‘Not right now’: McQuade picks teaching over politics

It’s a moment seared into former U.S. Attorney Barbara McQuade’s memory and resonates with her more than six years later.

It was the fall 2010, and McQuade and 92 other lawyers were at the White House visiting President Barack Obama for the first time as a group of U.S. attorneys.

“The president said, ‘Your loyalty is not to me, but to the Constitution and the people of the United States. And if those roads ever diverge, stand with the Constitution and the people,’ ” McQuade said Tuesday as she looked at a photo of her and all 93 U.S. attorneys standing next to the president.

On Tuesday, even as McQuade packed up her office after being asked to resign by the Trump administration last week after seven years as the top federal prosecutor, the Constitution was foremost on the 52-year-old’s mind.

McQuade quelled speculation Tuesday that she would run for elected office in 2018 and instead announced plans to join the University of Michigan Law School. McQuade, a 1991 Michigan Law graduate, will join the faculty as a professor from practice on May 1, teaching national security, criminal law and criminal procedure.

“I really want to continue in public service. ... The chance to teach the next generation of law students about what’s important in our legal system — to me — has never been more important,” McQuade said from her former desk at the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Detroit. “Understanding our courts and understanding our Constitution is really important.”

On Tuesday, as she cleaned out her 20th-floor downtown office overlooking the Detroit River, McQuade reflected on the past several days — which included learning of her requested resignation via the media — as well as the last seven years. It is common for new presidential administrations to ask all holdover U.S. attorneys to step down.

McQuade, the first woman to serve as U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Michigan, said she thought she would get another four to six weeks to wrap up case meetings, fully transition all of her responsibilities to new acting U.S. Attorney Dan Lemisch, who was her first assistant U.S. attorney, and hand off some speaking engagements booked two months in advance.

But she didn’t. This week, her badge access to the building and computer permissions were cut off.

“That struck me as creating unnecessary disruption,” McQuade said.

From Kilpatrick to Fata

During her career, McQuade and her team aggressively tackled public corruption, health care fraud, violent crimes and civil rights cases across the Eastern District, which covers 34 counties and an estimated 6 million residents.

Her most notable case was the collar and the conviction of former Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick and on public corruption charges. Kilpatrick was sentenced to 28 years in prison.

Her first major case in office was against Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, an al-Qaida operative, for attempting to blow up an airliner over Detroit on Christmas Day in 2009. He pleaded guilty and is serving a life sentence.

Under McQuade, the Justice Department brought cases against oncologist Farid Fata, who admitted to giving chemotherapy to cancer-free patients. She brought fraud cases against Volkswagen AG and Takata Corp. as well as Pittsfield Township and Sterling Heights for cases related to a religious land use law and the construction of mosques.

As for her legacy, McQuade said she hopes people remember her and her office for being effective.

“Sometimes, government gets a bad name,” McQuade said. “I hope we have demonstrated that good government can work well for people and can improve the quality of life for people. I just hope the people say that she proved government can be effective.”

All current and pending criminal and civil cases will continue under 115 career professional assistant U.S. attorneys, including a public corruption probe in Macomb County.

McQuade hopes her efforts to prosecute officials in public corruption cases — including recently 13 Detroit Public School principals and school supplier Norman Shy — have a lasting impact on how people consider whether to break the law.

“Someone once said ‘greed is a mighty river,’ and it’s really hard to resist. You hope people have a good moral compass and will make the right decision. ... We hoped to change the equation by letting people know there is somebody looking,” she said.

McQuade said the job has humbled her. To see defendants charged with crimes is humbling, she said. McQuade said she sees everybody is dealing with something, from her staff to people she encounters on the job.

“I have lived a very privileged life, and to see the challenges other people overcome has been humbling,” she said.

Before her tenure

Before McQuade’s tenure as U.S. attorney, the Eastern District faced several challenges.

In 2004, U.S. District Judge Gerald Rosen presided over the Detroit Sleeper Cell case in Detroit, the first criminal trial to result from the federal 9/11 terrorism probe. Though a jury convicted three North African immigrants in the case, Rosen overturned the convictions after discovering that prosecutors had withheld evidence favorable to the defendants.

In 2005, federal prosecutors in Detroit did not charge any former Kmart Corp. executives — including former chairman and CEO Charles Conaway and former president Mark Schwartz — for their roles in the events leading up to the discount retailer’s 2002 bankruptcy.

That decision capped a multimillion-dollar, 31/2-year FBI and Justice Department probe into allegations that corporate wrongdoing caused the retail bankruptcy filing.

Political future?

Democratic political consultant T.J. Bucholz said McQuade has a “good track record that could be leveraged into a great run for a statewide race” and was surprised to hear she does not plan to run.

The increasing importance of political fundraising can turn off some potential candidates, Bucholz said, acknowledging he does not know if that was a factor for McQuade.

“I certainly don’t think she’s going to disappear into the annals of academic history at the University of Michigan,” Bucholz said. “She’s young enough, has a good profile and good visibility. There’s no reason she couldn’t step in on a future cycle for a future race.”

Democrats had hoped McQuade would run for public office in 2018. Her name had been floated as a possible candidate for either attorney general or governor, and a “draft McQuade” page popped up this weekend on Facebook.

But McQuade, who is married and a mother of four, put an end to speculation about that prospect on Tuesday in her sit-down interview with the The News.

“No, it’s not something I plan to pursue. Not right now. I have teenage children and other things that are important to me right now,” she said. “People like to speculate on that, but no one has ever checked with me.”

What she will miss the most about her life as U.S. attorney, McQuade said, other than her staff, is the ability to solve problems.

“I will miss the ability to identify a problem in our community and then have the power to harness the resources of the federal government to try to solve the problem,” McQuade said.

jchambers@detroitnews.com

Staff Writer Jonathan Oosting contributed.

McQuade’s predecessors

Terrence Berg, (interim) 2008-10. Currently a federal judge in Flint.

Stephen Murphy, 2005-08. Currently a federal judge in Detroit.

Jeffrey Collins, 2001-04. Currently in private practice in Detroit.