President Trump’s decision to drop the bribery charges against Mayor Adams could escalate the burgeoning conflict between the 47th president and the federal judiciary — and set him on a collision course with a jurist whose background is on the left. 

The memorandum issued on Monday by the acting deputy attorney general, Emil Bove, to the acting United States attorney for the Southern District of New York, Danielle Sassoon, ordered: “You are directed to dismiss the case” against Mr. Adams. The ultimate decision, though, is not Mr. Bove’s to make. 

The fate of the prosecution of New York’s 110th mayor rests with a district court jurist, Dale Ho. Judge Ho was named to the bench by President Biden. Before that, he directed the American Civil Liberties Union’s voting rights project, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, and argued thrice against the Trump administration before the Supreme Court.

Judge Ho’s confirmation hearings proved contentious — he was confirmed by a 50-49 vote. During those hearings, he apologized for  “overheated rhetoric” on social media, which he insisted did not “reflect how I’ve shown up in court, or how I’ve conducted myself in professional settings.”

The nominee had previously expressed criticisms of Senate Republicans. Senator Cruz called him “an extreme partisan.” Judge Ho acknowledged that some could see in him a “wild-eyed sort of leftist.” He also, in online posts, called the Senate and the Electoral College “undemocratic.”

Will the judge, though, bow to the Constitution’s most important check in abuse of powers, the clause that restricts judicial power to resolving actual cases and controversies? Without that clause, the Framers feared, the courts could become dictatorial. What could stop them? This is why courts usually move with alacrity when the prosecutor walks in and says he or she is dropping a case or the dispute has been resolved.

Occasionally, though, a judge will object and try to refuse to drop a case. That happened with Judge Emmett Sullivan at Washington, who refused to credit Attorney General Barr’s decision to drop charges against General Flynn. Now, Judge Ho could — he hasn’t said he will — scrutinize Mr. Bove’s logic for dismissing a case that was set to go to trial in April.

Mr. Bove, himself an erstwhile prosecutor in the Southern District, now mandates: “There shall be no further targeting of Mayor Adams or additional investigative steps … and you are further directed to take all steps within your power to cause Mayor Adams’ security clearances to be restored.”

Mr. Bove cites “independent reasons” for the prosecutorial pivot, and ventures that the case “improperly interfered with Mayor Adams’ campaign in the 2025 mayoral election” and has “restricted Mayor Adams’ ability to devote full attention and resources to the illegal immigration and violent crime that escalated under the policies of the prior Administration.” The mayoral primary is in June, and Mr. Adams was charged in September.

Mr. Adams on Tuesday insisted at City Hall that he “never broke the law and I never would. I would never put any personal benefit above my solemn responsibility as your mayor.” The previous United States attorney for SDNY, Damian Williams, reckoned that he did just that by accepting thousands of dollars in perks and bribes from Turkey in exchange for political favors.

There has of yet been no word from SDNY about what it makes of the new dispensation from Main Justice, as the DOJ’s headquarters at Washington is frequently called. SDNY is sometimes reckoned to be the most prestigious of all the DOJ offices, and famously independent. The directive from Mr. Bove could be met with resistance — or possibly resignations.

Mr. Trump in November nominated the former chairman of the United States Securities and Exchange Commission, Jay Clayton, to lead the SDNY. That appointment, though, requires confirmation by the Senate. Ms. Sassoon, as acting United States attorney, can at will be replaced as the leader of the office.  

The real test, though, will be whether Judge Ho agrees to dismiss the charges. Rule 48 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure mandates: “The government may, with leave of court, dismiss an indictment, information, or complaint.” That means that the judge must approve the motion for the charges to be dismissed — in this case, “without prejudice.”

A study of this provision that appeared in the Stanford Law Review argues that the “leave of court” requirement is intended to “guard against dubious dismissals of criminal cases that would benefit powerful and well-connected defendants,” and is meant to “empower a district judge to halt a dismissal where the court suspects some impropriety has prompted prosecutors’ attempt to abandon a case.”     

The occasion for that article was the prosecution of General Flynn by Special Counsel Robert Mueller. After the general had already pleaded guilty, the first Trump administration asked Judge Sullivan to dismiss the case. The judge insisted on proceeding to sentencing, insisting that he was “not intended to serve merely as a rubber stamp” for a “patently pretextual” motion for dismissal.

Mr. Trump responded to that recalcitrance by simply pardoning General Flynn. If Judge Ho proves as unyielding as Judge Sullivan, the president could be forced to exercise that awesome power on behalf of the mayor who has, in recent months, dined at Mar-a-Lago and attended the inauguration.