Trump names Pam Bondi as his pick for attorney general after Gaetz drops from consideration

By Hannah Rabinowitz, Kristen Holmes, Zachary Cohen, Steve Contorno, Evan Perez and Alayna Treene, CNN

(CNN) — Hours after his first pick to run the nation’s top law enforcement agency dropped out, President-elect Donald Trump named former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi as his new choice to run the Justice Department.

Trump made the announcement in a post on social media Thursday evening – the same day that former Rep. Matt Gaetz, whom the president-elect had selected for the role last week, withdrew from consideration.

“For too long, the partisan Department of Justice has been weaponized against me and other Republicans – Not anymore,” Trump said in a post on his Truth Social platform. “Pam will refocus the DOJ to its intended purpose of fighting Crime, and Making America Safe Again. I have known Pam for many years — She is smart and tough, and is an AMERICA FIRST Fighter, who will do a terrific job as Attorney General!”

Bondi had been under consideration for the role before Trump tapped the former congressman, a person with knowledge of the deliberations told CNN, and some considered Bondi to be one of the president-elect’s favorite lawyers.

Gaetz’s selection had quickly faced trouble as his prospects for Senate approval narrowed amid growing pressure from lawmakers, including some in his own party, for the release of a House Ethics Committee investigative report into him.

The report, which has not yet been made public by the committee, details the panel’s investigation into allegations of sexual misconduct and other alleged crimes by Gaetz. The Florida Republican has vehemently denied the allegations investigated by the committee and the Justice Department, including the claim that he had sex with a woman in 2017 when she was a minor. He has not been charged with a crime.

Ultimately, Trump called Gaetz Thursday and said that he did not have the votes in the Senate to win confirmation, CNN reported, and the former congressman subsequently said on social media that he would be declining the nomination. He applauded Trump’s latest pick as “a stellar selection.”

Bondi’s name began being circulated almost immediately after Gaetz removed his name from consideration for the role, with one source familiar with conversations saying they began hearing Trump was leaning toward announcing her selection early Thursday afternoon.

While Trump has always like Bondi, she also has close ties with others in his orbit, including his incoming chief of staff Susie Wiles and his legal counsel Boris Epshteyn.

Trump met in person with Bondi at Mar-a-Lago before officially offering her the job, a source familiar told CNN. The president-elect informed her of the selection Thursday evening at the resort, two sources familiar with the discussion told CNN.

Trump allies breathe sigh of relief

Bondi’s selection will be subject to Senate approval once she is formally nominated, but allies of the president-elect swiftly expressed relief at the pick.

As of Thursday evening, there was a broad feeling among those working on the president-elect’s transition that Bondi would have a much easier confirmation process than Gaetz, given her background as the attorney general of Florida and her relationships with those on Capitol Hill.

One person close to Trump called Bondi “a solid choice” and said they “feel much better about her chances.”

Trump first considered Bondi for a post in his administration in 2018 after firing then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions, CNN has reported. Trump said at the time that he’d “love to have her in the administration.”

But there were concerns over whether Bondi would be able to secure confirmation in the Senate because of a controversial $25,000 contribution that Trump’s foundation gave to Bondi’s political action committee during her 2014 reelection bid.

Democratic lawmakers accused Bondi of declining to pursue an investigation into Trump University fraud allegations after receiving the donation. A Florida ethics panel cleared Bondi of wrongdoing in the matter.

Bondi stayed in Trump’s orbit, working in the White House as a legal advisor and defending the president-elect during his first Senate impeachment trial. She is also listed as the chair for the Center for Litigation at the pro-Trump think tank America First Policy Institute, where she has helped lead some of their work against the so-called “weaponization” of the Justice Department.

Legal history

Bondi practiced law in Florida for over a decade — first as a prosecutor in Tampa and then for eight years as the state attorney general — where she had a reputation for being a media savvy and effective litigator.

Elected as Florida’s top prosecutor in the conservative tea party wave, she grew increasingly partisan during her two terms in office, making regular appearances on Fox News and then becoming a top Florida surrogate for Trump during his 2016 campaign.

Bondi’s history in court at times touched hot-button issues, repeatedly landing her in the news. She led a failed effort to overturn Obamacare in 2012, and shortly after the deadly shooting at Pulse nightclub in 2016, Bondi defended herself in an interview with CNN’s Anderson Cooper for fighting to preserve Florida’s ban on gay marriage.

“I talked to a lot of gay and lesbian people here who are not fans of yours and who thought you were being a hypocrite,” Cooper said during the interview of Bondi’s assertions in the aftermath of the shooting that she was advocating for the LGBTQ community. “You said in court that gay people, simply by fighting for marriage equality, were trying to do harm to the people of Florida.”

Bondi said she was simply upholding the Florida Constitution, and that the ban is “not a law.”

“That was voted into the state constitution by the voters of Florida,” Bondi said. “That’s what I was defending. … I never said I don’t like gay people.”

After leaving the Florida attorney general’s office, Bondi joined Ballard Partners, a lobbying firm with deep ties to Trump and Wiles. There, she represented the country of Qatar from 2019 to 2020, according to documents submitted to the federal government by the firm under the Foreign Agents Registration Act.

Most recently, Bondi joined a group of pro-Trump lawyers who filed an amicus brief to a federal appeals court in the special counsel’s classified documents case against Trump. The brief was in support of Trump’s claim that special counsel Jack Smith was unlawfully appointed – a claim that led to Judge Aileen Cannon dismissing all charges against the president-elect earlier this year.

Bondi has also reportedly been in the hotseat as the subject of a legal case: a custody battle with a Louisiana family over their St. Bernard, Master Tank, who went missing after Hurricane Katrina. The family told The Tampa Bay Times that Bondi stole the dog, while Bondi accused the family of neglect.

That case was settled before trial and Master Tank returned to his family.

This story has been updated with additional details.

The-CNN-Wire
™ & © 2024 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.