What's Next After Firing of Pam Bondi & Mail-In Ballots

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1:31This is Bloomberg Law with June Grosso from Bloomberg Radio. After just 14 months, Pam Bondi, a loyal Trump ally, is out as attorney general after failing to deliver criminal cases against President Trump's political enemies. Bondi oversaw the unprecedented transformation of the Justice Department into an arm of the White House and tried to pursue cases against Democrats and the president's perceived political enemies. But will her successor fare any better, facing the same factual and legal hurdles and a skeptical court system? My guest is Constitutional Law Professor Harold Krent of the Chicago-Kent College of Law.

2:16Hal, tell us how the Justice Department became an arm of the White House under Bondi, something we've never seen before. Obviously, the ties between the actions on the ground for the Department of Justice and the president become closer and closer. Obviously, that's been a priority of the president to try to take everything in his own image and make sure that he can direct even very minor issues. But in this case, very important prosecutorial issues. And the Bondi's reign is probably most notable because of the revenge that Trump overtly tried to take against his enemies via the Department of Justice.

2:53So apparently one of the reasons that she was fired is that Trump wasn't satisfied with her prosecution of his political enemies. But she did try. It seemed like the legal system stood in her way. Yeah, I mean, the irony is she did his bidding and she tried to, you know, politicize, weaponize the Department of Justice, whichever word works with the James Comey prosecution, with the prosecution of John Bolton, Letitia James. She's just trying to follow President Trump's orders of trying to get back at his enemies. And it didn't work. Was it her fault? Probably not. It just wasn't there. And so the fact that she's being canned because she couldn't do the impossible is really a partial triumph of the justice system in the United States, but also an irony as well.

3:45She did appoint Lindsey Halligan as a U.S. attorney and a judge throughout the prosecutions against Comey and James because Halligan was illegally appointed. But I don't know if Halligan was Bondi's choice or Trump's choice. So if you think about what's gone wrong, there's the weaponization of the Department of Justice to go against Trump's enemies. Also, the chaos that was sown because of these interim appointments. And probably the fault doesn't lie with her. It probably lies with the president or the president's closer circle. But we have the Lindsey Halligan, the Alina Habba, about five other prosecutorial offices, major prosecutorial offices in the United States.

4:23They're just in chaos because the president wasn't able to appoint somebody who could be confirmed by the Senate. And then the shenanigans with trying to get these interim U.S. attorneys in place had just bounced back in his face. And maybe he blames that on her, though, again, it wouldn't be fair. Hundreds of career employees left the department during Bondi's tenure. She also shut down units investigating public corruption and curtailed investigations into corporate and environmental crime. How different is the department now compared to before she took over? Well, those such as me who has served in the Department of Justice just wonder if after Trump, will there be respect built up for the Department of Justice?

5:09because what we've seen is the fact that so many people have left so much knowledge, so much experience, that the president's having a hard time getting his agenda accepted by judges. And that's because people who are there, attorneys who are there, are no longer as respected. And so there has been a blowback from judges, just both with ineptitude and lack of credibility, which has undermined his ability to get convictions. I mean, Jerome Powell is a great example of how he tried to get subpoenas and tried to move because of cost overruns against the Fed. And the judge said, what are you doing?

5:41Where's the evidence? And the attorneys couldn't even point to anything to show why there is a need for the subpoenas against Powell. So it's a good example, again, of the blowback because of the lack of competence and care taken by the Department of Justice in building these cases. Temporarily, he's installed his former personal defense lawyer, Todd Blanche. Todd Blanche has been deputy attorney general. So do you expect to see any changes under his tenure. I don't, and I'm not sure what the president can accomplish with this switch, because the problem I don't think lies with Pam Bondi, except for maybe one exception we'll get to.

6:15But the problem is just the fact that there's not a lot of evidence, not a lot of experienced attorneys. And so his mission to get the courts to agree with what he wants to do is not succeeding. I don't think it's going to succeed under Todd Blanche either. And Todd Blanche, I know some former federal judges have expressed displeasure, shall we say, that Blanche came out at a Federalist Society function and said the Justice Department is at war with the judiciary and rogue judges. That's not the kind of statement you expect to hear from a deputy attorney general. No, he's been very confrontational, more confrontational, in fact, than Pam Bondi with respect to judges.

6:55And I don't think that is going to end up with judges rolling over. I think we're going to see judges continually to reject much of the mission of this administration. I want to just mention, I'm sure you will too, the one exception is Pembanyi did not handle the Epstein files well. And obviously, she was in a terrible situation. And there's all sorts of conflicting evidence and difficulties in dealing with the Epstein files. But she did make it worse. And she's going to testify before Congress. And I'm very curious about whether she's going to take the Fifth Amendment and testify or not. But she did worsen the president's situation.

7:30She did not protect the president with respect to the Epstein files. Is there any difference with her no longer being the attorney general? Like, should Trump have waited until after that deposition? I don't think there'll be a material difference. I could be wrong. But I think most of the issues could be a privilege issue in terms of protecting what the president told her. It could be still a privilege issue of not trying to undermine ongoing criminal investigations. And there's obviously a privilege against self-incrimination in case that comes up. So I don't think she'll be in material different position, but I know Congress wants at her and they want her testimony.

8:05And the most basic thing was she said she saw a client list, right, of Jeffrey Epstein, and then it disappeared. Well, what is she going to say about that? And that may not be subject to privilege. And that's why Congress has been so adamant that she testified and why she's in a very dicey situation, should she turn up. Might some of the problem be the way she expressed herself and framed the issues? Will Todd Blanche have a different approach, maybe a softer approach? I'm not sure that Blanche is going to do a softer approach. No, I think Blanche has been pretty hard-edged so far in his dealings with the judiciary.

8:41I'd be surprised if that changed. I mean, yes, I think her judgment with the Epstein files is the one area that one can really point to where she did not protect the president. But I think Blanche will have even more difficulty if trying to get at Jerome Powell, trying to get at John Bolton, trying to get at Comey, at James, and so many others. And, you know, the chaos in the U.S. Attorney's Office is because of the appointments isn't her fault. I don't think she was a mastermind of that. You know, I think that came from somewhere else. So I'm not sure that Blanche can improve on that either. Yeah, he said on Fox News Thursday, to the extent the Epstein files was a part of the past year of this Justice Department, it should not be a part of anything going forward.

9:20That's not going to work. No. And again, Blanche may have a different strategy, and he won't be sort of subpoenaed by Congress the way Pam Bondi is because he hasn't sort of perjured himself or made some very difficult to understand claims about the Epstein files. But I'm not sure what the right strategy is. Again, I think if you step back, the president has put the attorney general in such a difficult position, both with respect to the Epstein files, but also with respect to, you know, many of these prosecutions that I think almost anyone is doomed to failure unless they can sort of talk the president down.

9:53And we haven't seen evidence that many people can talk the president down. Also, Todd Blanche was responsible for interviewing Ghislaine Maxwell. And then suddenly the next day she gets sent to a prison camp. Convicted child offenders are not supposed to be allowed in those kind of camps. So the fix was in somewhere there. Yeah, many people were expecting even a pardon. And we haven't seen that. But obviously, she's in better quarters than she was before. And what kind of cooperation he was able to obtain, what kind of information he was able to obtain has not been revealed. But he's obviously has some built up relationship.

10:33And maybe the president just wants to rely upon that relationship to protect him, at least with respect to the Epstein files. And Blanche can only serve for 120 days. We're expecting that either perhaps Blanche can be appointed during that time period, perhaps somebody else will be appointed. I'm certainly not privy to those kinds of discussions, but he is knowledgeable about the Department of Justice. He's certainly knowledgeable about the president. So I think it's a wise choice for the president in terms of at least as an interim attorney general. But what follows is really critical. And so the prediction market is betting on who'll be the next attorney general.

11:07And Lee Zeldin, who's currently the EPA chief, is the frontrunner. Betters are placing a 47 percent probability on him being the next attorney general. There again, he's carried out Trump's mission at the EPA. So why would he be any different as attorney general? Anyone who gets appointed is going to be subject to the same presidential demands. It is not a job that I would cherish at this moment because it's an impossible job. And again, I think Pam Bondi did her best to help the president with the exception of the Epstein files. I think she did. She was a loyal soldier, but it's an impossible job.

11:44And unless somebody can sort of talk down the president and limit his desire to go after enemies and weaponize the Department of Justice, I think the succeeding attorney general will have just as difficult of a time as Pam Bondi did. New York Attorney General Letitia James, where the attempts by Bondi to prosecute her failed. So apparently they're still trying with a different angle. But at what point does it become a slam dunk case of malicious prosecution? Right. And the same thing is true with James Comey and with others. And I think, again, the courts are just tired of it. And I think that they've seen these thinly papered up prosecutions and they're insulted and they're insulted by the competence of the attorneys.

12:26They're insulted by the preparation for the cases. They're insulted by the theories of the prosecutions. And I hate to say it, but just wasting taxpayer money. And I'm not sure what Trump thinks he'll gain by this because he's just losing respect and the ability of courts in cases that probably he should care more about. And they may turn against him in those as well. Hal, I've been wondering if you see any strategy in the way President Trump is dealing with the Supreme Court. After he lost the tariff decision, he was brutally critical of the justices who voted against him. And the night before the birthright citizenship arguments, he criticized judges and justices in a post on social media.

13:06He then attended half of the oral arguments and afterwards posted about how stupid birthright citizenship is. This all seems counterproductive to me. I think at the beginning, his factiousness with the Supreme Court did serve a purpose. There was a theory that might be sort of borne out by the evidence that he tried to make the court very wary of a confrontation. And because of his assertiveness and dismissiveness of the court, they didn't want to challenge him. And I think that led to particular use of the shadow docket. So there was not a written opinion. It led to all of these cases where they really voted in favor of the Trump administration.

13:49But then with the tariffs case and all the gloves coming off and belittling the court and making fun of them, you know, even the conservative justices, I think, have been deeply insulted to the core. And I think that's basically just increased their resolve to vote against the president in the birthright citizenship case and others coming down the lane. So, again, it's not good strategy. It's just Trumpism. And there's a study in Just Security that revealed that more than 210 cases since the start of 2025 where the courts have issued strong rulings against the administration's conduct. Yeah, the lower court judges have been firmly aligned, many Republican judges joining Democratic judges, in saying this is lawless.

14:33You have to follow the law. We have a rule of law in this country. It's been cherished. It's part of our tradition. It's part of our future, we hope, and that the administration is just going over the line. and I don't think his effort to push judges from that has succeeded. Maybe again, maybe he did a little bit at the beginning, but I think it's only going to get worse, and I think he has basically undercut his own position to such an extent, bit off his nose to spite the face one could say, that he's going to face more and more losses in the courts. It's not going to be a happy situation. Is anyone talking yet about a preemptive pardon for Pam Bondi?

15:10You know, she stepped down. She's been involved in all these controversial issues, particularly perhaps lying to Congress with respect to the Epstein investigation. And so just as Biden considered preemptive pardons, she might want to solicit a farewell present from the president in the shape of a pardon just so she can go on with her life and not worry about possible criminal charges. What seemed a little off to me is that Kristi Noem, who was fired after two U.S. citizens were killed by DHS agents under her watch, she was given another position. But Pam Bondi, who was so loyal to Trump, was not given another position.

15:52Well, it's also an interesting signal that loyalty may not be enough in terms of surviving the Trump administration. The other thing I would mention I've been fascinated about this last couple of days is the leaks that are coming out from the Trump administration. I think there must be a lot of officials, a lot of the rank and file are no longer worried about repercussions. And they seem very willing to go to the press and to spill out all this information, obviously, even before the discharge happened, etc. So there's signs then that the cracks at the administration because it's not rewarding loyalty.

16:27So it's not attaining loyalty from the troops. There's also been a lot of speculation about who in the cabinet might be next to be fired. Thanks so much for joining me today, Hal. That's Professor Harold Krent of the Chicago-Kent College of Law. This message is brought to you by Apple Card. Apple Card members can earn unlimited daily cash back on everyday purchases wherever they shop. This means you could be earning daily cash on just about anything, like a slice of pizza from your local pizza place or a latte from the corner coffee shop. Apply for Apple Card and the Wallet app to see your credit limit offer in minutes.

17:04Subject to credit approval, Apple Card issued by Goldman Sachs Bank USA, Salt Lake City Branch. Terms and more at AppleCard.com. So there's a lot of noise about AI, but time's too tight for more promises. So let's talk about results. At IBM, we work with our employees to integrate technology right into the systems they need. Now, a global workforce of 300 ,000 can use AI to fill their HR questions, resolving 94 % of common questions. Not noise. Proof of how we can help companies get smarter by putting AI where it actually pays off. Deep in the work that moves the business. Let's create smarter business.

17:40IBM. You need to make a huge presentation in an hour. Adobe Acrobat uses AI to take all your documents and generate a presentation with a single click. Build slides quickly and streamline the process. Need a last-minute pitch deck? Do that with Acrobat. Need to level up your presentation design? Do that with Acrobat. You have 30-plus documents that need to be simplified into a proposal. Do that. Do that. Do that with Acrobat. Learn more at adobe.com slash do that with Acrobat. So far, there are four legal challenges to President Trump's executive order on mail-in voting. Democratic-led states, Democratic congressional leaders, the League of Women voters and civil rights groups are all suing to block the administration from prohibiting mail-in voting for anyone not on a pre-approved list of citizens to be compiled by the Department of Homeland Security.

18:38For years, Trump has claimed without evidence that there's widespread fraud, including non-citizen voting, in U.S. elections. This executive order is his latest effort to alter elections since his defeat by Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election. Joining me is an expert in elections law, Richard Brafalt, a professor at Columbia Law School. Rich, start by explaining this executive order. Trump's executive order requires two lists. One is that the Department of Homeland Security, in cooperation with the Social Security Administration and other governmental athletes will come up with a kind of a state-by-state voting list, a state-specific citizenship list of people eligible to vote.

19:27And they're supposed to transmit that to the states by 60 days before the next federal election. The states, I skipped a step, the states are then supposed to tell by 60 days before the election, the Postal Service, which of their voters are expecting to use absentee or mail-in ballots, then also the Postal Service is supposed to create a list of people whose mail-in ballots will be accepted and transmitted by the Postal Service. The Postal Service, in the meantime, will develop by a rule that basically says that only those voters who are on the federal voting eligible list will have their mail-in ballots actually transmitted by the Postal Service.

20:13There's other stuff about also developing unique identification QR codes on each ballot, which I think many states have already started to do. But the key idea is that there'll be a federal voting eligible list created by the federal government and says to the states, and then the states will send a list to the Postal Service, and the Postal Service will only carry absentee or mail-in ballots that the Postal Service concludes are eligible based on the Department of Homeland Security's citizenship list. So we're supposed to trust that the Department of Homeland Security in conjunction with the Post Office has given us a list that's accurate.

20:52It sounds like there would be, you know, just forget the legalities. It sounds like there would be a ton of problems with this. Yes. I mean, basically, Homeland Security has only really gotten into this fairly recently. They're relying on the Social Security Administration. Social Security Administration itself says that it kind of requires people to self-certify whether they're citizens. They don't check citizenship. And apparently they don't really have any records on citizens before about 1981. They only began to check citizenship in the 1980s. And they really only look into citizenship for people who are actually claiming Social Security.

21:25DHS, its citizenship records were mostly based on people becoming citizens through naturalization or other processes. There may be other federal databases that have this information, but the idea is that they're going to draw from all the relevant federal databases to come up with a state citizenship list, which they will then transmit to the states by 60 days before the next federal election. The states are not mandated to use this, actually. It doesn't actually require the states to use this list, but the assumption is the states will either will or will be guided by it. It kicks in more when the states send their absentee voter list to the Postal Service, which will have supposed to have developed a rule that says they'll only handle absentee ballots for voters who are on the federal list.

22:15That's where the federal list has bite. So there are several lawsuits. There's one by more than 20 Democratic-led states. There's another by top Senate and House Democratic leaders, one by a coalition of voting rights groups, and another by civil rights groups. So the basic contention is that Trump doesn't have the authority, the president doesn't have the authority to make these changes by executive order. Absolutely right. I mean, I guess the president probably has the authority to acquire the DHS to develop a list, but he has no authority to require the states to use it. Interestingly, it doesn't actually say they have to use it, although there's lots of talk about prioritizing the attorney general to go after voter fraud, which they can do anyway.

23:07And there's also talk about maybe cutting off funding for states that don't use the list, although again, it doesn't say that. And it doesn't actually say funding relating to elections, so it can be anything, which itself would be unconstitutional. The bite is in the directive to the Postal Service. He has no power to give directives to the Postal Service. The Postal Service is an independent corporation with its own board of governors. I mean, the president has some role in making nominations to the board of governors, but he cannot direct them and he cannot remove them. And they are subject to federal statutes basically requiring universal carriage of mail with specified exceptions for mail that can be exempted, mail involved in crimes, for example.

23:51This is not one of them. So you can't mandate the Postal Service to do this. The Postal Service, in any event, would have to go through a rulemaking process, which would certainly take some time and is hard to believe would be finished before this election. And it seems extremely unlikely, almost certainly illegal that the Postal Service could refuse to carry mail that's not otherwise barred from the mails by federal statute. Because to get back to the beginning of all of this, the president has no power to regulate elections, period. The Constitution gives power to regulate elections to the states, and then also says that Congress can regulate the phrase is time, place, or manner of federal elections.

24:39And so if Congress were to pass a statute like this, it might work. There would be issues, but at least conceptually, Congress has the power to regulate the procedures for federal elections and to regulate mail-in voting in federal elections. Although even Congress can't decide who's eligible to vote in federal elections. Even then, it's really the states. Congress can regulate time, place, and manner. Do we face a problem perhaps because the head of the Postal Service, right, is a Trump appointee? I mean, it's possible, but they still would have to go through a rulemaking. Even the executive order says that, that they have to go through a rulemaking.

25:20It's hard to imagine a rulemaking getting done in less than six months. That would be a fast rulemaking. They have to write a rule. They have to put it out for notice and comment. They have to respond to the comments. And that itself would take some time. And then there is the problem that the executive order is asking the Postal Service to refuse to deliver mail in a way that such refusal is not authorized by any federal law. So they can't adopt rules that decline to carry mail other than for the kinds of reasons that are in federal law. And until Congress acts, this isn't one of them. Okay, stay with me, Rich.

25:57Coming up next on the Bloomberg Law Show, I'll continue this conversation with Columbia Law School professor Richard Brafalt. How likely are the groups suing the Trump administration to get temporary relief? I'm June Grosso, and this is Bloomberg. So there's a lot of noise about AI, but time's too tight for more promises. So let's talk about results. At IBM, we work with our employees to integrate technology right into the systems they need. Now, a global workforce of 300 ,000 can use AI to fill their HR questions, resolving 94 % of common questions. Not noise. Proof of how we can help companies get smarter by putting AI where it actually pays off, deep in the work that moves the business.