David Metcalf

David Metcalf (born 1986) is an American lawyer who currently serves as the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.^[1] He was nominated by President Donald Trump for this position on March 11, 2025.^[2][3] Before the Senate approved his nomination, on June 24, 2025, the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania appointed Metcalf as the United States Attorney.^[1]

Early life and education

Metcalf grew up in Northern Virginia and graduated from Wakefield School. Metcalf went to Princeton University to play collegiate soccer for the varsity men’s soccer team, earning 1st Team All-Ivy Academic Honors.^[4][5] Metcalf received his Bachelor of Arts with Honors from Princeton.^[6][7]

Metcalf received his Juris Doctor from the University of Virginia School of Law, where he served as an editor of the Virginia Law Review and graduated Order of the Coif.^[8]

Career

After graduation from law school, Metcalf was a law clerk to Judge Albert Diaz of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit from 2012 to 2013.^[9] After his clerkship, he was then an associate lawyer for the Washington D.C. firm Covington & Burling, LLP.^[10]

Metcalf first joined the Department of Justice in 2015 as an Assistant United States Attorney for the District of Maryland, where he received an award for the Excellence in the Prosecution of Organized Crime and served as Deputy Chief of Appeals.^[11]

United States Attorney

As United States Attorney, Metcalf has been assigned significant national security investigations, and oversaw the prosecution of white-collar offenses, including a $770 million Ponzi scheme.^[12] In 2025, Metcalf filed charges in what he described as “the largest federal indictment this century” in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, charging 33 defendants in a drug-trafficking conspiracy based in Philadelphia.^[13][14] In September 2025, Metcalf also announced that the Department of Justice had filed a civil complaint against ProMedica Health System, alleging that several of its nursing facilities provided “grossly substandard” care in violation of the Nursing Home Reform Act.^[15]