All posts tagged "pam bondi"

Trump DOJ ditches case against special ed aide after 'deeply disturbing' public shaming

The Department of Justice has dropped a case against a special education aide whom it publicly shamed, per a court filing.

According to a court filing published by Politico legal reporter Josh Gerstein on Tuesday, the Department of Justice asked a federal judge to dismiss its case against Christina Rank, a special education aide from Minnesota.

Gerstein noted in a post on X that former Attorney General Pam Bondi publicly named Rank in a January X post. Rank's name showed up first in a list of 16 people who were arrested amid protests in Minneapolis in response to killings by Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

According to Bondi's January post, Rank and the others in the list were arrested under federal laws for "assaulting, resisting or impeding certain officers and employees."

Shortly after Bondi's post, a federal judge expressed fury toward Bondi for publishing the names and mugshots of the 16 protesters in a social media post. Judge Dulce J. Foster said in a Minneapolis federal court that she was "deeply disturbed" by the move, adding that sharing images of people who are presumed innocent "is not something that the court condones."

However, the DOJ's latest court filing requests that charges be dropped against Rank, a 25-year-old who made headlines after being violently detained and then named by Bondi. According to the DOJ, it didn't have enough evidence to charge her, and it asked the court to dismiss the case "with prejudice," meaning it can't be refiled.

"Upon a further review of the evidence and affidavit in support of the complaint, the government does not believe that probable cause for assault exists," the DOJ court filing reads. "Based on a lack of probable cause and in the interest of justice, the government requests this case be dismissed."

DOJ whistleblower urges Senate to probe whether Todd Blanche dodged records laws

A Department of Justice whistleblower is pressing the Senate to investigate Trump's nominee for Attorney General.

In a Wednesday piece, fired DOJ attorney Liz Oyer shared a letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee where she sounded the alarm about absent records related to her termination. She urged the Senate to probe Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, who is waiting for confirmation to take the role full-time.

"I respectfully suggest that this Committee should probe whether Mr. Blanche has complied with the Federal Records Act or is using forms of communication that evade oversight," Oyer wrote in a letter that detailed how she can't find documents she says should exist per federal law.

Oyer was fired after refusing to skip a vetting process to reinstate actor Mel Gibson's right to own a gun, which was stripped after his domestic violence conviction. She sought documents related to her firing through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request that is now in litigation, but she warned the Senate committee that the DOJ denied that they exist.

"The Department has claimed that Mr. Blanche's office has no documents—none—related to my firing despite the fact that Mr. Blanche himself dismissed me," Oyer wrote. "DOJ FOIA staff claim that they searched Mr. Blanche's files and found nothing—not a single page. They didn't even find the memo he signed firing me in his files."

She wrote, "This raises serious questions about what channels of communications Mr. Blanche is using to conduct official DOJ business; where (or whether) he is preserving records required by federal law; and whether he is telling the truth about documents in his possession, custody or control."

Oyer also noted that former Attorney General Pam Bondi "rarely" used her official DOJ email, and cited reporting by the New York Times and The Atlantic about how senior officials used auto-deleting Signal chats.

Judge's scathing rebuke of Trump admin startles CNN: 'Quite a shock to see it on paper'

CNN anchor Brianna Keilar was stunned after a federal judge scolded the Trump administration in a scorching new ruling on Monday.

Chief Judge Patrick J. Schiltz of the U.S. District Court for the District of Minnesota blocked the Justice Department's efforts to subpoena Minnesota Democratic Gov. Tim Walz and other Democratic officials in an immigration enforcement probe, CNN reported. Walz, who has publicly criticized President Donald Trump, was targeted by the DOJ along with Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, and St. Paul Mayor Kaohly Her. County officials in Ramsey and Hennepin counties were also issued subpoenas.

"That is quite a lashing," Keilar said, responding to the judge's ruling.

CNN correspondent Katelyn Polantz described the opinion — and what made it stand out.

"I don't know if I've seen an opinion take on the Justice Department in this way before from a federal judge saying just explicitly that they believe that the Justice Department was using its authority for political means in exactly the wrong, unlawful way," Polantz said.

The subpoenas from former Attorney General Pam Bondi came following weeks of unrest and protest in Minnesota after two people — Renee Good and Alex Pretti — were killed amid aggressive ICE raids in Minneapolis. In the letters, Bondi told local officials that they needed to support ICE, Polantz said.

"It was a retribution and a reckoning day that was coming for people in Minnesota that didn't support the federal government," Polantz explained. "What the Justice Department said at that time was that people like Walz, Frey, they were going to be investigated for impeding federal law enforcement. But this federal judge, Patrick Schiltz, in Minnesota, he finds that that is totally not what the Justice Department was doing."

"He says that the way they brought forth this criminal investigation into Walz's office, the mayor's offices, the attorney general's office in Minnesota," she added. "It was blatantly unlawful and unethical use of the grand jury process. He says that there was no doubt that these were grand jury subpoenas for documents that were meant to harass and coerce these local officials, and that there was no plausible investigative justification. The unlawful reasons here were overwhelming, quite a shock to see it on paper from a judge in this federal case saying, 'these guys, these grand jury subpoenas, they're not going to survive.'"

Todd Blanche may have torpedoed his own AG nomination with Epstein stunt: analysis

A damning New York Times report released on Wednesday raised new concerns about Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche and his involvement with the Epstein files.

Blanche has come under fire over his role in "attempting to kill off the Epstein firestorm," just days after President Donald Trump formally nominated his former personal lawyer for permanent attorney general, The Daily Beast reported. Now, doubts were raised over whether he could be the top leader of the Justice Department ahead of his Senate confirmation hearing — and whether he could maintain his independence.

"Opponents argue he is not fit for the job, pointing to his handling of the Epstein files, which identified numerous victims but kept the names of potential co-conspirators hidden, as well as other controversies, such as Trump’s $1.8 billion 'anti-weaponization' slush fund and the backroom deal giving the president immunity from continuing IRS audits," The Beast reported.

The bombshell reporting from Times reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan is part of an upcoming book and includes multiple revelations about what happened within the Trump administration and includes Blanche's involvement as the then-deputy attorney general under former Attorney General Pam Bondi.

"Blanche and other Trump aides—including Vice President JD Vance, White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles, Communications Director Steven Cheung and Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt—held a panicked meeting in the Situation Room in July last year, desperate to quell the MAGA civil war that had erupted over the administration’s failure to release the Epstein files," according to The Beast.

In the meeting, Blanche reportedly offered two potential options.

"The first was to petition Federal District Courts in Florida and New York to unseal grand jury testimonies related to Jeffrey Epstein’s heinous sex trafficking crimes, as these were unlikely to contain any new information, and therefore, releasing them was unlikely to damage Trump," The Beast reported.

Blanche likely knew that getting a federal judge to unseal grand jury material would be a tough move, The Beast reported.

"The second option was to have a Justice Department official interview Epstein’s accomplice, Ghislaine Maxwell, and release the transcript," according to The Beast.

Blanche apparently volunteered to sit down with Maxwell. He has described her attorney, David Oscar Markus, as "a friend."

Jaws drop as new Trump admin Epstein details go public: 'Sheer panic'

The internet was stunned on Wednesday after explosive reporting from two New York Times reporters revealed how the Trump administration panicked as the Justice Department released the Epstein files.

In an excerpt from the upcoming book from Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan, “Regime Change: Inside the Imperial Presidency of Donald Trump,” the reporters detailed what happened behind-the-scenes as former Attorney General Pam Bondi reportedly infuriated the Trump team over meeting with right-wing influencers about the Epstein files, while Chief of Staff Susie Wiles believed that the Jeffrey Epstein controversy would eventually pass.

The reporting also revealed that Vice President JD Vance convened an urgent Situation Room meeting to address the unfolding crisis after the DOJ denied there was an Epstein client list — infuriating MAGA — and told top administration officials, "This is a huge problem."

Public figures and media experts reacted to the revelations.

"Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan report that sheer panic over sordid facts surrounding the conduct of both Donald and Melania Trump have left the White House in a state of complete panic for over half a year. Suppressing the files and diverting attention from them led to commencement of a war," Scott Horton, Harper's Magazine contributing editor and lecturer at Columbia Law School, wrote on Bluesky.

"DOJ had already closed the Epstein file. No client list. Death ruled suicide. The Situation Room meeting wasn't about accountability. It was about stopping a MAGA civil war before the WSJ published a birthday letter Trump had been trying to bury. The performance of transparency. Not the thing itself," political commentator and Substack writer Mike Young, who has more than 15,000 followers, wrote on X.

"BIG excerpt out from new @maggieNYT and @jonathanvswan book 'Regime Change: Inside the Imperial Presidency of Donald Trump'...apparently WH staff were terrified about the release of a document alleging Trump had a 'predilection for nipples' and abused those of an Epstein victim," Tommy Vietor, co-host of Pod Save America and former spokesperson for President Barack Obama and the National Security Council, wrote on X.

"A must read by Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan," actress and activist Mia Farrow wrote on X.

Todd Blanche's Senate confirmation fight may expose Epstein coverup: expert

President Donald Trump's pick for attorney general, his former personal lawyer Todd Blanche, and his upcoming Senate confirmation hearing could reveal more about his efforts to conceal the Epstein files and backfire on his nomination, a former White House insider explained on Monday.

Bill Kristol, the editor at large for The Bulwark and a former chief of staff to Vice President Dan Quayle, described how senators who will vote to confirm Blanche as the nation's next top law enforcement official will ultimately have to face off over Jeffrey Epstein and Blanche's role in the cover-up.

"There are many, many Republican lawyers in America," Kristol wrote. "Many, sadly, are also pro-Trump. But it is Todd Blanche who has been selected by the president to be attorney general of the United States. He has this distinction: He is the prime orchestrator and key executor of the Trump administration’s Jeffrey Epstein coverup."

Former Attorney General Pam Bondi testified to the House Oversight Committee on May 29, saying Blanche “supervised [the] entire process” of overseeing the Epstein files.

"He was leading the Epstein matter and the release of everything from the beginning," Bondi said in her testimony.

Questions have surrounded Blanche and his visit to Epstein co-conspirator and former partner to the late financier, Ghislaine Maxwell. Maxwell has been pushing for clemency as a condition of her testimony to Congress.

"Blanche has also been the most visible public defender of the coverup, and of the decision not to investigate or prosecute anyone else for crimes," Kristol wrote.

After the files were released, no follow-up investigations have been underway.

"But thanks to Trump’s nomination of Blanche, there is a chance to force a real public debate, with real Senate votes, on the Epstein coverup," Kristol explains.

"That is not what Blanche wants. In early April, shortly after becoming acting attorney general, Blanche told Fox News, 'And so 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,'" Kristol wrote.

And that doesn't mean senators will not question him about it.

"But the Epstein coverup should be part, a key part, of one thing going forward: It should be a key part of the upcoming debate on Blanche’s confirmation as attorney general," Kristol wrote. "The Blanche confirmation fight can bring the Epstein coverup back into the spotlight this summer. His nomination can be turned into a referendum on the coverup by the Trump administration, and by the entire political class, of Epstein and his co-conspirators and clients."

"The vote on Blanche can become, it should become, a vote on Epstein," Kristol further added.

'It's disastrous': Expert warns Pam Bondi just put Todd Blanche in legal jeopardy

The Epstein files and Pam Bondi's testimony released on Thursday could come back to haunt Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche as he approaches his Senate confirmation hearing process, a legal expert said.

During a live broadcast with CNN anchor Jake Tapper, CNN legal analyst Elie Honig noted that Bondi, who served as the former attorney general until she was fired by President Donald Trump in April, told lawmakers that Blanche was overseeing the release of the Epstein files and could come under further scrutiny because of her comments.

"It has to be a big problem for Todd Blanche, Jake, because there's nothing good in this whole mess of the Epstein files, legally or politically," Honig said.

"And if you look at today's transcript, Pam Bondi truly does Todd Blanche no favors," Honig explained. "And I don't think she's trying to hurt him."

He argued that Bondi was making an effort during the closed-door testimony with the House Oversight Committee to "praise Todd Blanche's skill and ethics and his handling of this whole process."

"But the bottom line is it's disastrous," Honig added. "Todd Blanche was in charge. Pam Bondi makes that clear: the process that resulted in the release of victims' names, the process that resulted in the improper redaction of wrongdoers' names, and a process that was chaotic, overdue, and satisfied no one. And there's no way for Blanche to get out of that. It's actually surprising when you read the transcript how little Bondi knew about what was going on. This seems like it was a complete delegation, and you can bet this will come up in a big way when Todd Blanche goes in front of the Senate for his confirmation hearings."

5 standout moments from Pam Bondi's testimony on the Jeffrey Epstein files

Former Attorney General Pam Bondi's testimony with the House Oversight Committee was released on Thursday, revealing new details about the Department of Justice's rollout of the Epstein files.

Bondi was interviewed by House lawmakers on Capitol Hill last week and responded to questions about criticisms of how the department handled the release of documents and materials related to Jeffrey Epstein and his co-conspirators.

Here are five things to know about Bondi's testimony.

1. Bondi claimed she did not know about a document where Epstein’s 10 co-conspirators are listed.

Lawmakers showed Bondi an email from the 2019 Epstein case in the Southern District of New York and asked her to comment.

At one point, Bondi's attorney, Harmeet Dhillon, Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights at the Justice Department, told the lawmakers, "She's not going to answer that."

"I don't recall ever reviewing this document, so I don't know who's in it, and that came from the FBI New York," Bondi said.

2. Bondi blamed Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche for the release of the Epstein files.

Bondi said that Blanche was responsible for overseeing the Department of Justice's release of the documents and materials.

“He was in charge of the process and the entire release of the Epstein files," Bondi said.

She also said he briefed her on the case as soon as she joined the DOJ as attorney general in January 2025.

3. She claimed Blanche interviewed Ghislaine Maxwell because no one from the DOJ had interviewed her about Epstein.

"I believe Deputy Attorney General, now-Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, has said on several occasions that Epstein, by that time, was dead and no one had taken — had made an effort to interview Ghislaine Maxwell to see if she had evidence of co-conspirators and other crimes, and that was why he interviewed her," Bondi said.

She said she did not recall how the interview was prompted or whether Maxwell reached out first.

"I believe — I don't believe who initiated it. If she reached out to us, I believe — I don't want to speculate, but I believe Deputy Attorney General Blanche, at the time, reached out to them because there was someone, still living, in prison, who had potential information about other co-conspirators and crimes," Bondi said.

4. Bondi did not confirm if Blanche had knowledge of Maxwell's prison relocation.

"He may, and I'm not sure if he'd addressed that publicly. Probably. But transferring a prisoner is the decision of the Bureau of Prisons," Bondi said.

5. Bondi does not think Maxwell should be pardoned by President Donald Trump.

"I believe she should die in prison," Bondi said.

"She was a monster, just like Jeffrey Epstein," Bondi added. "She recruited these young women to a life of prostitution and abuse. And I often think the women that do that are just as bad, if not worse, than the men, because she participated in it."

House Oversight Committee releases Pam Bondi's Epstein testimony

The House Oversight Committee released on Thursday the full transcript of former Attorney General Pam Bondi's closed-door testimony last week, showing that Bondi was aiming to move away from the Department of Justice's handling of the release of the Epstein files.

The transcript also revealed that she told lawmakers that Todd Blanche, her former deputy attorney general and current Trump nominee for attorney general, was responsible for overseeing the Epstein files, CNN reported.

“He was in charge of the process and the entire release of the Epstein files,” Bondi said.

Lawmakers asked Bondi why the additional 3 million documents had not been publicly released yet following the first batch of 3 million files. She said the DOJ was not withholding other documents and argued remaining files were "either duplicates or privileged materials, despite bipartisan criticism that Trump’s Justice Department has withheld or overreacted to documents, while accidentally sharing information of Epstein’s victims," according to CNN.

"To my knowledge, they’ve all been released," Bondi said.

She told the congressional leaders that any questions surrounding further documents should be directed to FBI Director Kash Patel.

President Donald Trump fired Bondi from her position as attorney general in April. She and the department had faced mounting backlash over the release of the Epstein files and the rollout of the documents, which included names and personal information of survivors.

DOJ's 'intimidation' against groups that discipline bad lawyers alarms experts

The Department of Justice is trying to intimidate bar associations, which license and oversee lawyers, and legal experts are sounding the alarm.

Acting U.S. Attorney Todd Blanche "has been trying to intimidate state bars across the country and local bars," warned Adam Klasfeld, a legal journalist, in an episode of the Legal AF podcast. Blanche was hit with a bar complaint earlier this week for launching an investigation into Kilmar Abrego Garcia.

The DOJ, under Blanche's leadership, sued the D.C. Bar earlier this month and tried to strip state bars of the jurisdiction involving DOJ lawyers, Klasfeld said. The moves are part of a "campaign of intimidation," Klasfeld went on, worried that it could have a "chilling effect" on bars nationwide.

Klasfeld was speaking to Michael Klaw, the communications director for the Campaign for Accountability, the group that filed the bar complaint against Blanche. Klaw said the chilling effect is visible on bar associations.

"We can certainly say that we see a noticeable difference between how bars have been acting in the first year of the second Trump administration versus how they were acting previously," Klaw said. "There's sort of a bullying, chilling effect."

The intimidation started before Blanche took over the DOJ, Klaw explained. Under former U.S. Attorney Pam Bondi, the DOJ instituted a policy of "not cooperating with bar investigations," he said.

"They've only doubled down on that since," Klaw said. "Time will tell whether this is successful on their part to intimidate the bars further, but it's certainly concerning to see them trying."