Attorney General Todd Blanche said, “of course,” there are scenarios in which the Justice Department would block states from certifying elections. The admission came soon after Blanche said that the Justice Department did not have independence from President Donald Trump's demands.
Blanche made the remarks to reporters Thursday, less than two weeks before the midterm elections, CNN reported.
The attorney general, who said on a podcast a day earlier that he answers to President Donald Trump, now says the department would block certification if it had to.
“Is there any scenario in which DOJ would weigh in on that certification process or try to block states from certifying?” a reporter asked.
“I mean, is there any scenario? Yes. Of course, there are scenarios that we could all come up with hypothetically, you know, some doomsday scenario, for example,” Blanche replied.
“I don’t think it’s proper to make any kind of conclusory statements about what’s gonna happen in the future, because I have no idea what’s gonna happen in the future,” he continued.
“It’s never our intention to improperly interfere with elections or the state confirmation process or certification process. But, you know, to say that there’s no circumstances that we would ever do that, of course, I’m not gonna say that,” the attorney general said.
“But am I planning my days around the election to be somewhere to not certify? Of course not,” Blanche added.
On Wednesday’s episode of the New York Post podcast “Pod Force One,” Blanche told host Miranda Devine, “There was this misperception that there’s this separation and independence between the Department of Justice and the White House, and everybody likes to champion that, and they accused me of not suffering from independence.”
“I work for President Trump,” Blanche said.
Last week, Sens. Alex Padilla (D-CA), Dick Durbin (D-IL) and Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) asked Blanche to commit that the Justice Department would not seize ballots or voting machines before states certify their results, NBC News reported.
“Removing ballots from the officials legally charged with maintaining their custody could … even prevent lawful votes from being counted or an election from being certified,” the senators wrote.
The senators also cited the Justice Manual, the department’s internal rulebook, which says it “should generally avoid interfering or appearing to interfere with election administration, tabulation, validation, or certification.”
The senators asked Blanche to respond in writing by Oct. 29, according to NBC News.