President Donald Trump kicked off his second term with a mass purge of Justice Department officials, but in doing so, created an “army of experts” who could be tapped to investigate him should Democrats seize the opportunity, security expert Miles Taylor argued Monday.
In what was described by The Associated Press as a “retribution” campaign, more than a dozen DOJ employees were ousted within days of Trump being sworn into office, all of whom had worked on criminal prosecutions of the president. By March of this year, more than 10,000 federal government lawyers had left, roughly one in five, according to a New York Times analysis, an exodus that Trump called “very good.”
Now, with Democrats primed to retake control of the U.S. House, and possibly the Senate, Republicans are “running scared” at the prospect of congressional investigations into alleged corruption committed by both Trump and GOP lawmakers, Taylor wrote in an analysis published Monday on his Substack.
Following the Trump administration’s mass purge of DOJ officials, however, “Congress has nowhere near” the capability to adequately investigate Trump and GOP lawmakers for potential wrongdoing, Taylor argued, “at least not yet,” he clarified.
“They were pushed out for doing their jobs, and almost every one of them told me some version of the same thing: if there were a serious, well-run effort to hold this administration accountable, they’d step back into the fight tomorrow,” Taylor, who previously served as Homeland Security chief of staff during the first Trump administration, wrote. “Congress should take them up on it.”
According to Rolling Stone, House Democrats are eyeing Trump’s billion-dollar ballroom, his monument arch and the alleged weaponization of federal law enforcement, and they want to haul in Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and her close adviser Corey Lewandowski. Would-be committee chairs have also flagged the Trump family’s business dealings as a top priority, and Reuters reported that Democrats plan to subpoena companies and financial firms in Trump’s orbit.
“If Democrats take the House or Senate, they’ll need to bring in the big guns. That means making serious budget decisions to hire outside talent capable of extensive investigations into obviously illegal acts, unconstitutional conduct, self-enrichment, and presidential revenge,” Taylor wrote.
“The president spent two years making sure no one inside the government could investigate him. It will backfire. Because Congress may soon have leaders willing to put them all back on the case.”
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