{"id":2390793,"date":"2025-01-15T17:33:02","date_gmt":"2025-01-15T22:33:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/grassley-to-bondi-ensure-doj-weaponization-never-happens-again\/"},"modified":"2025-01-15T17:34:55","modified_gmt":"2025-01-15T22:34:55","slug":"grassley-to-bondi-ensure-doj-weaponization-never-happens-again","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/grassley-to-bondi-ensure-doj-weaponization-never-happens-again\/","title":{"rendered":"Grassley To Bondi: Ensure DOJ Weaponization \u2018Never Happens Again&#8217;"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">18<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fgrassley-to-bondi-ensure-doj-weaponization-never-happens-again%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=2390793&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>In\u2063 a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/implicit-bias-is-nothing-but-divisive-junk-science\/\" title=\"\u2018Implicit Bias\u2019 Is Nothing But Divisive Junk Science\">recent confirmation hearing<\/a> for Pam Bondi,\u200b the former Florida Attorney General, Senator Chuck \u2064Grassley criticized the Department of justice&#8217;s targeting of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/ted-cruz-manages-to-trigger-leftists-by-doing-something-millions-of-americans-do-every-year\/\" title=\"Ted Cruz Manages To Trigger Leftists by Doing Something Millions of Americans Do Every Year\">political opponents<\/a>\u2064 over\u2062 the past decade. He \u200burged Bondi, if confirmed \u200das attorney general in the Trump administration,\u2064 too \u200dtake steps to\u200b prevent such\u200c actions from occurring again.Grassley specifically condemned federal operations like Crossfire Hurricane\u2014which was aimed at\u2064 spying\u2063 on Donald trump during the 2016 election\u2014and the use of the Steele Dossier, which falsely implicated \u2062Trump in collusion with Russia. He described\u2064 the \u2062current conduct of the \u2064Biden-Harris Justice \u200cDepartment as a failure to uphold the ideals \u200cof \u200bthe country and \u2062emphasized the need\u200d for accountability.<\/p>\n<p>Grassley pointed to\u200d the &#8220;lawfare&#8221; \u200dagainst\u200c Trump,including the controversial FBI raid on his home,and highlighted the perceived \u200cdouble standards in how similar\u2063 cases involving \u2064figures\u200b like\u200c Hillary clinton and Joe Biden have been handled. He expressed concerns over \u200cthe DOJ&#8217;s prosecution of individuals praying outside\u200c abortion clinics, suggesting that such actions exemplify \u200dthe weaponization of the\u2062 justice system. Grassley&#8217;s comments aimed to hold \u2062the Justice Department accountable and prevent future\u200c abuses of power.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"readmore\">\n    <button onclick=\"showReadMore()\" id=\"readmorebtn\">Read more&#8230;<\/button>\n<\/p>\n<hr id=\"line\">\n<span id=\"more\"><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, called on Pam Bondi to make sure the Department of Justice&rsquo;s targeting of political opponents over almost the last decade &ldquo;never happens again&rdquo; if she is confirmed as attorney general in the incoming Trump administration.<\/p>\n<p>In the first confirmation <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=UzGmbDtS8IQ\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">hearing<\/a> for former Florida Attorney General Pamela Bondi before the Senate Judiciary Committee Wednesday morning, Grassley <a href=\"https:\/\/www.judiciary.senate.gov\/press\/rep\/releases\/grassley-opening-statement-on-the-nomination-of-pam-bondi\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">slammed<\/a> specific federal efforts including Operation <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2020\/03\/02\/leak-of-crossfire-hurricane-agents-identity-to-the-nyt-suggests-more-to-come\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Crossfire Hurricane<\/a>, former President Barack Obama&rsquo;s secret campaign to spy on Donald Trump ahead of the 2016 election; the <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2019\/01\/02\/new-documents-suggest-steele-dossier-deliberate-setup-trump\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">fake<\/a> Steele Dossier which claimed Trump colluded with Russia; as well as the weaponization of the justice system against Trump and American citizens.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;The impact of this political infection in our one-story law enforcement institutions is catastrophic. By every metric, the Biden-Harris Justice Department conduct has failed to live up to our country&rsquo;s ideals,&rdquo; Grassley said. &ldquo;Miss Bondi, should you be confirmed, the actions you take to change the department&rsquo;s course must be for accountability so that the conduct I just described never happens again.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Grassley also highlighted Special Counsel Jack Smith&rsquo;s &ldquo;<a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2023\/08\/03\/jack-smiths-latest-indictment-is-legally-flawed-and-politically-suspect\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">lawfare<\/a>&rdquo; against Trump, including the&nbsp;2022 &ldquo;unprecedented FBI <a href=\"https:\/\/judiciary.house.gov\/media\/press-releases\/testimony-reveals-senior-fbi-official-expressed-concerns-about-trump-raid\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">raid<\/a> on Trump&rsquo;s house, including agents that even <a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2022\/08\/09\/fbi-even-searched-melanias-wardrobe-in-trump-raid\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">searched<\/a> the former First Lady&rsquo;s clothing drawers.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden certainly did not receive the same treatment by the government regarding their <a href=\"https:\/\/www.npr.org\/2023\/01\/21\/1150617734\/the-doj-searched-bidens-home-and-found-more-classified-documents\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">records<\/a>,&rdquo; Grassley said. &ldquo;Indeed, as my oversight exposed, the FBI amazingly agreed to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.grassley.senate.gov\/news\/news-releases\/grassley-deliberate-mishandling-classified-information-requires-accountability\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">destroy<\/a> laptop records and records associated with Clinton staff. This Orwellian conduct should have no quarter.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Grassley also blasted the DOJ&rsquo;s <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2024\/01\/30\/dad-of-11-convicted-for-praying-at-abortion-facility-alongside-5-other-pro-lifers-targeted-by-doj\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">prosecution<\/a> of Americans praying outside abortion clinics, as well as the department&rsquo;s <a href=\"https:\/\/judiciary.house.gov\/media\/press-releases\/new-report-details-extent-fbis-weaponization-law-enforcement-against\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">labeling<\/a> of &ldquo;traditional Catholics&rdquo; as &ldquo;domestic terrorism threats,&rdquo; <a href=\"http:\/\/judiciary.house.gov\/media\/press-releases\/us-house-judiciary-republicans-doj-labeled-dozens-of-parents-as-terrorist\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">investigations<\/a> into parents at school board meetings, and <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2025\/01\/15\/its-hard-to-take-zuckerbergs-sudden-about-face-on-free-speech-seriously\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">collusion<\/a> with Big Tech to censor online speech as &ldquo;misinformation.&rdquo;&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Grassley later called attention to a binder he said contained &ldquo;144 oversight letters &hellip; sent to the Biden-Harris Justice Department and its component agencies.&rdquo; He said the letters have either gone unanswered or officials &ldquo;didn&rsquo;t fully respond.&rdquo; He asked Bondi if she would &ldquo;commit to responding to his oversight requests, as well as those of other members of the committee.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;Chairman, either I or my top staff will personally review the letters and do everything we can to respond to you,&rdquo; Bondi replied.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2>Leftist Hypocrisy<\/h2>\n<p>Even after Grassley laid out the myriad ways in which Biden&rsquo;s DOJ targeted political opponents, the Democrat senators repeatedly urged the importance of the DOJ&rsquo;s &ldquo;independence&rdquo; and raised &ldquo;concerns&rdquo; about Trump potentially weaponizing the justice department. Bondi continually assured she would apply the law impartially.<\/p>\n<p>For example, Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., suggested Trump might &ldquo;use the department to target his political adversaries&rdquo; and &ldquo;might interfere with prosecution.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Using a hypothetical scenario, Coons asked Bondi what she would do &ldquo;if your career DOJ prosecutors came to you with a case &hellip; grounded in the facts and law, but the White House directs you to drop [it]?&rdquo; <\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;Every case will be prosecuted based on the facts and the law that is applied in good faith,&rdquo; Bondi responded. &ldquo;Politics have got to be taken out of the system. This department has been weaponized for years, and years, and years.&rdquo; <\/p>\n<p>Other Democrats held lockstep, pushing Bondi on the same points. After a series of questions, Democrat Sen. Mazie Hirono asked, &ldquo;[I]f President-elect Trump asks, suggests, or hints that you as attorney general should investigate one of his <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/biden-purges-trump-appointees-from-fixed-term-government-boards-in-unprecedented-departure-from-norms\/\" title=\"Biden Purges Trump Appointees From Fixed-Term Government Boards In \u2018Unprecedented\u2019 Departure From Norms\">perceived political enemies<\/a>, would you do so?&rdquo;<\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Bondi noted that Sen. Hirono was &ldquo;the only [senator] who refused to meet&rdquo; with her prior to the hearing but said that, had they met, the two &ldquo;would have discussed &hellip; it is the job of the Attorney General to follow the law.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Hirono went on to claim that Trump &ldquo;considers the agency&rsquo;s office his law firm,&rdquo; without mentioning how the DOJ has been acting as Biden&rsquo;s personal political enforcer for years.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>&ldquo;I certainly have not heard the president say that, but what I will tell you is two-thirds of Americans have lost faith in the Department of Justice, and it&rsquo;s statements like that, I believe, that make people continue to lose faith,&rdquo; Bondi responded, as Hirono tried to interrupt. &ldquo;If I am confirmed as attorney general, it will be my job to not only keep America safe, but restore integrity to that department.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<hr>\n<p>      Logan Washburn is a <a href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/3YuVZYV\">staff writer covering election integrity<\/a>. He is a spring 2025 fellow of The College Fix. He graduated from Hillsdale College, served as Christopher Rufo&#8217;s editorial assistant, and has bylines in The Wall Street Journal, The Tennessean, and The Daily Caller. Logan is from Central Oregon but now lives in rural Michigan.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Sen. Grassley urged Pam Bondi to prevent DOJ&#8217;s past targeting of political opponents if confirmed as attorney general<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":507,"featured_media":2390794,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/Screenshot-2025-01-15-at-9.49.25%E2%80%AFAM-e1736964749165-1024x644.png","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[12872,45543,7076,9760],"class_list":["post-2390793","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-weaponization","tag-bondi","tag-doj","tag-grassley"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/Screenshot-2025-01-15-at-9.49.25%E2%80%AFAM-e1736964749165-1024x644.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2390793","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/507"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2390793"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2390793\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2390797,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2390793\/revisions\/2390797"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2390794"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2390793"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2390793"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2390793"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}