Audrey Strauss, U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York Audrey Strauss, acting U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York/courtesy photo

Audrey Strauss, the new acting U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, reported income of about $1.5 million in a 2018 financial disclosure, before rejoining the office she now heads.

Strauss' disclosure, a required filing for many top government officials, provides a glimpse into her earning power over the last months she spent working in the private sector.

A former top in-house lawyer at Alcoa Inc. and senior litigation partner at Fried Frank Harris Shriver & Jacobson in New York, Strauss returned to the Manhattan U.S. Attorney's Office in February 2018 to serve as senior counsel to Geoffrey Berman, who was abruptly dismissed from his post last weekend. Last year, she became Berman's second-in-command, succeeding Robert Khuzami, who had held the post since 2018.

She previously served as an assistant U.S. attorney in the Southern District, trying more than 20 cases from 1976 to 1983, according to the Southern District's website.

According to the filing, signed in May 2018, Strauss received a $1 million bonus and $33,880 in consulting fees from Alcoa. She also reported $333,500 in deferred compensation, as well as $76,300 in cash payments on phantom stock and performance shares from the company.

Strauss also listed a total of 233,400 vested shares in the industrial giant, which she could exercise at any time up to Jan. 1, 2022.

Strauss joined Alcoa, then known as Arconic Inc., as executive vice president and chief legal counsel from 2012 to 2016. She worked as a consultant for the company from January to June 2016, and also served on the board of The Innocence Project in 2017, according to the filing.

The disclosure forms generally cover the period for the year leading up to the date on which they were signed, plus the previous calendar year.

The report did not disclose her earnings as Alcoa's top attorney, but a 2012 regulatory filing revealed that she earned an annual salary of $565,000 and received a one-time sign-on bonus of $1.5 million. She was also eligible for variable compensation of 100% of her base salary for meeting certain targets, with a maximum opportunity of 200% of base salary for "exceptional performance."

In that post, she reported directly to the firm's then-CEO and Chairman Klaus Kleinfeld, who stepped down in April 2017.

Strauss' financial disclosure also highlighted a marked difference in private-sector earnings, compared with Berman, who was appointed to serve as U.S. attorney by the judges of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York in 2018.

ALM reported that year that Berman earned $3.5 million in salary and bonuses as a white-collar defender and shareholder at the New York law firm Greenberg Traurig in 2017.

On her return to the Manhattan U.S. Attorney's Office, Strauss worked closely on sensitive investigations into members of President Donald Trump's inner circle, including Michael Cohen, Trump's former attorney who pleaded guilty to criminal tax evasion and campaign-finance violations in 2018.

Strauss was named acting U.S. attorney on Saturday, following a standoff between Berman and U.S. Attorney General William Barr, who suddenly announced late Friday night that Berman was "stepping down" after 18 months in the post.

The announcement elicited a prompt and defiant response from Berman, who said in a statement that he had "no intention" of resigning. Berman did agree to step aside on Saturday, after Barr said that Trump had agreed to fire him.

However, the administration did appear to retreat from its original plan to install Craig Carpenito, the U.S. attorney for New Jersey, to serve on an acting basis in the Southern District, clearing the way for Strauss to take over leadership of the office.

Trump has said that he would nominate U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission head Jay Clayton to serve as U.S. attorney, though observers have said that nomination appeared dead on arrival in the U.S. Senate following last weekend's ordeal.

Strauss, meanwhile, is seen as a competent and well-respected official who represented continuity in the office, which has historically prided itself on its independence.

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