Bondi firing a reminder that even ultra-loyalists get dumped by Trump | Donald Trump
Pam Bondi’s swift dismissal Thursday underscores a reality facing Trump loyalists from Jeff Sessions to Kristi Noem: no amount of loyalty is enough to save yourself from being abandoned by Donald Trump.
Since the president took office last year, few people have been more important to his efforts to rebuild government than his longtime friend Bondi.
Trump promised that revenge would be the hallmark of his second term, and Bondi was the chief enforcer from his first day in office. As attorney general, he overturned the longstanding norm that the justice department be apolitical and keep its distance from the White House. He oversaw the purge of career employees assigned to work on criminal cases against Trump and numerous career attorneys with irreplaceable expertise. He also oversaw politically motivated investigations into Trump’s political enemies, including former FBI director James Comey and New York attorney general Letitia James.
“Pam Bondi has taken a sledgehammer to the justice department and its workforce. Under her leadership, the Justice Department’s independence, integrity, and workforce have declined more than at any time in the department’s 155-year history,” said Stacey Young, a former justice department attorney who leads Justice Connection, an advocacy group for Justice Department graduates.
“What he destroyed in one year could take decades to rebuild. But we have a president who fired him because he didn’t go far enough,” he added.
Bondi met with prosecutors from the southern district of Florida on Wednesday to discuss the investigation into former CIA director John Brennan and others, according to a source familiar with the matter. Ultimately, however, Bondi’s loyalty to Trump grew to the point where she could not fully accommodate the president’s volatile demands. Embers reportedly fired him in part because of his lack of progress in prosecuting his enemies and his handling of the Epstein files.
A federal judge dismissed the cases against Comey and James last year after finding that the prosecutor who oversaw them, who was also a Trump loyalist, was unlawfully appointed. A federal grand jury in Virginia also turned down efforts to reindict James. The administration’s failure to overcome these measures was a stark reminder of the checks and balances that still exist in the American legal system. It was these same security measures that apparently enraged Trump.
Trump’s frustration with Bondi’s handling of the Epstein files shows how the issue continues to plague his administration. Shortly after becoming attorney general, Bondi appeared on Fox News and said the Epstein files were “sitting on my desk.” Months later, the justice department said it would not release any further information, citing the need to protect victims and saying it had no “client list.”
Congress responded by passing bipartisan legislation requiring the release of the files. The justice department has released millions of documents to comply with this law, but there are unexplained redactions and documents appear and disappear from the department’s website. These documents shed light on a vast network of powerful people who communicated and interacted with Epstein, many of whom have since left their powerful positions in the private sector. It also brought the controversy into the news amid questions about Trump’s own friendship and relationship with Epstein.
Bondi has tried to save face with Trump by insulting and combatively arguing with members of Congress during public hearings, and as recently as Wednesday he was meeting with prosecutors and justice department officials to discuss an investigation into Brennan and other Trump foes.
It wasn’t enough.
California senator Adam Schiff, whom Trump wants prosecuted, said in a post on
“But Pam Bondi was just one symptom of Donald Trump’s chronic allergy to our nation’s laws. And ultimately her sycophancy could not prevent the inevitable breach of defense that befell so many Trump loyalists.”
