Attorney General Todd Blanche declines to pledge DOJ independence from White House

Today’s Focus

Attorney General Todd Blanche declined on Sunday to promise that the Justice Department would always act independently of President Donald Trump and the White House, telling NBC’s Meet the Press host Kristen Welker, “No, I’m not going to pledge that,” and adding that “no attorney general should ever pledge that.”

The remarks, reported by The Guardian, The Hill and USA Today, came weeks after Trump dismissed Blanche’s predecessor, Pam Bondi, amid reported frustration over what the president viewed as insufficient action against his political opponents.

Blanche, a former personal defense lawyer for Trump before joining the administration, drew a distinction between doing the department’s job on individual cases and asserting categorical independence from the president. He told Welker the president “will never ask me to do something unethical or legal or illegal,” according to The Guardian’s transcript of the exchange.

Blanche also said his oath was to the Constitution, echoing language used by prior attorneys general, and rejected what he called a “false narrative” pushed by Democrats and the press that Trump would direct him to pursue specific individuals.

The Hill reported that Blanche did not commit to independent decision-making but stated the president had not asked him to prosecute named people and would not do so.

Reaction was swift on social media. Barb McQuade, a University of Michigan law professor and former U.S. attorney, wrote that Blanche’s stance was “an appalling departure” from the reforms adopted after the Watergate scandal that led to President Richard Nixon’s 1974 resignation, according to The Guardian.

The Justice Department did not release a follow-up statement clarifying Blanche’s remarks by Sunday evening.

The Debate

Supporters argue

Blanche’s defenders say he was making a narrow, technically accurate point about the constitutional structure. The attorney general is a presidential appointee who serves in the executive branch, and the president is the head of that branch under Article II.

Conservative legal scholars associated with the unitary executive theory, including writers at the Heritage Foundation, have long argued that a fully autonomous Justice Department is a norm, not a legal requirement, and that pretending otherwise misleads the public about who is ultimately accountable for federal law enforcement.

Blanche himself told Welker, as quoted by The Guardian, that he swore an oath “to the constitution of the United States, like every cabinet secretary” and that Trump “never has” and “never will” ask him to do something illegal.

Allies of the administration argue the distinction Blanche drew, between routinely doing the department’s job and pledging categorical independence, is one previous attorneys general have privately acknowledged. They point out that presidents from both parties have publicly commented on Justice Department matters and set enforcement priorities without prompting resignations.

Critics argue

Critics say Blanche’s refusal breaks with a bipartisan norm built after Watergate to insulate individual criminal cases from White House pressure. McQuade, writing on social media and quoted by The Guardian, called the position an “appalling departure” and said the department “as we once knew it, is no more.”

Senate Democrats and civil-liberties groups have argued that the norm, though not codified in statute, is a central safeguard against politicized prosecutions. They note that after Watergate, the department issued internal contacts policies limiting communications between the White House and prosecutors on specific cases.

Legal ethics scholars have said Blanche’s prior role as Trump’s personal defense attorney compounds the concern, because he now oversees investigations that could touch the president’s political adversaries or allies.

Critics also cite the circumstances of Bondi’s departure. The Guardian reported that Trump grew frustrated with what he saw as insufficient action against political foes before dismissing her, a pattern opponents say makes Blanche’s refusal to pledge independence more significant than a purely theoretical point.

What the experts say

The post-Watergate framework critics invoke is not a single law but a collection of internal Justice Department policies and norms. According to the Congressional Research Service, the department has maintained written “contacts policies” since the Ford administration limiting who at the White House may communicate with prosecutors about pending cases; these memoranda have been reissued, with variations, by attorneys general of both parties.

Jack Goldsmith, a Harvard Law School professor and former head of the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel under President George W. Bush, has written that the attorney general’s independence is best understood as a “convention” rather than a constitutional command, and that its erosion is difficult to measure in real time.

Data from the Pew Research Center’s 2023 survey on trust in federal institutions showed that public confidence in the Justice Department to act fairly has declined among both Republicans and Democrats over the past decade, though the partisan gap has widened.

The Brennan Center for Justice, a nonpartisan law and policy institute at NYU, has catalogued proposals to codify DOJ independence in statute; none has advanced in Congress.

By the Numbers

1974: the year President Richard Nixon resigned following the Watergate scandal, prompting the reforms critics say Blanche is departing from, according to The Guardian.

2: the number of attorneys general Trump has installed in his second term, following Pam Bondi’s dismissal, according to The Guardian.

5: the approximate number of presidential administrations, from Ford through Biden, that have issued or reissued formal White House, DOJ contacts policies, according to the Congressional Research Service.

0: the number of federal statutes that codify a general requirement of Justice Department independence from the White House, according to the Brennan Center for Justice.

36%: the share of Americans who expressed “a great deal” or “quite a lot” of confidence in the criminal justice system in Gallup’s 2024 Confidence in Institutions survey.

1: the number of times Blanche said “no” when Welker asked him to pledge independence, according to The Hill’s transcript.