U.S. Attorneys, Political Control, and Career Ambition

United States Attorneys (USAs), the chief federal prosecutors in each judicial district, are key in determining how the federal government uses coercive force against its citizens. How much control do national political actors exert over the prosecutorial decisions of USAs? This book investigates this question using a unique dataset of federal criminal prosecutions between 1986 and 2015 that captures both decisions by USAs to file cases as well as the sentences that result.