and misdemeanor charges for breaching the U.S. Capitol. Hale-Cusanelli was among the 1,500 Jan. 6 defendants Trump pardoned when he returned to office in Jan.

In his introductory remarks at the Bedminster event, Martin hugged Hale-Cusanelli and encouraged the crowd to welcome him with a round of applause. “It’s one of the goals of many of us to make sure that the world, and especially America, hears more from Tim Hale, because he’s extraordinary,” Martin said.

In a 2017 CNN appearance, Martin defended then-Senate candidate Roy Moore’s controversial comments about the so-called upsides of American slavery — invoking the biblical story of Jews in Egypt. “What he said was families still loved each other when they existed,” Martin argued. “When the Jews were in bondage for, you know, years, they still loved each other.”

Martin was the deputy director of the Republican National Convention’s 2024 platform committee.

Top Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee called on Republicans to hold a hearing — despite the panel’s practice of skipping hearings for U.S. Attorney nominees — to allow members to question Martin about what they described as his “objectionable record.” Sen. Dick Durbin, the ranking member of the committee and the minority whip, said in a letter to Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa, the Republican chairman, that the “shocking conduct” at the Bedminster event “necessitates sworn testimony from Mr. Martin.”

Sen. Adam Schiff of California, who is Jewish, said he plans to place a hold on Martin’s nomination to delay a confirmation vote.

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