WASHINGTON — Assistant Attorney General Colin McDonald directed all U.S. attorneys' offices to detail a local prosecutor to support the Washington-based National Fraud Enforcement Division beginning July 1, according to a memo. The division was created earlier this year.

McDonald said the detailing of a prosecutor from each U.S. attorney's office is intended to help execute a nationwide strategy to eliminate fraud in every district and to increase efficiency and efficacy by relying on local assistant U.S. attorneys to prosecute, support, and consult on fraud division litigation in their district, according to the memo. Beginning July 1, each prosecutor detailed to the new office should not be assigned any new work or cases without prior approval from the fraud division, the memo stated.

The staffing arrangement was announced one day after the Justice Department invited state and local governments to apply for $300 million in grants to hire local prosecutors on a temporary basis. Under the grants, local prosecutors would serve in the fraud division as special assistant U.S. attorneys focusing on public benefit fraud schemes involving people living in the United States illegally.

Staffing levels across the Department of Justice, including many U.S. attorneys' offices, have been stretched thin by widespread departures and difficulties in hiring new attorneys. Many U.S. attorneys' offices have also been contending with a flood of habeas petitions by immigrants swept up in the Trump administration's mass detention policy.

The Trump administration has focused on pursuing fraud investigations involving government benefit programs in Minnesota and California. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said the new fraud division would primarily be staffed by combining various Department of Justice offices that handle criminal fraud involving health care, taxes, benefits, and corporations. Blanche suggested the division would be open to accepting criminal referrals from the White House, departing from norms established after the Watergate scandal to insulate criminal investigations from political influence.