'President was unswayed': NYT's Haberman reveals moment Pam Bondi 'pushed back' on Trump
Attorney General Pam Bondi stood up to Donald Trump in the course of a recent DOJ shake up, according to new reporting.
Bondi has publicly supported the president's moves, but a Saturday article from Maggie Haberman and others at the New York Times shows the behind-the-scenes push back.
It started with James Comey, whom Trump had sought to prosecute. According to the report, things turned heated with "the resignation of Erik S. Siebert, the U.S. attorney who believed the evidence against Mr. Comey was insufficient."
"By mid-September, Mr. Trump was determined to rid himself of Mr. Siebert, a 15-year veteran of the office. Ms. Bondi and Mr. Blanche, who had worked closely with Mr. Siebert on immigration, drug and gang cases, pushed back," according to the Times. "The president was unswayed. On Friday, Sept. 19, he told reporters he wanted Mr. Siebert to leave. The prosecutor, who had hoped to find another job in the department, knew that time was up and resigned, according to officials in his office who requested anonymity to avoid retribution."
The report continues:
"The next morning, shellshocked staff members in the U.S. attorney’s office awakened to find an email in their inboxes from Maggie Cleary, a veteran state prosecutor, saying she was their new boss."
Bondi and Blanche kept pushing back with Trump's new appointment, as well, the report states.
"Mr. Trump announced that Ms. Halligan, a former member of his criminal defense team who had previously specialized in insurance law, would run the office. That her first order of business was indicting Mr. Comey was obvious," the article notes. "Ms. Bondi and Mr. Blanche had not been given much of a head’s up, or veto power, over the pick. Both quietly questioned Ms. Halligan’s credentials to run such an important U.S. attorney’s office, according to a person with knowledge of her thinking."