Manhattan US Attorney Preet Bharara is not doing much to encourage speculation that he's on the short list to be the next attorney general and he's not exactly discouraging it either.
Bharara's profile has grown steadily in his five years as head of one of the nation's most high-profile federal prosecutor's offices.
He made the cover of Time magazine for his aggressive pursuit of Wall Street fraudsters. He's overseen the biggest civilian terrorism cases. And he stood up to Gov. Andrew Cuomo over his dismantling of an anti-corruption commission.
As recently as this week, Bharara used humour to deflect speculation he's among a handful of potential candidates for the job being vacated by Attorney General Eric Holder a promotion that would make him the first Indian-American ever to serve on any US president's cabinet.
"So here's the problem: When you have a very proud Indian mother and a vacancy seems to be coming open, she will call all the newspapers and say please put me on the list," he said at a recent public appearance. "So I've told my mom to stop calling."
He added: "I'm very happy doing my job. And that's all I'm going to say."
Still, Bharara sounded interested in the job, signalling that if he was in charge, the Justice Department would keep its current course.
"The focus on national security, the focus on cyber-crime, the focus on civil rights " I think all those things are incredibly important," he said. "My sense is the priorities are pretty good and in line with how we go about things."
Having already cleared confirmation hearings for his current job, the 45-year-old Bharara is thought to be looked on favourably from both sides of the aisle in Congress among a list rumoured to include Solicitor General Don Verrilli, Labour Secretary Tom Perez and former Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano.
Before he became US attorney, Bharara was US Sen. Charles Schumer's chief counsel, helping to lead the investigation into the firings of nine US attorneys under President George W. Bush.
If Bharara were to get the job, he wouldn't have far to go to reconnect with some of his predecessors in the Manhattan US attorney's office. In the last year and two months, James Comey took over as FBI director and Mary Jo White became the top boss at the Securities and Exchange Commission.
White was US attorney in Manhattan during the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and in the months immediately afterword. Comey replaced her before he was appointed the No. 2 lawyer at the Justice Department in 2003.
