Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche on Wednesday stood by President Donald Trump’s criticism of U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro, who has drawn the president’s ire for dropping charges against a former Olympian and others accused of vandalizing the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool.
Trump’s Justice Department indicted former Olympian David Hearn in July, charging him with one felony count of destruction of property after the president repeatedly said the costly renovation of the landmark had faced major setbacks because politically motivated actors were vandalizing the project.
The DOJ moved to drop the felony charges against Hearn on July 31. Pirro filed the motion to dismiss after prosecutors obtained information that showed the damage was caused by “botched work” performed by the project’s contractor, not by criminal conduct.
As to whether he will fire Pirro, Trump said Tuesday, “I haven’t made a determination” — as he continues to disparage his handpicked U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia.
“She choked because the judge was really vicious,” Trump told reporters Monday in the Oval Office. “Instead of going after the people that did it, the judge went after her and went after her department, and I guess she choked. … I don’t know what the hell happened.”
Blanche, who is himself facing an uphill battle in the Senate as Republican support for his nomination to serve as Trump’s attorney general wanes, told reporters during a joint DOJ-FBI news conference on counterterrorism objectives that Trump has the right to fire Pirro should he choose to do so.
Pressed as to what message it would send to fire a U.S. attorney “because she determined there was not sufficient evidence to charge four people with a crime,” Blanche said simply that the president “has the power to do that.”
“If President Trump wanted to fire anybody, right, within his administration, he understands he has the power to do that,” Blanche said. “So when he makes a decision about whether to fire a U.S. attorney or anybody else, that’s his.”
As to senators’ support for his own nomination, Blanche pointed reporters to the Justice Department’s “body of work” since Trump returned to the White House last year, saying, “I’m hopeful that the work, like what we’re talking about today, the body of work the department has done over the past year and a half — of which I’m a very small part of — is something that the Senate recognizes.”
That body of work does seem to have the attention of some Republican senators. Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, announced Tuesday she would oppose Blanche’s nomination, citing “several actions” Blanche took in his capacity as acting attorney general that she said have further “eroded” the department’s political independence.
Among them, Collins said, were his role in brokering a settlement agreement between Trump and the IRS that established the $1.8 billion taxpayer-funded “anti-weaponization” fund to compensate Jan. 6 defendants and others who claim to have been politically persecuted by the federal government. She also listed Blanche’s involvement in trying to charge two Democratic senators with sedition, among other misgivings.
Two other GOP senators, Bill Cassidy of Louisiana and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, who have bucked their party on key votes in the past, have yet to declare publicly whether they will vote in favor of Blanche.
Asked Wednesday whether he was concerned that other Republican senators would follow in Collins’ footsteps, Blanche said, “I’m not worried about what’s going to happen over the next couple of days.”
Sens. John Cornyn, R-Texas, and Thom Tillis, R-N.C., who are both on the judiciary committee, said a formal order Blanche issued last weekend assuaged their concerns about the fund and the tax audit immunity provisions for Trump and his family.
Legal experts, however, have warned that the scope of Blanche’s documents seemed to fall short of Cornyn and Tillis’ original demands.
“I think we’re not going to get a better nominee at this point than Todd Blanche,” Cornyn told MS NOW. “So I think we need some stability, and I think he can provide that.”
Cornyn said Murkowski had told him on Tuesday that she was still deliberating. Murkowski declined to comment to MS NOW on Wednesday when asked about her vote.
With a slim GOP majority in the chamber, Blanche can only afford to lose one more Republican senator and still be confirmed. Senate leaders are seeking to hold Blanche’s confirmation vote this week before the upper chamber heads home for the August recess.
“I’m not going to do anything except continue to communicate with anybody who has questions about anything involving the department that I can answer, or me personally that I can answer,” Blanche said Wednesday.
Mychael Schnell contributed reporting.
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