"When Trump took office, former Attorney General Jeff Sessions asked the 46 remaining Obama-appointed U.S. attorneys to submit their resignations, leaving the spot that Charles Oberly once held in Delaware open. But although Trump ultimately makes the appointment, Senators within the state have some sway, according to FactCheck.org.
“There is an old Senate tradition going back to when George Washington was president called ‘senatorial courtesy,’ in which home state senators get a virtual veto over executive appointees with jobs that exist entirely within their home state,” Michigan State University political science professor Ian Ostrander told Fact Check. “Senatorial courtesy is the tradition that led to the more familiar blue slips process for court appointments in the Senate Judiciary Committee.”
Sens. Chris Coons and Tom Carper, both Democrats, recommended Weiss, a registered Republican, to Trump in 2017, with Carper calling Weiss “an excellent choice for U.S. Attorney for the District of Delaware.”
So, while it is accurate to call Weiss a “Trump-appointed” U.S. attorney, that label omits the fact that he was actually chosen by a pair of Democratic lawmakers and could mislead readers into thinking that Weiss was at one time a close ally of Trump."
