Reports that former Donald Trump advisor Stephen Miller is recruiting lawyers who will assume positions of power in a second Trump administration have left an ex-attorney of the former president's White House terrified.
According to a report from the Guardian, Miller's America First Legal is rounding up lawyers willing to do Trump's bidding — even if it means opposing constitutional restrictions.
That led Ty Cobb — a noted historian, former deputy attorney general who served under President George H.W. Bush and an ex-White House lawyer — to bluntly state, "They’re looking for lawyers who worship Trump and will do his bidding. Trump is looking to Miller to pick people who will be more loyal to Trump than the rule of law.”
Speaking with the Guardian's Peter Stone, he added, "Trump doesn’t care about the rule of law or the quality of the criminal justice system. He only cares about fealty to him.”
With the Guardian's Stone writing, "Miller’s legal group, which raked in a hefty $44m dollars in 2022, also has a board seat with Project 2025, a sprawling effort led by the Heritage Foundation and dozens of other conservative groups to map policy plans for a second Trump term — or another GOP presidency if Trump is not the nominee," presidential historian Timothy Naftali warned, "This is a search for people with situational ethics.”
"They’re trying to screen out people who have higher loyalties to the U.S. Constitution," Naftali went on.
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"It’s likely they’re looking for people whose higher loyalty is to Donald Trump. They’re trying to find lawyers who believe in dictatorship. You have to wonder what kind of people in good conscience could sign up for a Trump revenge tour. This appears to be a casting call for an American political horror movie.”
Former Assistant Attorney General Donald Ayer chipped in, "When you consider the number of lawyers who became Trump’s severe critics after joining the first Trump administration and participating in a lot of questionable actions, selection for a new administration will have to exclude pretty much anyone who has any inclination to defend our legal system or question the president asserting absolute authority.”
Citing a mission statement from Miller's group that states, "“Our security, our liberty, our sovereignty, and our most fundamental rights and values are being systematically dismantled by an unholy alliance of corrupt special interests, big tech titans, the fake news media, and liberal Washington politicians," Stone added, "the mission statement of Miller’s America First Legal reveals its ideological compatibility with Trump’s authoritarian-leaning agenda, of which hard-right lawyers would be assets in implementing should Trump get another term."
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