Apr.03

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GOP 53

Bondi Gets Noem'd...

Donald Trump's problems are never Donald Trump's fault. When he's having a bad week, or a bad month—and he's in the middle of both right now—everyone who works for him is at risk of becoming a scapegoat. And yesterday, the wheel of misfortune stopped spinning with the arrow having landed on "Attorney General" Pam Bondi. So, she is now former "Attorney General" Pam Bondi.

As Trump is wont to do, because it's easier than putting your big boy pants on and doing it face-to-face, he got on his social media platform for cowards to swing the ax:

Pam Bondi is a Great American Patriot and a loyal friend, who faithfully served as my Attorney General over the past year. Pam did a tremendous job overseeing a massive crackdown in Crime across our Country, with Murders plummeting to their lowest level since 1900. We love Pam, and she will be transitioning to a much needed and important new job in the private sector, to be announced at a date in the near future, and our Deputy Attorney General, and a very talented and respected Legal Mind, Todd Blanche, will step in to serve as Acting Attorney General. Thank you for your attention to this matter! President DONALD J. TRUMP

This "much needed and important new job in the private sector" is so badly needed, and so important, that... nobody in the White House knows what it is, as yet. And the scuttlebutt is that what Trump really wants to do is nominate Bondi to a federal judgeship. Whether she could make it through the Senate is an excellent question, but in any case, the careful reader will notice that a federal judgeship is not, in fact, a private-sector job. If a judgeship is not in the cards, then we certainly could imagine her landing a very prestigious job cleaning gold toilets. That could be a private-sector job, depending on whether it's at the White House or Trump Tower.

Officially, Bondi was on the job for only 423 days. In that brief time, however, she built an excellent case for the title of "worst AG in American history." A recap of her "greatest hits":

1. Purges: Bondi instigated the firings and resignations of more than 5,000 DoJ employees, taking particular interest in purging career attorneys assigned to cases involving Trump and/or 1/6 defendants
   
   
2. Paging Roy Cohn: Recalling the worst elements of McCarthyism, Bondi pursued baseless prosecutions and investigations at Trump's behest; the "enemies" of Trump who were targeted include former FBI Director James Comey, New York AG Letitia James, Fed Chair Jerome Powell, former Fed Governor Lisa Cook and Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ).
   
   
3. Grift: Bondi negotiated "settlements" with convicted criminals like Mike Flynn and, possibly, Trump himself.
   
   
4. U.S. Attorneys: Many of the federal U.S. Attorneys' offices were left rudderless, or even saw some of their cases quashed, because Bondi defied court orders regarding unconfirmed acting U.S. Attorneys serving unlawfully.
   
   
5. Reputation: Bondi played a key role in wrecking a generations-long presumption, on the part of federal judges, that the DoJ endeavors to do that which is right, and just and in line with U.S. law and with legal ethics.
   
   
6. Civil Rights Unit Gutted: Now derisively called the "Civil Whites Division," it is soliciting complaints from white men who feel they've been discriminated against and initiating lawsuits against companies that hold women's networking events. More than 250 lawyers have been pushed out or were transferred.
   
   
7. Public Corruption Unit Gutted: Most of the attorneys were fired or transferred to work on immigration cases; Bondi's DoJ also dismissed cases against public officials and shuttered investigations, such as the open-and-shut bribery case against Border Czar Tom Homan.
   
   
8. Counterterrorism and Counterespionage Unit Gutted: Most members were fired, or resigned, or were transferred to immigration cases. With a war in Iran going on, it might just be useful to have some legal minds who know this particular subject.
   
   
9. Financial Corruption, Fraud and White Collar Crimes Unit Gutted: Bondi closed the tax division and dramatically reduced prosecutions of white-collar cases. This is surely completely unrelated to the fact that many of Trump's supporters and donors are white-collar criminals, or rich guys who try to cut corners on their taxes, or both. And, of course, Trump himself is also a white-collar criminal who tries to cut corners on his taxes.

In short, on Bondi's brief watch, the once-venerated Department of Justice shrunk to a shell of its former self, having expelled its most senior, experienced and ethical career prosecutors and gutted the divisions that have rooted out public corruption and enforced civil rights laws and otherwise kept government honest. Bondi was not so much an attorney general as a henchman for the president. She didn't even bother to pay lip service to serving the American people, unless it was to pretend that Trump's retribution campaign was what America voted for. The U.S. has had some corrupt attorney generals who were way too cozy with the president and much too willing to break the law—John Mitchell, John Ashcroft, and Bill Barr come to mind. But they at least saw the value in maintaining the core professional prosecutors who were largely insulated from politics.

Could it get worse for the American people? Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, who is now acting AG, continues to act like Trump's defense attorney, as opposed to the American people's attorney. And he told CPAC that he's in favor of sending ICE agents to polling places in November, conveniently ignoring the law that prohibits that action. So, yes, it looks like it could.

Further, it seems that Trump suspects that he might not be able to get Blanche past the Senate. So, Trump is reportedly thinking about nominating EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin to be the permanent AG (to the extent that "permanent" means anything in this administration). Zeldin has been thrilled to tote the administration's water in his current post, from keeping coal-powered plants open, to trying to open the oceans to drilling, to freezing $20 billion in climate research grants. He will undoubtedly be thrilled to do the same in a different, higher-profile posting. And since he got past the Senate once before, he'll probably get past them again.

The other question is: Could it get worse for Trump? The answer to that one is also "yes." There is some dispute as to what doomed Bondi, with different outlets pointing to two different Achilles heels for her. The first is the Epstein files, where she initially said too much, and then followed that by doing too little (as compared to what the law passed by Congress demanded), and doing that "too little" fairly incompetently. Blanche, or Zeldin or any other future AG can't take back what is already out there, but they do present a new pressure point for subpoenas, etc. In other words, the unreleased Epstein files couldn't get more dead and buried than they already are, but they could get less dead and buried. That would presumably be a setback for Trump.

The other alleged reason that Bondi lost her job was her failure to properly pursue Trump's enemies. The thing here is that she most certainly did pursue them (see above). However, the causes of action were so shaky, they couldn't even get past a grand jury, much less a judge and a petit jury. A replacement for Bondi isn't going to change the fact that James Comey, Letitia James, Mark Kelly, etc. didn't break the law. So either the new AG is going to: (1) take the loss on these cases and move on, or (2) is going to overreach even more than Bondi did with the result that the administration ends up with even more egg on its face or (3) is going to be less willing to serve as Trump's lackey. Don't sleep on Option #3; Trump thought he had a pliant lackey in AGs Jeff Sessions and Bill Barr, only to discover that even they had limits (that Bondi did not). And whatever of these three options it ends up being, it's hard to see how Trump ends up better off with a new AG. It's either worse off on the "persecute my enemies" front, or status quo.

We also cannot help but notice that Kristi Noem got hauled before Congress, embarrassed herself, and got fired. Then Bondi got hauled before Congress, embarrassed herself, and got fired. Think that Congressional Democrats have noticed this? Or maybe Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY)? We bet they have. So, other Cabinet officers should probably be checking their mailboxes for subpoenas.

And now that Trump has broken the seal, and is back to his Cabinet-level-officer-firing ways, there is reporting that he's considering lopping a few more heads off. Here are the apparent "favorites" to be next, in alphabetical order:

Note that some of the "reasons" are valid, others are much less so. These are pretty much all real problems, the question is where the buck stops. In many cases, it's NOT with the Cabinet secretary.

We've had a few requests to survey readers on this question; if you would care to cast your vote (and to comment, if you want), you can do so here. We'll run an item on the results next week. (Z & L)