Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey is resigning to join Trump administration

Kacen Bayless - The Kansas City Star (TNS)

Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey will resign next month to serve as a co-deputy director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, signifying the Missouri litigator’s rapid ascent in Trump’s political orbit.

Bailey announced his resignation, which will be effective on Sept. 8, in a press release Monday evening. Bailey will serve in President Donald Trump’s administration alongside Dan Bongino, the FBI’s current deputy director.

“My life has been defined by a call to service and I am once again answering that call, this time at the national level,” Bailey said in a statement on Monday. “But wherever I am called, Missouri is and always will be home.”

The announcement had been rumored in Missouri GOP circles most of the day on Monday. The move marks another example of a Missouri attorney general’s quick rise to a federal post. But Bailey will move to an administrative role while his most recent predecessors, Eric Schmitt and Josh Hawley, used the office as a pathway to more visible positions in the U.S. Senate.

As co-deputy director, which does not require Senate confirmation, Bailey will serve as second-in-command to FBI Director Kash Patel under U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi. The office has come under withering criticism in recent weeks due to the Trump administration’s reported mishandling of documents related to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

Bailey, a soldier-turned-lawyer, had never held elected office before former Republican Gov. Mike Parson named him attorney general to fill a vacancy in late 2022. He went on to win a full term in 2024, including defeating one of Trump’s lawyers, Will Scharf, in the Republican primary.

In his more than two years as attorney general, Bailey was largely viewed as a conservative firebrand. He often used the office to insert himself and Missouri into politically explosive fights in support of Trump, filing headline-grabbing lawsuits and rarely-used legal maneuvers that pushed the boundaries of the office.

Bailey distinguished himself among national conservatives through a barrage of litigation, legal threats and incendiary social media posts that often went further than his Republican predecessors.

He attempted to use state law to ban transgender health care for both adults and kids. He deployed rare legal mechanisms to remove from office elected officials across the state. He regularly fought against the expansion of abortion rights after voters enshrined a right to the procedure in the state constitution. And he wielded the office to take on former President Joe Biden, while championing efforts by the federal government under Trump.

Before becoming attorney general, Bailey served as Parson’s general counsel where he faced sharp criticism for his role in helping draft talking points that the governor used to argue that a journalist should be prosecuted for uncovering a security flaw on the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education website.

Parson’s effort to prosecute the journalist was roundly criticized by free press advocates and the Cole County prosecutor declined to pursue charges.

As attorney general, Bailey often appeared on TV and online shows with national conservative talk show hosts and touted many of the culture war political causes elevated by Trump supporters. But he also faced extensive criticism from both Democrats and some Republicans, who argued that he incompetently managed the attorney general’s office.

Bailey’s appointment means that the Missouri Gov. Mike Kehoe will have the power to appoint the state’s next attorney general. The office is one of the most sought-after positions in Missouri and largely viewed as a political golden ticket to climb to a higher office.

Schmitt was elected to the U.S. Senate just four years after Parson appointed him as attorney general while Hawley began his successful Senate campaign less than a year after being sworn into the office. Before them, attorneys general John Danforth, John Ashcroft and Jay Nixon all used the office as a path to a more visible position.

Parson said he picked Bailey to bring stability to the office, which had seen four different attorneys general since 2017. When asked in 2022 whether he planned to seek higher office, Bailey told The Star that he was “focused on being the kind of Attorney General that Missourians deserve and that is my driving motivation.”

Kehoe appears to have moved quickly to fill the position in an effort to avoid an extensive and chaotic interview process. The Republican governor has called a press conference to announce Bailey’s successor on Tuesday. One name being floated in Republican circles as a potential candidate is Catherine Hanaway, a former federal prosecutor, Missouri House speaker and candidate for governor.

In an email to The Star prior to Bailey’s appointment, Hanaway did not say whether she had been approached by Kehoe about the job.

“I didn’t realize that Andrew Bailey was no longer AG,” Hanaway said in the email on Monday.

A spokesperson for Kehoe did not immediately respond to a request for comment about Bailey and his potential successor.

While Kehoe prepares to announce Missouri’s next attorney general, Bailey’s appointment appeared to solidify the Missouri Republican Party’s influence within the Trump administration. While some of the tenures have been rocky, several top Missouri officials have been placed in high-profile positions by the Republican president.

Scharf, Bailey’s former opponent, serves as the White House staff secretary. Former Missouri Solicitor General D. John Sauer is Trump’s U.S. Solicitor General. Trump also picked two employees in Bailey’s office, Josh Divine and Maria Lanahan, for federal judge posts.

Former U.S. Rep. Billy Long, a Missouri Republican, briefly served as Trump’s Internal Revenue Service commissioner before being fired earlier this month. Trump also chose Ed Martin, a former chair of the Missouri GOP, for U.S. attorney for Washington, D.C., before the Republican president pulled the nomination.

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