What is 28 U.S.C. § 515 and how has it been used to authorize prosecutors to work outside their districts?
Executive summary
28 U.S.C. § 515 is a short, longstanding federal statute that authorizes the Attorney General (or officials the Attorney General delegates) to direct Department of Justice attorneys — including specially appointed “special assistants” or “special attorneys” — to conduct any legal proceeding a U.S. Attorney could bring, even if the attorney is not a resident of the district where the proceeding occurs [1] [2]. The provision has been used as the statutory vehicle to seat Department lawyers, unpaid or paid, and to vest them with prosecutorial authority across district lines, but it operates alongside internal DOJ delegation rules and other statutes that shape how and when it is actually employed [3] [4] [5].
1. What § 515 actually says and who it names
The statute plainly empowers the Attorney General or “any other officer of the Department of Justice, or any attorney specially appointed by the Attorney General under law,” to “conduct any kind of legal proceeding… which United States attorneys are authorized by law to conduct, whether or not he is a resident of the district in which the proceeding is brought” (text of statute reproduced across statutory sources) [1] [2] [6]. It also contemplates commissioning, oaths and the Attorney General’s authority to fix salary for special assistants or special attorneys, language that identifies these lawyers as DOJ actors acting under the department’s umbrella [1] [7].
2. How DOJ implements § 515 inside the department
The department has mapped § 515 into regulatory delegations: Assistant Attorneys General and the Deputy Attorney General are authorized to exercise the Attorney General’s § 515 powers and designate Department attorneys to handle matters in districts where they do not reside (e.g., 28 C.F.R. Part 0 and section 0.15), creating a routine administrative pathway for out-of-district representation [3] [4]. The Office of Legal Counsel has confirmed that § 515 supplies the Department with “requisite authority” for certain appointment schemes and that the statute does not specify a minimum salary, which informed OLC advice allowing uncompensated special attorneys in narrow proposals [8] [9].
3. Real-world uses: special attorneys, Special Counsel and intra-DOJ detail
Practically, § 515 has been relied on to appoint special attorneys and to vest DOJ-appointed counsel with the ability to investigate and prosecute beyond their home districts; the General Accountability Office’s review of special counsel appointments notes that Acting Attorneys General have invoked § 515 alongside other statutory authorities when appointing internal Special Counsels (for example, the Fitzgerald appointment discussion) [5]. The statute has also undergirded internal programs where litigating divisions assign Department attorneys to represent the U.S. in districts other than their official residence [8] [3].
4. Legal and institutional limits — what § 515 does not automatically do
Although § 515 is broad, it is not a free-for-all: it requires specific direction by the Attorney General (text) and is shaped by other statutory schemes and DOJ regulations that govern appointment mechanics, delegation and oversight [1] [3] [4]. Separate statutory authorities — such as those creating independent-counsel mechanisms in past eras — provide different scopes of independence and funding; the independent-counsel frameworks are distinct from the internal § 515 appointments and historically vested different powers and institutional insulation [10]. The sources provided do not catalogue every instance of § 515’s use, nor do they litigate constitutional limits; reporting here is limited to statutory text, DOJ OLC and administrative descriptions [1] [9] [8].
5. Debates, transparency and potential concerns
Supporters argue § 515 supplies necessary national flexibility for the Department to marshal expertise and to ensure continuity when local resources are unavailable, a point reflected in DOJ regulatory delegations and OLC reasoning that the statute provides requisite authority [3] [9]. Critics, whose concerns are backgrounded in public debate though not itemized in the provided sources, typically warn that out-of-district appointments can erode local U.S. Attorney prerogatives, complicate accountability, or be used for politically sensitive prosecutions; those critiques are not exhaustively documented in the material at hand and would require case-by-case empirical review beyond these statutory and advisory texts [1] [8]. The record does show, however, that DOJ has long used § 515-related delegations in ways that balance centralized direction with internal procedures for designation and oversight [3] [4].