President Donald Trump said Thursday Pam Bondi is out as his attorney general. Trump made the announcement in a post on social media.
It marks the end of a contentious tenure of a loyalist who upended the Justice Department’s culture of independence from the White House, oversaw large-scale firings of career employees and moved aggressively to investigate the Republican president’s perceived enemies.
Trump said Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche will
serve as acting attorney general.
Here is the latest:
Blanche is a former federal prosecutor who worked as Trump’s criminal defense attorney in two cases brought by the department under President Joe Biden’s administration.
He was also a key figure on the president’s defense team in the hush money case against Trump in New York.
Blanche became second in command behind Bondi at the Justice Department last year.
“We love Pam, and she will be transitioning to a much needed and important new job in the private sector,” Trump said in a post on Truth Social, after saying she’s been a “loyal friend.”
Trump said Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche will serve as acting attorney general.
Republican Rep. Nancy Mace, in response to earlier reports that President Donald Trump was considering ousting Attorney General Pam Bondi, said in a statement Thursday: “I welcome it.”
“Bondi handled the Epstein Files in a terrible manner and seriously undermined President Trump,” said Mace in the statement, whose long been critical of the justice department over the release and review of the Jefferey Epstein files.
President Donald Trump said Thursday that Pam Bondi is out as his attorney general, ending the contentious tenure of a loyalist who upended the Justice Department’s culture of independence from the White House, oversaw large-scale firings of career employees and moved aggressively to investigate the Republican president’s perceived enemies.
The announcement follows months of scrutiny over the Justice Department’s handling of files related to Jeffrey Epstein’s sex trafficking investigation that made Bondi the target of angry conservatives even with her close relationship with Trump. She also struggled to satisfy Trump’s demands to prosecute his political rivals, with multiple investigations rejected by judges or grand juries.
The former Florida attorney general came into office last year pledging that she would not play politics with the Justice Department, but she quickly started investigations of Trump foes, sparking an outcry that the law enforcement agency was being wielded as a tool of revenge to advance the president’s political and personal agenda.
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