Trump Picks Todd Blanche, His Defense Lawyer, to Be Deputy Attorney General

President-elect Donald J. Trump said on Thursday that he would name Todd Blanche, a lawyer who oversaw his defense against multiple indictments, to become the No. 2 official at the Justice Department.

The selection of Mr. Blanche, a former prosecutor in Manhattan, as the deputy attorney general serves as an extraordinary rebuke to the criminal cases against Mr. Trump. A day earlier, the president-elect chose Matt Gaetz, a Florida Republican and a caustic critic of the F.B.I. and the Justice Department, to become attorney general.

If confirmed as deputy attorney general, Mr. Blanche would be responsible for supervising the day-to-day operations of a department that Mr. Trump has repeatedly assailed.

Others on Mr. Trump’s legal team are also in line to receive top assignments: Emil Bove as principal associate deputy attorney general, and D. John Sauer, who represented Mr. Trump before the Supreme Court in arguing that the former president was entitled to broad immunity, as solicitor general.

In announcing his selection of Mr. Blanche, Mr. Trump pointed to his years as a supervising federal prosecutor at the U.S. attorney’s office for the Southern District of New York and his past clerkships.

“Todd is an excellent attorney who will be a crucial leader in the Justice Department, fixing what has been a broken System of Justice for far too long,” he wrote.