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While the Department of Justice no longer has to contend with the prospect of Attorney General Matt Gaetz, it still is likely to face a lot of the same directives under the direction of Pam Bondi.
The 59-year-old former Florida attorney general has a much better chance of getting through the Senate confirmation process than the now-former congressman ever did.
But while some Justice Department employees may have breathed a sigh of relief with the abrupt exist of her fellow Floridian, they are still in all likelihood going to have a disruptive force at the top of the agency.
“None of the baggage, but still the same orders,” one department attorney told CNN.
If Bondi, a loyal Trump ally, follows the president-elect’s likely wishes, she will become one of his top lieutenants on immigration, reproductive health access, and exacting the political retribution he promised on the campaign trail.
Trump remains irate at the investigations he faced from the department under special counsel Jack Smith, including criminal indictments for his alleged mishandling of classified documents and his attempts to overturn the 2020 election.
During a TV appearance last year, Bondi declared that at “the Department of Justice, the prosecutors will be prosecuted — the bad ones.”
“The investigators will be investigated,” she added. “Because the deep state, last term for President Trump, they were hiding in the shadows. But now they have a spotlight on them, and they can all be investigated.”
With Gaetz no longer in the running, some career staffers believe that conservative lawyers may be willing to return to the department after serving in previous Republican administrations, according to CNN.
Career staffers hope that Bondi — alongside Trump’s criminal defense attorney Todd Blanche, who is nominated for deputy attorney general — will be able to hire attorneys who know the ins and outs of the department and enact the president’s agenda while also retaining the department’s independence.
Trump nominated another one of his personal attorneys, Emil Bove, to be the principal associate deputy attorney general. He also nominated D. John Sauer, who managed to convince the Supreme Court that Trump and other presidents have immunity for official acts, to be the solicitor general.
Prosecutor Nick Cox was one of Bondi’s top deputies in Florida.
While calling her “effusive” and “sweet” when speaking to CNN, Cox also said, “If you crossed her in court or pissed her off, run for the door.”
“She’s going to do everything she can, I’m sure, to remain loyal to what [Trump’s] desires are and what his needs are,” he told the network.
But he added that he didn’t think she would “cross the line” and bring politically motivated charges.
“When it comes to criminal prosecutions, we have nothing to worry about,” he said.
Palm Beach County state attorney Dave Aronberg told the network that Bondi “will not intentionally violate the law to round up Trump’s enemies.”
But he added that Bondi is likely to order more special counsel investigations, such as those conducted by attorney John Durham, who probed possible misconduct in the FBI’s Russia investigation.
“I know she will do controversial things like John Durham-like investigations, but we have been through that, and it will be okay,” Aronberg told CNN.
“Pam Bondi is the best attorney general that Donald Trump is going to nominate,” he added. “We should pick our battles.”
Bondi was one of the top surrogates for Trump in Florida during his 2016 campaign and she has been a strong supporter of the former president ever since.
During Trump’s first impeachment, Bondi was part of the defense team for his Senate trial and she made unfounded claims about President Joe Biden having had illicit business dealings with his son Hunter in Ukraine.
During her speech at the Republican National Convention in 2020, she once again railed against the Biden family. She also pushed baseless claims about election fraud.
She serves as the chair for the Center for Litigation at America First Policy Institute, where she spearheaded its work against what conservatives call the “weaponization” of the Justice Department. On a number of occasions, she has appeared in the press railing against the department’s focus on the cases against Trump.
Bondi’s nomination to lead the department comes amid reports that Trump set to attempt to fire the attorneys who worked with Special Counsel Jack Smith investigating the former president for his alleged mishandling of classified documents and for his connection to the Capitol riot.
Those affected are likely to include career professionals usually shielded from such revenge efforts, according to The Washington Post.
Trump is also set to put together groups to look for evidence that the 2020 election was riddled with fraud.
The president-elect continues to falsely allege that the 2020 election was stolen from him as he remains steadfast in his baseless belief that Smith’s investigations investigations are evidence of the weaponization of government for which he is now seeking revenge.
“For too long, the partisan Department of Justice has been weaponized against me and other Republicans,” Trump said in his statement announcing Bondi as his new pick for attorney general following the departure of Gaetz. “Not anymore. Pam will refocus the DOJ to its intended purpose of fighting Crime, and Making America Safe Again.”
Smith is set to reveal in court filings on December 2 how he plans to wind down the cases against Trump in adherence with department policy not to prosecute sitting presidents.
Trump and his allies have yet to provide any evidence of widespread fraud.
He wrote in September that there was “rampant cheating” in 2020 and that those responsible would “be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, which will include long-term prison sentences.”
“Please beware, that this legal exposure extends to Lawyers, Political Operatives, Donors, Illegal Voters, & Corrupt Election Officials,” he wrote on Truth Social. “Those involved in unscrupulous behavior will be sought out, caught, and prosecuted at levels, unfortunately, never seen before in our Country.”
Source: independent.co.uk
