President Donald Trump sometimes seems to fancy himself a king, so it’s not surprising that he treats his Cabinet like a royal court. In his second term, the president has filled his top posts with courtiers who compete to offer the most extravagant praise in marathon Cabinet meetings.
And that’s how we should look at acting Attorney General Todd Blanche’s work for the past two months. Blanche has served in a temporary capacity while Trump decided whether to nominate him permanently. It was a seemingly endless job interview — one he could fail only by disappointing the man conducting it. Last week, he finally passed the test when Trump announced that he would nominate him for the post, subject to Senate confirmation.
But his conduct during that audition should be disqualifying.
Since becoming acting attorney general in April, the president’s former personal lawyer has often seemed more like his current personal lawyer. Blanche has argued that the president has the “right” and “duty” to direct Justice Department investigations, advanced investigations involving Trump’s political adversaries, refused to recuse himself from matters presenting potential conflicts of interest, and unsuccessfully sought to create a nearly $1.8 billion fund that critics warned could reward Trump allies, including Jan. 6 defendants.
We’ve all been in job interviews, so it’s not hard to see what was going on here. When the interviewer asks whether you’re willing to work nights and weekends, you say yes. By naming Blanche acting attorney general, Trump put him in a position where he could either do the president’s bidding or risk losing the job he wanted.
That dynamic would be troubling in any Cabinet department. But it is especially dangerous at the Department of Justice, which possesses the power to investigate virtually any American. As Attorney General Robert Jackson observed in a famous 1940 speech, a federal prosecutor “has more control over life, liberty, and reputation than any other person in America.”
The greatest danger, Jackson warned, comes when “the prosecutor picks some person whom he dislikes or desires to embarrass, or selects some group of unpopular persons and then looks for an offense.” The reverse danger is just as real: A prosecutor can decline to pursue an ally despite compelling evidence.
For that reason, Americans have long expected the Justice Department to maintain a degree of independence from the White House. It was considered scandalous when former President Bill Clinton merely chatted with Attorney General Loretta Lynch on an airport tarmac while her department was investigating Hillary Clinton in 2016.