Pam Bondi is officially in control of the Justice Department — and she’s gone right to work.
President Donald Trump’s attorney general issued a flurry of orders Wednesday just after she was sworn in, releasing 14 “first-day” directives. Among them, Bondi ordered the department to set up a task force to examine the “weaponization” of the Justice Department and rein in investigations into foreign influence. She also warned career lawyers at her agency not to try to thwart Trump administration policies.
Here’s POLITICO’s look at a few of her Day 1 priorities:
Bondi directed the “weaponization” group to investigate former special counsel Jack Smith, who brought the two federal criminal cases against Trump: one over Trump’s role in the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol and another on Trump’s mishandling of classified documents.
And she directed the group to examine “federal cooperation with the weaponization” by the offices of Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg and New York Attorney General Letitia James. Bragg’s office brought the criminal hush money case against Trump that ended in his conviction on 34 felony counts of business fraud. James brought a civil fraud lawsuit against Trump and his family business that resulted in a judge ordering Trump to pay a massive civil judgment.
Trump has repeatedly vowed revenge on Bragg and James, both Democrats, saying Bragg should be prosecuted and that James is “grossly incompetent.” Trump and his supporters have also questioned the role of one of the prosecutors in Bragg’s office, Matthew Colangelo, who previously worked at the Justice Department. Trump has pointed to Colangelo’s resume to claim that former President Joe Biden’s administration played a role in bringing the criminal case.
Spokespeople for Bragg and James declined to comment.
Bondi also called for the group to examine “the pursuit of improper investigative tactics and unethical prosecutions” surrounding the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, though she sought to draw a distinction from “good-faith actions by federal employees simply following orders from superiors.”
Redirecting law enforcement
Bondi called for the Justice Department to put its full weight behind Trump’s effort to crack down on illegal immigration, using “all available criminal statutes.” She also called for the department to support the Department of Homeland Security, which has primary responsibility over immigration matters. Bondi’s memo follows an earlier directive from DOJ’s acting No. 2 official, Emil Bove, instructing FBI-led terrorism task forces across the country to re-focus on immigration.
Bondi’s memo on law-enforcement priorities also said the FBI will shutter the Foreign Influence Task Force it set up during the first Trump administration. Additionally, the Justice Department will bring charges under the Foreign Agents Registration Act only in “instances of alleged conduct similar to more traditional espionage by foreign government actors,” the memo said. The move seems to be an effort to shift the Justice Department away from prosecutions related to covert propaganda and behind-the-scenes “malign influence” campaigns. DOJ brought several such cases against Trump allies with mixed results.
Making DOJ lawyers toe the line
Bondi also laid down a get-tough policy toward any career lawyers who might seek to undermine the Trump administration’s agenda, even going so far as to raise the possibility of firing attorneys who won’t go along with their superiors.
“Department of Justice attorneys have signed up for a job that requires zealously advocating for the United States,” Bondi wrote. “The discretion afforded Department attorneys entrusted with those responsibilities does not include latitude to substitute personal political views or judgments for those that prevailed in the election.”
“It is therefore the policy of the Department of Justice that any attorney who because of their personal political views or judgments declines to sign a brief or appear in court, refuses to advance good-faith arguments on behalf of the Administration, or otherwise delays or impedes the Department’s mission will be subject to discipline and potential termination, consistent with applicable law,” she added.
That last part could be the rub: Civil service protections and legal ethics rules combine to make it difficult to take action against a government lawyer who says he or she thinks a particular argument is improper, unjustified or unethical. Already, there have been notable filings in federal cases where Justice Department political appointees have signed pleadings alone, suggesting that career staff declined to do so.
An Oct. 7 task force
Bondi signaled a renewed focus on Hamas’ attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, which killed about 1,200 people including 47 Americans and involved the taking of more than 200 hostages, including eight U.S. citizens. She directed the creation of a “10-7” task force aimed at “seeking justice for victims of the attack and addressing the ongoing threat posed by Hamas and its affiliates, both domestically and abroad.”
In addition to pursuing criminal charges against those involved in the attack, the task force will investigate and prosecute “acts of terrorism, antisemitic civil rights violations, and other federal crimes committed by Hamas supporters in the United States, including on college campuses.” Trump has repeatedly vowed to deport foreign students who are backers of Hamas.
Under the Biden administration, the Justice Department filed criminal charges against Hamas’ leaders in connection with the killings and kidnappings on Oct. 7. The case was brought under seal in federal court in New York in February 2024 and made public in September. Four of the six men charged in the case are believed to have been killed by Israel. Last week, the Justice Department asked the FBI for the names of all its personnel involved in that case. DOJ spokespeople have not responded to queries about why that information is being gathered.
DEI
In the wake of Trump’s executive order shuttering diversity, equity and inclusion programs at federal agencies, Bondi said the Justice Department “must thoroughly evaluate consent decrees, settlement agreements, litigation positions (including those set forth in amicus briefs), grants or similar funding mechanisms, procurements, internal policies and guidance, and contracting arrangements.”
“There is no place in these materials for race- or sex-based preferences, diversity hiring targets, or preferential treatment based on DEI- or DEIA-related criteria,” she wrote.
Bondi also ordered Justice Department entities to submit reports by March 15 confirming the elimination of DEI and “environmental justice” programs, as well as identifying any federal contractors who have provided DEI training or materials to any department employees since Trump took office.
Reinstating the federal death penalty
Bondi said the Justice Department would end a moratorium on federal executions that was put in place during the Biden administration. She pledged that department lawyers will “evaluate all potential avenues to strengthen the federal death penalty as a valid means of punishment for the heinous crimes it is intended to punish.”
Bondi also took aim at Biden’s decision to commute the sentences of 37 inmates on federal death row, giving them sentences of life in prison before Trump took office.
In her memo, Bondi said the Justice Department would seek to arrange a public forum for their victims’ families “to express how the commutations affected them personally.” And she directed federal prosecutors’ offices to aid local prosecutors’ offices in pursuing death sentences under state law “where appropriate and legally permissible.”
She also directed the Federal Bureau of Prisons to implement what will likely be harsher conditions for the inmates in question, ordering the agency to adjust them so they are “consistent with the security risks those inmates present.”
Sanctuary cities
Bondi reignited a long-running legal battle between DOJ and “sanctuary jurisdictions,” or cities or counties that have declined to cooperate with enforcement of federal immigration law.
She ordered the department to “pause the distribution of all funds until a review has been completed” of grants or other money flowing to those jurisdictions.
A similar move by Attorney General Jeff Sessions in Trump’s first term led to lawsuits from localities that said the Justice Department lacked the authority to cut off funding. Courts reached mixed verdicts, with a federal appeals court in Chicago ruling that the Trump administration appeared to have usurped Congress’ authority to restrict grants and an appeals court in New York finding DOJ’s policy met legal muster.
Bondi also ordered a 60-day pause in all DOJ grants or contracts to organizations that “provide services to illegal or removable aliens.”
