George Kelesis is a longtime Nevada attorney and state official who has been nominated to lead federal prosecutions in Nevada as the next U.S. attorney, a post that has been filled on an interim and acting basis. If the U.S. Senate confirms him, he would become Nevada’s top federal prosecutor in President Donald Trump’s second term, according to reporting describing the nomination. The nomination also comes as legal scrutiny continues over the way Sigal Chattah was appointed to serve as acting U.S. attorney.

Kelesis, 70, has worked in Nevada for roughly 45 years and is a partner with Cook & Kelesis in Las Vegas. The reporting on his background describes him as a defense attorney with long-standing work in tax law, and also a lawyer involved in corporate and commercial transactions and business formation. He has chaired the Nevada Tax Commission since 2023, after serving on the commission from 2002 to 2020, according to the description of his public-service record.

The nomination sets Kelesis against a recent dispute over Chattah’s authority to serve. A federal judge said in September that Chattah was illegally appointed to an acting role, and the decision is pending appeal before the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. In that context, the nomination marks the first time Trump’s administration has nominated someone to fill the U.S. attorney position permanently during his second term, the reporting said.

For the Senate process, Nevada’s Democratic senators have signaled that they plan to examine the nomination. Rosen’s office said she was reviewing Kelesis’ nomination, while Cortez Masto’s office said she “plans to conduct a tough, thorough interview,” according to the reporting. The senators had previously vowed to block Chattah’s nomination if it reached the chamber, amid concerns about the acting appointment.

Details from Kelesis’s career trace back to the early 1980s, when he earned a master’s degree in tax law from New York University, following earlier degrees from the University of the Pacific and UNLV. The reporting describes Nevada Supreme Court Chief Justice Michael Cherry, then a lawyer’s colleague, saying their firm partnership with Kelesis began after Cherry heard of the young Greek lawyer’s new degree and decided to steer him toward trial work. Cherry later told The Nevada Independent that he emailed Rosen after the announcement, praising Kelesis as someone who would be a “great manager” who is “so sensible,” according to the reporting.

Kelesis’s path through law firms included time working as an associate, later becoming a co-partner at a firm with Cherry and Mark Bailus. After Cherry left to become head of the Clark County Special Public Defender’s Office in 1997, the partnership ended, but the reporting says he and Cherry remained close. In 2005, Kelesis formed Bailus Cook & Kelesis with Marc Cook, and after Bailus became a judge in 2017, the firm became Cook & Kelesis, which is where Kelesis works today, the reporting said.

As chair of the Nevada Tax Commission, Kelesis is required to submit annual financial disclosures. The reporting said his latest disclosure filed last month lists six affiliated businesses tied to his law firm and that state business records connect them to him, and it also said an online search of records found about 30 other Nevada businesses tied to Kelesis and his firm, most of which are no longer active. The reporting added that none of those businesses appeared in federal or Clark County court filings, and it described Kelesis as registered Democrat according to voting records for Cherry, while also portraying Kelesis as registered nonpartisan.

The nomination also highlights Kelesis’s relationships to political figures from across parties. The reporting said voter and campaign-finance data show he donated to officials from both major parties, including $500 in 2023 to Las Vegas City Councilman Brian Knudsen, a registered Democrat, and donations connected to former President George W. Bush’s 2000 campaign and Cortez Masto’s Senate campaign. The reporting also said the law firm and other companies tied to Kelesis contributed to candidates in Nevada races involving both Democrats and Republicans, including donations reported in 2021 and 2016.

It also described Chattah’s acting tenure as set to expire this month, while noting that depending on how the appeals court rules on the legality of her appointment, she might remain in the role while Kelesis moves through the nomination process. The reporting said the Justice Department argued to the court that Chattah should be allowed to serve for an additional 210 days from the date of a withdrawal, rejection, or return of the nomination. Kelesis declined to comment when reached by The Nevada Independent after his nomination, according to the report.

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  • id: src_001 url: https://apnews.com/article/george-kelesis-donald-trump-donald-trump-es-nevada-catherine-cortez-masto-30b3452eb8c4b4dad12b1d514ba42ab5 outlet: Associated Press outlet_class: wire author: Eric Neugeboren/the Nevada Independent publication_date: 2026-02-17 access_date: 2026-02-17 reliability_tier: 1 originating_or_republishing: originating metadata: framework_version: 1.3.0 generation_timestamp: 2026-05-24T00:00:00Z source_cluster_id: cluster_ap_2026-02-18_george-kelesis-donald-trump-donald-trump gdelt_event_ids: [] consensus_floor_version: v1 publication_mindspec_version: msi-editorial-supervisor-v1 ai_disclosure: This article was generated algorithmically by Main Street Independent’s News Article Generator framework from the public sources listed under sources. Specification: /methodology. Human review: not_triggered. human_review_status: not_triggered human_review_triggers: [] license: https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/ primary_entities:
    • George Kelesis
    • Donald Trump
    • Sigal Chattah
    • Jacky Rosen
    • Catherine Cortez Masto primary_themes:
    • Federal courts and prosecutions
    • Senate confirmation and nominees
    • Political and legal accountability geographic_location: United States floor_values_engaged:
    • value: truthfulness intensity: 0.75
    • value: accountability_of_power intensity: 0.7
    • value: informed_citizenship intensity: 0.65