A U.S. official is illegally serving as the top federal prosecutor in Los Angeles, a federal judge has ruled.

First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli “is unlawfully serving as a ‘de facto’ United States Attorney,” U.S. District Judge J. Michael Seabright said in a 32-page decision on Oct. 27.

Seabright said he must disqualify Essayli from overseeing the prosecutions of two defendants, although the disqualifications will not become effective until a ruling comes on the government’s motion for a stay pending appeal.

“Just so there’s no confusion, today’s order is stayed and has no immediate effect,” Essayli wrote on X. “I remain First Assistant U.S. Attorney and continue running the office. The Supreme Court will ultimately decide this matter.”

Essayli is the top official at the United States Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California, because there is no U.S. attorney at present.

Essayli was a Republican state lawmaker when President Donald Trump in 2025 appointed him to be the U.S. attorney for the office, which covers Los Angeles County and some nearby counties.

U.S. attorneys require Senate confirmation, but the Senate has not voted on Essayli’s nomination. Essayli was named in 2025 as interim U.S. attorney, a position limited to 120 days.

Federal officials said that Essayli became the acting U.S. attorney at the office after he resigned as the interim U.S. attorney just before 120 days elapsed, and the attorney general appointed him to the first assistant U.S. attorney position. Seabright ruled in October 2025 that Essayli could not serve as acting U.S. attorney, but allowed him to continue serving as first assistant U.S. attorney and be involved in prosecutions of defendants in that role.

A recent ruling by a federal appeals court found invalid the appointment of a federal official in Nevada to first assistant U.S. attorney following her resignation as interim U.S. attorney. The first assistant promotion to acting U.S. attorney only applies to the first assistant serving when a resignation or another trigger occurs, not to a first assistant appointed after a trigger happens, the appeals court said. It also upheld the disqualification of the prosecutor from multiple felony cases, due to the appointment not being valid.

That ruling prompted new motions from people charged by prosecutors in California, a new order from Attorney General Todd Blanche that authorized Essayli to perform certain duties of a U.S. attorney, and the new ruling from Seabright.

Seabright said in the new ruling that Blanche’s recent order was very similar to the order struck down by the appeals court and the order he ruled against in 2025.

The appeals court ruling “rejected the position that someone could perform those duties in a different role, such as the [first assistant], when they were in reality acting as a ‘de facto’ United States Attorney,” Seabright said. That means Essayli is illegally serving as the de facto U.S. attorney, he said, and must be disqualified from the cases involving the defendants.

Seabright said the disqualifications would not go into effect until the court rules on the government’s motion for a stay, and denied the defendants’ bid to dismiss the charges against them, partly because the indictments were not signed by Essayli.