(AFP) – President Donald Trump’s pick to be the next US attorney general — his former defense lawyer Todd Blanche — came in for tough questioning from Democrats at a contentious Senate confirmation hearing on Wednesday.
“In less than 18 months at the Department of Justice you’ve shown you’re still President Trump’s personal attorney,” Senator Dick Durbin, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, said in his opening remarks at the nearly five-hour session. “This nation deserves an attorney general who loves the Constitution more than any single president,” Durbin said. “An attorney general focused on keeping America safe and combating corruption, not satisfying the president’s personal grievances.”
Blanche, who has been acting attorney general since Pam Bondi was fired in April, defended his record, although he misspoke when asked if he and Trump were “friends.” “I’m his lawyer,” Blanche replied, before correcting himself and saying “was his lawyer.” Democratic senators Sheldon Whitehouse and Chris Coons took aim at Blanche over the firing of hundreds of career Department of Justice and FBI employees seen as insufficiently loyal to the Republican president. “You’ve cleaned house of every attorney who worked on a case related to Trump,” Whitehouse said. Coons said Blanche has been “prosecuting the president’s political enemies and firing rank-and-file prosecutors and FBI agents because of the cases they were assigned to.”
Blanche pushed back, calling Whitehouse’s questions “obnoxious” and accusing him of lying about his tenure at the department. A former federal prosecutor himself, Blanche has been closely tied to what Democrats have dubbed a “retribution” campaign by the president against his perceived political enemies. Former FBI director James Comey, an outspoken Trump critic, is among those who have been targeted under Blanche. Comey was indicted in April for allegedly threatening Trump’s life in an Instagram post.
Blanche was also grilled about a $1.8 billion “anti-weaponization fund” to compensate Trump’s political allies that Democrats have denounced as a “slush fund.” He reiterated previous statements that the fund was “dead.” But he defended a deal with the Internal Revenue Service that shields Trump and his sons from audits of their past tax returns. A federal judge on Monday voided the settlement.
Blanche has also come in for criticism from victims of Jeffrey Epstein over his handling of the release of investigative files about the convicted sex offender, a one-time close friend of Trump. He said charges would be brought against anyone associated with Epstein if merited. “If we learn today, if we learn next week, if we learn next month that there’s an individual that we can investigate, indict, and prosecute out of the Epstein files, you better believe it, we will,” Blanche said. Several women who were victims of Epstein — who died in prison in 2019 while awaiting trial for sex trafficking — were in the public gallery for Blanche’s Senate appearance.
Trump, in a Truth Social post on Tuesday, defended Blanche, saying he had done a “phenomenal job” as acting attorney general. He urged “every Republican senator” to vote for him. A sole Republican “no” vote on the panel could be enough to torpedo the 51-year-old Blanche’s appointment to be the chief law enforcement officer of the United States. But the two Republicans on the Senate panel seen as potential opponents — Senator Thom Tillis, who is retiring, and Senator John Cornyn, who was defeated in a primary after Trump backed his opponent — appeared to be leaning to vote for confirmation.
If the committee advances Blanche’s nomination it will go for a full vote in the Senate, where Republicans have a majority. Prior to joining the Department of Justice, Blanche represented Trump in his New York trial over alleged “hush money” paid to porn star Stormy Daniels. He was also on the legal defense team in two federal cases brought against Trump by Special Counsel Jack Smith — for allegedly mishandling classified documents and for seeking to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election. Both cases were dropped after Trump won the 2024 presidential election.
– Chris Lefkow
© 2024 AFP
