Trump’s attorney general pick has exactly one qualification |
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Trump’s attorney general pick has exactly one qualification
Todd Blanche passed his loyalty test to Trump.
In May 2025, Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, a Democrat, arrived at an ICE detention facility in his New Jersey city and asked for a tour. Though he was initially let inside the facility’s gate, he was soon confronted by about a dozen federal law enforcement officers and asked to leave. And so he did.
For a moment, that seemed like it would be the end of this incident, but then one of the officers had a phone call. A video, later submitted to a federal court, shows this officer turning to his fellow law enforcers after the call and informing them, “We are arresting the mayor right now, per the deputy attorney general of the United States.”
Get the latest developments on the US Supreme Court from senior correspondent Ian Millhiser.
That deputy attorney general was Todd Blanche, who is now the acting leader of the Department of Justice. On Wednesday, President Donald Trump announced that he would nominate Blanche to become the Senate-confirmed attorney general of the United States.
The practical stakes of this nomination are fairly low. Federal law provides that if the attorney general’s job is vacant, “the Deputy Attorney General may exercise all the duties of that office.” And the Senate already confirmed Blanche as deputy AG (or “DAG” as the job is known within the DOJ). So, Blanche has already been leading the Justice Department since former Attorney General Pam Bondi’s exit in April, and, one way or another, he will continue to do so.
But Trump’s decision to........