Matt Gaetz's nomination for attorney general may scare off many Justice Department veterans who were around for Donald Trump's first presidency.
Many former DOJ officials were initially excited or at least open to returning to senior roles or as U.S. attorneys, but dozens of those veterans told Bloomberg they are reconsidering whether to sign up again after the president-elect tapped the widely disliked Florida Republican to lead the agency.
“This choice is putrid,” said a former senior Trump DOJ official. “I can’t imagine anybody with integrity would want to work for this guy as attorney general, period – full stop.”
Four department veterans said the selection of Gaetz, who has no prosecutorial experience, had immediately crushed their optimism that the DOJ would maintain its historic independence from the White House, and former department aides worry they would be required to defend him if he “does something crazy."
“If you say things that are too outside the norm of how the department has typically functioned, they just won’t do it,” said Seth DuCharme, DOJ’s principal associate deputy attorney general in the first Trump administration. “If they take total outsiders to come in and run the department, it’s just not going to work.”
DOJ veterans said they were less concerned that Trump would order retaliatory prosecutions against his enemies, including president Joe Biden and special counsel Jack Smith, than they were about pardons for Jan. 6 rioters. But critics say Gaetz made those dark fears more likely.
“What does it mean to be an institutionalist if someone accepts a DOJ position knowing that Trump has promised to use its law enforcement powers as a tool for retaliation and retribution?” said Kristy Parker, a former DOJ civil rights supervisor and counsel at Protect Democracy, before the Gaetz announcement.
After the choice was announced, Parker said DOJ veterans who returned under Gaetz “will not enjoy the same immunity Trump has and will therefore be placing themselves and their law licenses in jeopardy.”
ALSO READ: Do not submit: Your guide to a way out of this catastrophic mess
Richard Donoghue resisted Trump's pressure to overturn his 2020 election loss while serving as acting deputy attorney general, and before Gaetz was announced he downplayed concerns about MAGA corruption of the department he helped lead.
“I understand why the concerns arise given some of the rhetoric over the last year, but I have a lot of faith in the institutions. And I do think that the right people will do the right thing, given the opportunity,” Donoghue said before the pick. “I’m not as concerned about it as other people, maybe, but time will tell.”
He declined to say whether Gaetz's nomination changed his view, but Donoghue said Trump's decision was “surprising, to say the least.”
