President Trump has nominated James M. McDonald to serve as US Attorney for the Southern District of New York, placing a former top crypto enforcement official in charge of the office widely regarded as the most consequential in American financial law.
The appointment, announced on June 13, fills the vacancy left by Jay Clayton’s recent move to Director of National Intelligence.
A career built on financial enforcement
McDonald served as the CFTC’s Director of Enforcement from 2017 to 2021. During that period, the CFTC ramped up its pursuit of digital asset fraud. One notable case under McDonald’s watch was a multi-million-dollar Bitcoin fraud prosecution brought by the SDNY in 2019.
Before leading CFTC enforcement, McDonald worked as an Assistant US Attorney in the very same Southern District. He later moved to the private sector as a litigation partner at Sullivan & Cromwell, where his work focused on financial matters from the defense side of the table.
