President Donald Trump’s abrupt ouster of almost half the country’s U.S. attorneys has done more than create yet another tempest for his nascent administration. It’s also created a new and potentially potent Democratic political class.

Campaign consultants in both parties have long identified prosecutors — especially those confirmed by the Senate to act as the chief federal law enforcement officers in the nation’s 93 judicial districts — as top-flight congressional recruiting opportunities. But, for reasons that aren’t all that obvious, the Republicans have propelled many more crime busters onto Capitol Hill than the Democrats in recent years.

But, as of this week, almost four dozen U.S. attorneys installed during the Obama administration are suddenly out of work. And they are carrying a very big Trumpian chip on their collective shoulders just as Democratic operatives are shifting their search for 2018 candidates into high gear.

The abruptness of their dismissals has only reinforced the perception of a White House intent on destabilizing normal governmental operations and eager to disregard old political conventions. One evermore clear consequence of Trump’s governance-by-upheaval approach is that the legislative steps toward conservative policymaking, not to mention political life, are becoming steadily more complicated for Trump’s putative GOP allies on Capitol Hill.

(Plucking four Republican congressmen for the Cabinet has only made it more difficult for the leadership to round up votes for Trump’s agenda, starting with the health care bill, for example.)