In just the few weeks since he’s taken over the justice department’s top job on an interim basis, Todd Blanche has aggressively moved to deploy the department’s resources to please Donald Trump, leaving little doubt about how the president’s former personal attorney would further politicize the department if his status atop US law enforcement becomes permanent.
Blanche was named acting attorney general earlier this month when Trump fired Pam Bondi after the president reportedly grew frustrated with the lack of progress Bondi had made on prosecuting the president’s political enemies. Blanche told Trump he would like to have the job permanently and the president told him to consider his time as the acting attorney general as an audition, according to Fox News.
Blanche has wasted little time.
Less than two weeks after Blanche took over, four career prosecutors were fired and a widely criticized report accused them of unfairly punishing anti-abortion protesters. Blanche also hired Trump ally Joe diGenova, an 81-year-old former US attorney, to oversee the investigation into John Brennan, the former CIA director, and others that is rooted in their assessment that Russia interfered in the 2016 election with the goal of boosting Trump. DiGenova represented the Trump campaign as it sought to overturn the 2020 election and called for Chris Krebs, a DHS official who said the 2020 election was secure, to be “drawn and quartered” and “taken out at dawn and shot.”
DiGenova is taking over the case from a career prosecutor who recently expressed reservations about it.
A justice department official familiar with Blanche’s actions said there has been more pressure internally on matters involving Trump enemies since Blanche took over. “Doesn’t mean he’ll be any more successful than [Bondi], but he, via his surrogates, is definitely demanding results,” the person said.
“Blanche – a former federal prosecutor with decades of experience enforcing our laws impartially – has made clear that the department’s mission is to apply the law equally to all persons,” a justice department spokesperson said in a statement. “He remains committed to upholding the rule of law, advancing President Trump’s agenda, and ending the weaponization of government. These actions are long overdue and sought by the American people.”
Under Blanche, the justice department has also sought to vacate the seditious conspiracy convictions against members of the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers for some of the most serious crimes committed during the January 6 attack on the capitol.
The justice department entered into an “unprecedented era of politicization” that Blanche now appears poised to push even further, said Skye Perryman, the president and CEO of Democracy Forward, a watchdog group that has filed a slew of lawsuits challenging the administration in court.
“I do think what we’ve seen over the past few weeks is definitely a sharper focus on the president’s retaliation agenda,” she said. “If the administration wants an attorney general that’s going to prevail in court, they’re not going to be able to find one. It doesn’t matter who it is because the administration’s conduct is so lawless.”
Blanche has not only “replicated” Bondi’s “Trump-pleasing moves”, but also “taken her one better or worse in several instances where the cases or actions he’s brought go beyond anything she did”, said Harry Litman, a former justice department lawyer.
Mike Davis, a pugilistic Trump ally who leads the Article III project, a conservative watchdog group, said Blanche was off to a “fantastic start”.
“Todd is making bold and fearless moves to bring much-needed accountability. No one is above the law,” he said.
On Tuesday, the justice department unveiled an 11-count criminal indictment against the Southern Poverty Law Center, the prominent civil rights organization. The organization long used paid informants to monitor extremist groups and share that information with law enforcement (the group’s chief executive said this week it no longer uses paid informants). In filing the charges, the justice department made the novel and extraordinary argument that the organization was defrauding its donors by funneling money to the groups it sought to combat. The charges are flimsy, legal experts have said.
“The shoddiness of the indictment speaks for itself,” said Vanita Gupta, a civil rights lawyer at New York University who served as the number three official at the justice department during the Biden administration. The indictment ignores the fact that the SPLC has shared information with law enforcement across Republican and Democratic administrations, she added.
“I do view this as yet another kind of salvo in the administration’s attacks on nonprofit organizations and trying to quell dissent,” she said.
Blanche faces some hurdles ahead. His handling of the justice department’s files related to Jeffrey Epstein continues to haunt the agency, with Congress and the justice department inspector general continuing to investigate. Blanche has sought to put the matter in the rearview: “I think that to the extent that the Epstein files was a part of the past year of this justice department, it should not be a part of anything going forward,” he said during an interview on Fox News.
On Friday, the justice department dropped what was a thinly veiled politically motivated criminal inquiry into Jerome Powell, the chair of the Federal Reserve, regarding connections to the Fed’s headquarters in Washington. Powell’s term expires on 15 May, and a key Senate Republican had vowed to block his replacement while the investigation was ongoing.
Blanche also faces some skepticism from some Trump allies who doubt his conservative credentials. Blanche was a registered Democrat, but switched his party in recent years as he left a lucrative partnership at Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft to be Trump’s personal defense lawyer.
“He’s attempting to show that with Pam Bondi gone, things are going to start happening. And that’s a lowlife tactic,” said Peter Ticktin, a Florida lawyer who is friends with Trump and has thrown his hat in the ring to be the next attorney general. “Pam Bondi is not here to defend herself and he’s basically casting an aspersions against her.” He called the case against the Southern Poverty Law Center a “stupid case” and “really pathetic”.
