Faith in DOJ plummets as Biden, pardoning Hunter, joins Trump in denouncing the department

Let’s face it, trust in most of our government institutions has utterly collapsed.

Many people don’t have faith in the FDA, the DOD, HUD, Homeland Security, the health agencies, and the list goes on. And they don’t trust the media to deliver basic facts about Washington without bias and blunders.

These sentiments have basically been growing for the last 60 years, since the lies about Vietnam merged with the lies about Watergate and forced Richard Nixon to resign.

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But the most sensitive federal agency, everyone would agree, is the Justice Department, including the FBI. Donald Trump has been attacking these agencies for years (along with the "fake news"), accusing them of politically persecuting him. He campaigned outside courthouses by telling reporters the prosecutors and judges were awful people who were out to get him solely because he was the leading candidate to win back the White House.

Joe Biden, by breaking his promise not to pardon his son Hunter, did more than just lie. He ripped his own DOJ for "selectively and unfairly prosecuting" his son. 

I used to patrol the endless hallways of the J. Edgar Hoover building as the Justice Department beat reporter. On the criminal side, it is supposed to be independent, since Justice often winds up investigating the administration. Back in the day it was filled with fair-minded career prosecutors who pursued legitimate leads regardless of party.

In saying that Hunter Biden was singled out for harsh treatment, the outgoing president is making the same argument as the incoming president, that the department is badly biased. Little wonder that so many people don’t trust DOJ.

All Biden had to do when repeatedly asked about a pardon or commutation was "I’m not going to discuss hypotheticals." Then at least he wouldn’t have the lying part.

There is no question that Pam Bondi, despite some roughing up, will be the next attorney general, having precisely the experience (Florida AG, career prosecutor) that Matt Gaetz so blatantly lacked. She is not going to blow up the department.

But in picking Kash Patel to run the FBI – and ignoring that Chris Wray is not through with his 10-year term – Trump is sending a very different message. And this isn’t some dark secret. It’s in the nominee’s own words.

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Patel has vowed to shut down the bureau’s Washington headquarters. He said last year on Steve Bannon’s podcast, which we played on "Media Buzz": "We will go out and find the conspirators…not just in government, but in the media.… Whether it’s criminally or civilly, we’ll figure that out."

In his 2022 book "Government Gangsters," Patel names 60 people as part of the deep state,  "a cabal of unelected tyrants…the most dangerous threat to our democracy." The press has dubbed this an enemies list.

It includes the aforementioned Bill Barr (for blocking his appointment), NSC chairman John Bolton (an "arrogant control freak"), and Defense Secretary Mark Esper (who tried to fire him).

Also on the list, as recounted by the New Republic:

Joe Biden. 

Kamala Harris.

Hillary Clinton.

Merrick Garland.

Samantha Power, who now runs the Agency for International Development.

Former Obama officials James Clapper; John Brennan; Peter Strzok (who trashed Trump in texts with his FBI girlfriend, Lisa Page), Andrew McCabe (FBI deputy director), Eric Holder and Loretta Lynch.

A striking number are Donald Trump’s own appointees: Pat Cippolone (his White House counsel). Gina Haspel (his CIA director). Mark Esper. Charles Kupperman (his deputy national security adviser).

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Cassidy Hutchinson (Mark Meadows’ top aide, who criticized Trump in her testimony before the House Jan. 6 committee).

It’s a pretty big list. And having worked for Trump hardly provides immunity.

Patel would have his work cut out for him, though he’d have to get a career prosecutor to submit a wiretap request or search warrant to the courts.

Meanwhile, many Democratic lawmakers are hitting their party’s president pretty hard for the Hunter pardon, in interviews with the Times.

Colorado Congressman Jason Crow: He promised he would not do this. I think it will make it harder for us going forward when we talk about upholding democracy."

Washington Congresswoman Marie Gluesenkamp Perez: "The president made the wrong decision. No family should be above the law."

Colorado Sen. Michael Bennet said the Biden move "put personal interest ahead of duty and further erodes Americans’ faith that the justice system is fair and equal for all." And his late dropout from the race was also "putting his personal interest ahead of his responsibility to the country."

Vermont Sen. Peter Welch: "President Biden’s pardon of his son Hunter is, as the action of a loving father, understandable — but as the action of our nation’s chief executive, unwise." 

Michigan Sen. Gary Peters: "Wrong."

Pretty bracing stuff.

Some progressives defended Biden, such as Texas Congresswoman Jasmine Crockett: "Way to go Joe!" She said a 34-count convicted felon is about to walk into the White House, perhaps missing the news that Jack Smith has dropped the charges.

On "Morning Joe" yesterday, Mika Brzezinski, while saying she wished Biden hadn’t promised no pardon, took on the coverage: "You look at what has happened on the Trump side, especially if you even parallel pardons that Trump has done himself, it’s just always so — it seems so hysterically imbalanced!"

Joe Scarborough spoke of "the frustration that many Democrats are having on the New York Times, The Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, a lot of mainstream organizations blowing this up to the size that they believe is really out of proportion, given everything Donald Trump has done in the past and what he’s doing right now."

Still, the two presidents have wound up in the same place in their view of the Justice Department as partisan and politicized.

One fascinating tidbit dug up by the Times: When Biden had Trump to the White House, according to three sources, and listened to his familiar grievances about the biased DOJ – the president-elect "surprised his host by sympathizing with the Biden family’s own troubles with the department."