Summary: U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder has announced that he will formally resign from the post on Thursday after becoming the first African American to hold it.
News broke on Thursday that the United States Attorney General, Eric Holder Jr., will announce his resignation from the position. Holder is the first black U.S. attorney general in the country’s history, according to NPR.
Holder will leave the Justice Department when his successor is named, which might not happen until the end of 2014 or early in 2015. Unnamed sources have told NPR that Holder wants to leave the position soon because he fears that he could be stuck in the position for the remainder of President Barack Obama’s second term in the White House.
Holder is the fourth-longest tenured Attorney General in the history of the position and is among one of the longest-serving members of Obama’s Cabinet.
A leading candidate for the job is Solicitor General Don Verrilli. Verrilli is the top representative to the Supreme Court for the administration.
Those close to Holder say he has yet to decide what his next move will be in regards to his career, but he very well could return to Covington & Burling.
The former resignation announcement will be made later in the day on Thursday. Holder graduated from Columbia Law School and served as the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia. He also served time as an associate judge at the Superior Court of the District of Columbia under President Ronald Reagan.