Why it matters that Trump is adding Fox News' Jeanine Pirro to his made-for-TV team

[LetMyPeopleVote]

Ed Martin’s tenure as interim U.S. attorney was a disaster. His successor, Jeanine Pirro, is unlikely to be an improvement.

https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/maddowblog/jeanine-pirro-us-attorney-nomination-donald-trump-rcna205791

Within hours, multiple news organizations reported that Trump’s Plan B was none other than Fox News host Jeanine Pirro. Many, including me, responded to the reports with the same four-word utterance: “That can’t be right.”

It was right. NBC News reported:

President Donald Trump announced Thursday night that he is appointing Fox News host Jeanine Pirro as interim U.S. attorney for Washington, D.C., calling her ‘incredibly well qualified for this position’ and ‘in a class by herself.’ Trump made the announcement on his Truth Social, mentioning Pirro’s previous roles as a prosecutor and a judge, and said she was ‘currently Co-Host of The Five, one of the Highest Rated Shows on Television.’

In modern American history, a great many presidents have appointed a great many federal prosecutors. Not once, however, did a chief executive feel the need to justify the decision by pointing to the appointee’s television ratings — until now.

In fairness, it’s worth emphasizing that Pirro clears a low bar that Martin did not: While Martin had literally no prosecutorial experience, making his selection to lead one of the nation’s most important prosecutorial offices bizarre, Pirro actually did serve as a district attorney in New York. In fact, if someone were to look at her C.V. and exclude her work as an on-air television personality, she might even seem well suited for the position to which Trump has appointed her.....

As for the extraordinary personnel pipeline between Fox News and the Trump administration, it’s apparently time to update the overall tally.

In January, The New York Times published a tally and found 19 “former Fox News hosts, commentators, on-air medical experts, producers and other personnel” who’d landed jobs in the Republican administration. Soon after, Media Matters published a revised total, putting the new number at 20. (The list did not include Attorney General Pam Bondi, who briefly moonlit as a guest host of a Fox News program while she was serving as Florida’s chief law enforcement official.)

As March got underway, the president also appointed Fox News personalities Laura Ingraham and Maria Bartiromo to the Kennedy Center board, and as March neared its end, Trump added yet another Fox News contributor to his White House operation, tapping Sara Carter to serve as drug czar. Last month, Trump kept going, appointing Bo Dietl, another Fox vet, to serve on a Department of Homeland Security advisory council.

With Pirro joining the ranks, what’s the new total? I suppose it depends on who one is inclined to include or exclude, but by any fair measure, there are now enough Fox News veterans on Team Trump to field a full football team’s offense and defense, with a person or two left on the bench