Executive Order 13775:DOJ Succession

What the Executive Order Says

This Executive Order (EO) is entitled "Providing an Order of Succession Within the Department of Justice".  It was issued on February 9th, 2017 and has 4 sections.  Note that this EO has been superseded by EO 13787 about which I have written here.

Section 1

This section lists 3 individuals who are US Attorneys that would succeed the Attorney General in case the existing list is exhausted.

Section 2

This section mentions exceptions to the rules of succession that might prevent a person who is in the role mentioned in subsection 1 to be able to fulfill the role of acting Attorney General.  There are some laws about it such as section 3345 of USC 5.

Section 3

This section revokes EO 13762.

Section 4

This section includes the regular legal fine print to ensure the constitutionality of the EO.

My Commentary

This is a regular kind of administrative thing for which Executive Orders or Memos are a good way of executing tasks.  I am sure that there was a lot of internal Republican party politics that went into the selection of the 3 individuals who hold the positions listed in Section 1, but they won the election so they are able to make these kinds of choices.
Having read somewhat into 5 USC 3345, it looks like there has been some history of this kind of order of succession.  And there are definite limits as to who can act as an interim and how long this can go on.  It does make me wonder if for some of the positions lacking Senate approved appointments in the executive branch, are we getting anywhere close to the statutory limits for acting interim appointments?