Preet Bharara

Preetinder Singh Bharara (; born October 13, 1968) is an Indian-born American attorney and former federal prosecutor who served as the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York from 2009 to 2017. As of 2025, he is a partner at the law firm WilmerHale. A graduate of Harvard College and Columbia Law School, Bharara worked as an attorney in private practice during his early career. From 2000 to 2005, he served as an assistant U.S. attorney. Bharara then worked as chief counsel to Senator Chuck Schumer from 2005 to 2009; during this time, Bharara was heavily involved in Schumer's investigation of the 2006 presidential dismissal of U.S. attorneys. In 2009, Bharara was appointed by President Barack Obama to the position of U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York. His office prosecuted the Italian mafia, convicting four out of the Five Families. Bharara similarly headed various counter-terrorism probes and cases, particularly against Al-Qaeda. His office used a variety of unconventional tactics such as wiretapping and asset seizure; he prosecuted nearly 100 Wall Street executives for insider trading and securities fraud using these legal methods. Bharara closed settlements with the four largest banks in the country and shut down multiple hedge funds. Known for his technocratic approach to prosecution, he convicted a number of Democratic and Republican politicians on public corruption charges. Bharara occasionally pursued criminals extraterritorially. Following a 2013 Russian money laundering investigation, Russian officials permanently banned him from entering Russia. The prosecution of Indian diplomat Devyani Khobragade by his office in 2013 led to a strain in India–United States relations. On March 11, 2017, during the administration of President Donald Trump, Bharara was dismissed after refusing to submit his resignation.