Part of the reason I said I was not going to resign and be fired was because I want the record to reflect for all time that there was a deliberate decision, not just a bureaucratic sweeping away of what had been there in the past, but a specific decision to change one’s mind and deliberately fire me, particularly given what my office’s jurisdiction is and where my office is situated.

Preet Bharara

Categorized in : Politics

I don't get paid to serve the president. I get paid to serve the public and what I think is in the interest of justice, no matter who the president is.

Preet Bharara

president justice thinking

I just want to apologize in advance that I don’t have enough subpoenas for all of you.

Preet Bharara

apologizing enough want

History has shown that one cannot legislate a culture of integrity. And yet, one of the paramount responsibilities and challenges of corporate leadership is to ensure such a culture.

Preet Bharara

responsibility challenges integrity

We have witnessed the most educated, successful, and monied professionals in the country put their companies - not to mention their own liberty - at risk by engaging in flagrant and foolhardy illegal conduct.

Preet Bharara

risk successful country

That's an incredibly serious thing if people think that the president of the United States can tell heads of law enforcement agencies, based on his own whim or his own personal preferences or friendships, that they should or should not pursue particular criminal cases against individuals. That's not how America works.

Preet Bharara

president people thinking

I do my job. I love my job. It's the best job I ever had. And it's probably the best job I will ever have. And I serve at the pleasure of the president. That's true of President Obama. That will be true of President Trump. And if and when a president decides that they want to replace me, I'll ride off into the sunset.

Preet Bharara

sunset pleasure president

I wanted to be a prosecutor - a criminal lawyer - because there's nowhere where the stakes are higher, where you can wake up every day and believe in what you're doing.

Preet Bharara

criminals wake-up believe

In some respects, inside information is a form of financial steroid. It is unfair: it is offensive; it is unlawful; and it puts a black mark on the entire enterprise.

Preet Bharara

information financial black

Securities fraud generally and insider trading in particular should be eminently deterrable crimes.

Preet Bharara

insider-trading crime should

Insider trading tells everybody at precisely the wrong time that everything is rigged, and only people who have a billion dollars and have access to and are best friends with people who are on boards of directors of major companies - they're the only ones who can make a true buck.

Preet Bharara

dollars directors people

I don't eat green things, no vegetables.

Preet Bharara

green-things green vegetables

I don't like coffee but I need caffeine.

Preet Bharara

caffeine coffee needs

I would like to think that the level of aggressiveness in law enforcement will remain the same, when you're talking about things like keeping the markets fair and government honest. I don't foresee any departure from that, unless I'm missing something big.

Preet Bharara

honest missing thinking

I have come to really love the sound of nervous laughter.

Preet Bharara

nervous laughter

Unfortunately, from what I can see from my vantage point as the U.S. Attorney here, illegal insider trading is rampant and may even be on the rise.

Preet Bharara

insider-trading vantage-point may

As the United States attorney in Manhattan, I have come to worry about few things as much as the gathering cyber threat.

Preet Bharara

united-states gathering worry

Businesses should be assured that law enforcement will operate with the utmost sensitivity toward victims of cyber attacks.

Preet Bharara

cyber-attacks enforcement law

I eat almost no lunch. I have a big dinner but I don't have a big lunch.

Preet Bharara

dinner lunch bigs

The aggressive use of wiretaps is important: It shows that we are targeting white-collar insider-trading rings with the same powerful investigative tools that have worked so successfully against the mob and drug cartels.

Preet Bharara

drug-cartels powerful white

Significant officials at publicly traded companies are casually and cavalierly engaged in insider trading. Because insider trading has as one of its elements communication, it doesn't take rocket science to realize it's nice to have the communication on tape.

Preet Bharara

tape communication nice