L’Etat C’est Trump

Pam Bondi has started her tenure by just flat-out declaring that lawyers in the Department of Justice are in fact Donald Trump’s personal counsel. The grim details are here, and she gets straight to the point:

“It is the job of an attorney privileged to serve in the Department of Justice to zealously defend the interests of the United States. Those interests, and the overall policy of the United States, are set by the Nation’s Chief Executive, who is vested by the Constitution with all ‘[E)xecutive Power,’“ Bondi wrote in an order titled, “GENERAL POLICY REGARDING ZEALOUS ADVOCACY ON BEHALF OF THE UNITED STATES.”

We can safely say the word “lawfare” will stop being the shiny new toy conservative politicians and pundits can’t stop playing with, unless they’re defending firing the prosecutors involved in the 1/6 prosecutions with a particular lack of self-awareness.

And now, a walk down memory lane:

Bill Clinton saying hi to Loretta Lynch on a tarmac was covered as a major scandal in 2016. Now the press is like "wow Trump makes bold moves at DOJ!" as an independent justice department totally falls apart

[image or embed]— mtsw (@mtsw.bsky.social) February 6, 2025 at 8:12 AM

Not only was Clinton briefly meeting with Lynch (admittedly, a stupid decision by a politician who had long since lost his fastball, but still) a five-alarm scandal, it apparently played a major role in Comey deciding to throw the election by altering Jason Chaffetz about emails that had virtually no chance of demonstrating any actual wrongdoing on the eve of the election. It’s safe to say this will not in the end result in a net increase in Department of Justice independence.