Here's why the prospect of a second Trump term terrifies DOJ officials

Justice Department officials are expressing worry that a Donald Trump 2024 election victory would plunge the agency into chaos, New York Magazine reports.

Ankush Khadori writes for the outlet that concerns that a revenge-seeking Trump would use the Justice Department to prosecute his political enemies are not based on theory, but rather on the former president’s own words.

“I will appoint a real special prosecutor to go after the most corrupt president in the history of the United States of America, Joe Biden, and the entire Biden crime family” and everyone “involved with the destruction of our elections, our borders, and our country itself,” Trump said at his Bedminster golf club just hours after his June 13 arraignment on a 37-count federal indictment alleging he mishandled classified documents.

“On November 5th, 2024,” Trump proclaimed, “justice will be done.”

Such statements have raised alarms, including among some who served in Trump’s Justice Department, the report said.

Khadori writes “The group I spoke with included Senate-confirmed officials at the highest levels of the Trump Justice Department, including appointees who were involved in some of the most controversial matters, both criminal and civil in nature. These are not crypto-liberals.”

“To varying degrees, they all broadly disagreed with the way they and their colleagues were portrayed in the media — including at times by me — but they agreed to talk on condition of anonymity in order to speak candidly about their views on the prospect of Trump’s return to power, including who might staff the department and what its priorities would likely be. Their most pressing concern was that Trump would follow through on his threats to target his political enemies — and that he could be much more effective next time.”

A former senior Justice Department official who spoke to New York Magazine on the condition of anonymity said that Trump, during his presidency, discussed using the Justice Department against anyone who happened to be in his crosshairs, but suggested in a second term, Trump would be more focused on retaliation.

“During the first administration, the president talked a lot about pursuing political enemies. He spoke about it during the campaign, he spoke about it while he was president, but the Justice Department did not act on it,” the former senior official said.

Khadori writes that although “this may seem counterintuitive,” that the Justice Department during Trump administration, the DOJ conducted criminal probes of Hillary Clinton, former Secretary of State John Kerry, along with his own national security adviser, and former acting FBI director Andrew McCabe and John Bolton, who in 2019 wrote a tell-all book after leaving the White House.

“My concern is in a second term…I think the president would be very focused on finding people who would act on his desire to retaliate against political opponents.”

Geoffrey Berman, who served as Trump’s U.S. Attorney in Manhattan until 2020 told Khadori: “The prospect of a second Trump administration frightens me.”

Read the full article here.