Pam
Bondi
(Photo
by
Joe
Raedle/Getty)
Well,
there’s
no
forthcoming
report
on
Trump’s
latest
Attorney
General
pick
suggesting
she
paid
17-year-olds
for
sexual
contact.
In
the
year
of
our
lord
2025,
that
actually
qualifies
as
an
improvement!
But
that
doesn’t
mean
that
Pam
Bondi
is
teed
up
to
be
an
amazing
AG.
In
fact,
attorneys
are
raising
some
pretty
serious
alarm
bells
about
a
potential
AG
Bondi.
Bondi
is
the
former
Florida
Attorney
General
and
worked
as
Trump’s
personal
attorney
before
getting
the
nod
to
take
over
the
Department
of
Justice.
As
former
S.D.N.Y.
judge
and
current
counsel
at
Boies
Schiller
Flexner
Shira
Scheindlin
noted
to
Law.com,
it’s
concerning
Trump
is
consistently
elevating
*his*
attorneys
to
government
roles
(in
addition
to
Bondi,
he’s
also
nominating
his
former
personal
attorneys
Todd
Blanche
and
John
Sauer
to
top
DOJ
leadership
positions).
“I’m
worried
about
their
[DOJ
leadership’s]
independence
from
the
president,
because
the
attorney
general
is
supposed
to
be
independent,
not
the
president’s
personal
lawyer.
They’re
supposed
to
be
representing
the
people
of
the
United
States
in
writ
large.
And
I
am
worried
that,
given
it’s
Bondi
and
Blanche
and
Sauer,
all
of
them
have
been
his
personal
lawyers,”
said
Scheindlin.
Danya
Perry
of
litigation
boutique
Perry
Law
contrasted
Bondi’s
fealty
to
Trump’s
personal
agenda
relative
to
her
predecessors,
“There’s
a
lot
of
reason
to
believe
that
[Trump]
vetted
her
specifically
because
there
is
so
much
alignment
and
will
not
exercise
the
kind
of
independence
that
he
really
has
very
aggressively
criticized
in
the
past
from
Jeff
Sessions
and
Bill
Barr.”
Georgetown
University
Law
Center
professor
Erica
Hashimoto
echoed
those
concerns
saying
it
is
“much
less
likely
that
there
will
be
that
same
kind
of
separation
and
independence”
between
Bondi
and
Trump.
And
we
can
expect
Bondi’s
history
as
a
lobbyist
to
impact
her
prosecutorial
agenda
too.
“[Bondi]
has
been
working
for
the
past
five
years
as
a
lobbyist
and
for
essentially
big
companies,
and
so
she
is
used
to
arguing
that
those
companies
should
not
be
prosecuted
or
fined
or
anything
else.
I
think
that
will
affect
how
she
prioritizes
things
for
the
Department
of
Justice,”
said
Hashimoto,
adding
the
DOJ
priorities
will
likely
be
“much
more
about
individual
criminal
prosecutions,
as
opposed
to
the
more
corporate/business
types
of
investigations
and
prosecutions.”
We’re
getting
a
pretty
clear
image
of
what
Bondi’s
reign
as
AG
might
look
like,
and
it
isn’t
great.
Kathryn
Rubino
is
a
Senior
Editor
at
Above
the
Law,
host
of
The
Jabot
podcast,
and
co-host
of
Thinking
Like
A
Lawyer.
AtL
tipsters
are
the
best,
so
please
connect
with
her.
Feel
free
to
email
her
with
any
tips,
questions,
or
comments
and
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her
on
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@Kathryn1 or
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@[email protected].