US President Donald Trump fired Attorney General Pam Bondi on Thursday, reportedly after growing frustrated with what he saw as her insufficient zeal in pursuing his political opponents and her handling of the department’s review of the Jeffrey Epstein files.
Trump confirmed the dismissal in a Truth Social post, saying Bondi will move to “an important new job in the private sector.” He named Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche as acting attorney general while the White House weighs a permanent replacement; former New York Rep. Lee Zeldin, who now heads the Environmental Protection Agency, has been floated as a leading candidate.
Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Calif.), the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee, said Bondi “will not escape accountability” and remains legally obligated to appear before the committee under oath in response to a subpoena the panel approved last month. Garcia accused Bondi of leading “a White House cover-up of the Epstein files,” saying she “weaponized the Department of Justice to protect Donald Trump and put survivors in harm’s way by exposing their identities.”
Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) highlighted Bondi’s refusal to apologize to Epstein survivors whose identities were revealed in Justice Department disclosures that Democrats say were redacted to protect powerful figures, including Trump. “Bondi called apologizing to the Epstein survivors getting into the ‘gutter,’” Jayapal wrote on social media. “Good riddance.”
Politico reported Bondi had been under pressure since last summer over her handling of the Epstein inquiry, with close allies privately criticizing her response. Trump had publicly complained late last year that Bondi was not aggressive enough in pursuing his perceived political enemies, posting in September that many observers saw “all talk, no action.”
After that post, the Justice Department pursued charges against former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James; those cases were dismissed by a federal judge in November.
Public Citizen co-president Lisa Gilbert criticized Bondi’s tenure, saying the DOJ under her “took the DOJ in a lawless, non-independent, shameful direction” and has “trivialized the DOJ, the sanctity of law, and the attorney general position.” Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) accused the department under Bondi of handing out merger approvals as political favors and called the DOJ “a cesspool of corruption.”
The article above was originally published by Common Dreams and is republished under a Creative Commons license.
Separately, The Daily Mail, citing an unnamed “senior Trump administration source,” reported that Trump believed Bondi had tipped off Rep. Eric Swalwell about FBI efforts to release documents related to his alleged relationship with Christine Fang, an alleged Chinese spy. That account claims Bondi intervened because of a friendly relationship with Swalwell; the report was included with commentary by Asia Times editors noting the claim’s circulation but not confirming the details.
