President-elect Donald Trump’s nomination of Pam Bondi for attorney general has caused quite a stir, especially among folks on the left who fear that the incoming administration will target Justice Department officials who participated in the politically motivated efforts to prosecute Trump.
If current signs are any indication, they have every reason to be afraid.
During an interview with Fox News last year, Bondi said that if Trump wins the election, “The Department of Justice, the prosecutors will be prosecuted, the bad ones.”
Bondi accused the officials of being part of a “deep state” conspiracy, saying, “They are no longer hiding in the shadows…they can all be investigated.”
A former senior Justice Department official told NBC News that they “would expect [Bondi] to do exactly what Trump wants her to do” and noted that members of special counsel Jack Smith’s team who indicted Trump in the classified documents case and supposed efforts to overturn the 2020 election are “very concerned and talking to lawyers.”
Trump reportedly plans to fire Smith and his team as one of his first acts as president, according to The Washington Post. Two sources close to the president-elect’s transition team said he aims to “clean out the bad guys.”
The person noted that the idea of assembling investigative teams of federal agents and prosecutors in battleground states is less well-formed and “not at the top of the list” — unlike the president-elect’s oft-proclaimed desire to clean house at the Justice Department. Trump reiterated that goal Thursday, after his first pick for attorney general, former congressman Matt Gaetz, withdrew from consideration.
“For too long, the partisan Department of Justice has been weaponized against me and other Republicans,” Trump wrote when announcing his new pick, longtime ally Pam Bondi, in a post on Truth Social. “Not anymore. Pam will refocus the DOJ to its intended purpose of fighting Crime, and Making America Safe Again.”
Sen. Eric Schmitt (R-MO) agreed with these sentiments during an appearance on “Meet the Press.”
“First and foremost, the people involved with this should be fired immediately,” he said, arguing that “There has to be accountability for these kinds of abuses.”
So, let’s whip out the political crystal ball and see if we can peer into a future when Trump and his team start cleaning house at the Justice Department. If the president-elect follows through on his pledge, then there is ample reason for many in the agency to be concerned.
Over recent years, the DOJ has been weaponized not only against the president-elect but also against conservatives. Agents have targeted pro-life protesters and even Catholics. Hopefully, Trump’s cleanup efforts aren’t limited only to those who went after him personally. If he does expand the effort, it would go a long way toward wrecking the administrative state embedded in the DOJ. It would become harder for the agency to continue targeting folks on the right even when Trump is in office.
The reaction from the Democrats and media is so predictable one does not need a crystal ball to predict the national meltdowns that will ensue. In fact, there was already mass hysteria on the left when Trump nominated Bondi. They will claim Trump is using the DOJ for his own political agenda, a claim that might conjure images of a pot and kettle. We can also expect to hear the word “fascist” more than we have even during the 2024 presidential campaign.
To put it simply, they will accuse Trump of what they have been doing. But if Trump plays his cards right, it won’t matter. While I don’t have a lot of faith that efforts to root out corruption in the Justice Department and FBI will be completely successful, there is always the chance that Trump could prove me wrong. Here’s to hoping, right?
