President Trump demanded on Saturday that his attorney general move quickly to prosecute figures he considers his enemies, the latest blow to the Justice Department’s tradition of independence.
“We can’t delay any longer, it’s killing our reputation and credibility,” Mr. Trump wrote in a social media post addressed to “Pam,” meaning Attorney General Pam Bondi. “They impeached me twice, and indicted me (5 times!), OVER NOTHING. JUSTICE MUST BE SERVED, NOW!!!”
Mr. Trump named James B. Comey, the former F.B.I. director; Senator Adam B. Schiff, Democrat of California; and Letitia James, the New York attorney general, saying he was reading about how they were “all guilty as hell, but nothing is going to be done.”
Asked later by reporters about his message for Ms. Bondi, Mr. Trump said, “They have to act. They have to act fast.”
His demands came a day after he ousted the federal prosecutor who failed to charge two of the adversaries he most reviles, Ms. James and Mr. Comey, showing how far Mr. Trump has gone in exerting personal control over the Justice Department and breaching the longstanding norm about keeping politics at a distance from law enforcement.
In a different social media post later on Saturday, Mr. Trump defended Ms. Bondi, saying she was doing a “GREAT job,” but that she needed a “tough prosecutor” in the Eastern District of Virginia, where Erik S. Siebert, was abruptly forced from his post atop the U.S. attorney’s office on Friday. Mr. Trump said he would nominate Lindsey Halligan, a lawyer and special assistant to the president who was on his personal legal team, to fill the role.
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The post Trump Demands That Bondi Move ‘Now’ to Prosecute Foes appeared first on New York Times.
