Joe diGenova, the 81-year-old Trump ally tapped to run a sprawling Florida-based Justice Department investigation into President Donald Trump’s perceived political enemies, resigned Thursday — still without charging anyone.

“It was an honor and a privilege to serve the president and the department,” diGenova told NBC News. Asked why he is leaving, he said, “I’m moving on.” In a brief call with CNN, he used nearly the same line: “It was an honor and privilege to serve the president and the department.”

ABC News, which first reported the departure, said diGenova submitted his resignation to Attorney General Todd Blanche amid growing frustration from Trump and senior DOJ officials over the pace of the so-called “grand conspiracy” probe based in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Florida. CNN reported he stepped down under pressure after clashes with top Justice officials, including a recent warning that he had lost his superiors’ confidence.

NBC News, citing a source familiar with the determination, said department leaders had already lost confidence in diGenova’s leadership even though he resigned rather than being fired. Officials felt the investigation was not moving quickly enough despite a team of Justice Department lawyers sent from Washington. For now, no single replacement will be named; the probe is expected to continue with those attorneys at the helm, NBC reported. The Justice Department declined to comment.

DiGenova, a former U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia under President Ronald Reagan, was installed in April after career prosecutor Maria Medetis Long was removed. Long had objected to advancing an investigation into former CIA Director John Brennan, whom Trump allies wanted charged over alleged false testimony, NBC reported. DiGenova had pitched himself as someone who could accelerate the case; on Rudy Giuliani’s podcast in April he vowed charges could come in 30 days and blamed then-Attorney General Pam Bondi for blocking his earlier appointment, CNN said.

The investigation has revisited government inquiries into Trump stretching from the 2016 Russia interference probe through the January 6 Capitol riot and Mar-a-Lago classified documents cases. Former FBI Director James Comey and others have also been among those scrutinized, CNN has reported. Despite dozens of subpoenas over the past year and a recent burst of grand jury activity, the probe has produced no prosecutions. A major legal hurdle, NBC noted, is the age of some conduct — nearly a decade old and outside the typical five-year statute of limitations for most federal crimes.

The Fort Pierce, Florida, grand jury sits before U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon, and the district is overseen by Trump-appointed U.S. Attorney Jason A. Reding Quiñones. DiGenova brought his wife, Victoria Toensing, onto the team; CNN said she is also expected to leave. In that April podcast, Toensing argued the earlier Virginia case against Comey should have been saved for the “vast conspiracy” in Fort Pierce — and diGenova floated folding New York Attorney General Letitia James and even seeking testimony from former President Barack Obama into a “massive conspiracy” count. It is not clear how far those ambitions got.

Trump has publicly and privately pressed for faster charges against people he says unfairly targeted him, including at a White House meeting with U.S. attorneys where he complained some were weak, CNN reported. He fired Bondi in part over that frustration. A prosecutor who promised speed and left with an empty charging sheet is the kind of outcome that should make voters ask whether the department is investigating crimes — or staging politics with subpoenas.

Sources