This time, Donald Trump is determined to get exactly what he wants at the Justice Department: a compliant attorney general and total control.
On Wednesday, the Senate will consider the president-elect’s request to install Pam Bondi — a MAGA enthusiast and election denier — to serve as attorney general. Bondi is wholly unqualified for the role.
The Senate will consider the president-elect’s request to install Pam Bondi — a MAGA enthusiast and election denier — to serve as attorney general. Bondi is wholly unqualified.
Granted, she might appear qualified on paper. She spent nearly two decades as a state prosecutor and was elected twice as the attorney general in Florida. She became the first woman in the role. Even some Democrats, including former Palm Beach County State Attorney Dave Aronberg, whom I respect, speak highly of her.
But serving as the nation’s chief law enforcement officer requires independence and sound judgment and the ability to accept court rulings even when you disagree with them. On these counts, Bondi fails — miserably.
That’s precisely why the president-elect picked her. Trump is determined to avoid the setbacks of his first term, when his attorneys general defied him by siding with facts and respecting institutional norms when it mattered most to Trump that they do the opposite. In 2020, William Barr — despite his controversial tenure — ultimately refused to back Trump’s baseless claims of election fraud. Before him, Jeff Sessions had recused himself from overseeing the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election, an appropriate and necessary decision given his prior conversations with the Russian ambassador to the U.S.
Trump was livid, once telling NBC’s “Meet the Press” that appointing Sessions was his “biggest mistake.” “Gutless pig” and “coward” are how Trump, after he was out of the White House, described Barr.
Enter Bondi, whose absolute fealty to Trump is clear: She stridently represented Trump during his first impeachment trial; she knowingly asserted Trump’s false claims that Joe Biden, as vice president, used his position to benefit his son’s business associates; and, instead of letting the justice system work its will, she traveled to New York and fervently criticized the prosecutor and the judge overseeing Trump’s criminal trial there.
But it was her involvement in Trump’s big lie that solidified her place in Trump’s orbit and makes her nomination especially troubling.
In late 2020, Bondi traveled to Pennsylvania to baselessly allege “mass cheating,” and she spoke falsely of fabricated ballots. To this day, she hasn’t disavowed her actions or her comments, which had real repercussions:
“Pennsylvania officials from both parties say there were consequences to her actions, arguing that Bondi spread misinformation that helped wreak long-lasting damage to the electoral system,” The Washington Post observed.
Barr was even more blunt in his memoir: “The President and his legal team were peddling the narrative of widespread fraud and a stolen election. The available facts did not substantiate those claims, but the peddlers didn’t feel bound to any objective reality; what counted, to them, was whatever Trump wanted to hear.”
Think about that. The Senate is poised to make an election denier — someone who deliberately and repeatedly ignored the facts and repeatedly disregarded judicial rulings — the nation’s chief law enforcement officer. This is a red line the Senate should refuse to cross.
Bondi, of course, wasn’t Trump’s first choice to serve as attorney general. Trump initially tapped then-Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida, who later withdrew his name from consideration. Gaetz had been investigated (but not charged) by the Justice Department Trump wanted him to run on allegations involving sex trafficking. Weeks after he withdrew, the House Ethics Committee released a report that says Gaetz bought illegal drugs, paid multiple women for sex and had sex with a 17-year-old while he was serving in Congress. It also said he “willfully sought to impede and obstruct” the committee’s investigation.
This is a red line the Senate should refuse to cross.
Gaetz, who has acknowledged giving money to women he dated, has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing and says he “NEVER had sexual contact with someone under 18.”
Bondi doesn’t have the personal baggage Gaetz does. But she still has a professional history that disqualifies her.
As former Rep. Liz Cheney put it on Tuesday: If Trump’s Cabinet nominees “cooperated with Trump’s deceit to overturn the 2020 election, they cannot now be entrusted with the responsibility to preserve the rule of law and protect our Republic.”
The stakes couldn’t be higher: A conservative Supreme Court supermajority has already granted presidents sweeping immunity and authority over the Justice Department’s investigative functions. Placing Bondi at the helm would further erode public trust in the rule of law, undermine the department’s independence and pave the way for Trump to use the vast powers of the department to go after his perceived political enemies with no legal or factual basis.
As a person of faith, I strive to see the good in others. But faith doesn’t require us to ignore painful truths. Bondi’s record proves that she is unfit to be attorney general of the United States.
Anthony Coley
Anthony Coley is a legal analyst for NBC News, MSNBC and CNBC. He was director of the Justice Department’s office of public affairs from February 2021 until January 2023.