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PAM BONDI’S SACKING ends a turbulent 14-month tenure as US attorney general that saw her upend the Department of Justice’s culture of independence from the White House.
She oversaw large-scale firings of career employees and moved aggressively to investigate US president Donald Trump’s perceived enemies.
The 60-year-old faced months of scrutiny over her department’s handling of files related to Jeffrey Epstein’s sex trafficking investigation, making her the target of angry conservatives even with her close relationship with Trump.
Bondi’s public embrace of the president marked a sharp departure from her predecessors, who generally took pains to maintain an arm’s-length distance from the White House to protect the impartiality of investigations and prosecutions.
She postured herself as Trump’s chief supporter and protector, praising and defending him in congressional hearings and placing a banner with his face on the exterior of justice department headquarters.
Trump repeatedly publicly praised and defended Bondi, but also showed flashes of impatience with her efforts to meet his demands to prosecute his political rivals.
The former Florida attorney general came into office last year, having previously been part of Trump’s legal team during his first impeachment trial and when he made false claims that the 2020 election had been stolen from him.
From the get-go, she pledged that she would not play politics with the justice department.
But she quickly started investigations of Trump’s foes, sparking an outcry that the law enforcement agency was being wielded as a tool of revenge to advance the president’s political and personal agenda.
Former FBI director James Comey, who successfully prosecuted Trump for fraud, and New York attorney general Letitia James, who brought a civil case against him for business fraud, were both indicted by the Department of Justice.
It came after Trump called on her to move quickly to prosecute his foes in an extraordinary social media post last year, telling her “We can’t delay any longer, it’s killing our reputation and credibility”.
A federal judge dismissed both criminal cases last November on the grounds that the prosecutor handpicked by Trump who brought the charges was unlawfully appointed.
Cases against John Bolton, Trump’s former national security advisor and critic, and Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell remain ongoing.
Bondi called for an end to the “weaponisation” of law enforcement she claimed took place under Joe Biden administration, even though Biden’s attorney general, Merrick Garland, and Jack Smith, the special counsel who produced two cases against Trump, have said they followed the facts, the evidence and the law in their decision-making.
Her critics, meanwhile, said she was the one who had politicised the agency to do the president’s bidding.
Bondi oversaw the exodus of thousands of career employees, through firings and voluntary departures, including lawyers who prosecuted violent attacks on police at the US Capitol on 6 January 2021, environmental, civil rights and ethics enforcers, counterterrorism prosecutors, and others.
But it is perhaps her handling – or mishandling – of the release of the Epstein files for which her tenure will be most remembered.
In February last year, a month after Trump’s re-election, Bondi told Fox News that a “client list” related to Epstein was “sitting on her desk”. Months later, the DOJ acknowledged in a two-page memo that the so-called list did not exist.
Far-right influencers were also invited to the White House in February 2025 and provided with binders marked: “The Epstein Files: Phase 1” and: “Declassified” that contained documents that had largely already been in the public domain.
Bondi was ridiculed over the move. She later said officials were poring over a “truckload” of previously withheld evidence she said had been handed over by the FBI and raised expectations of forthcoming releases.
Last July, the DOJ said no more would be released. It prompted Congress to vote overwhelmingly to force the release of the government files into Epstein.
It came after Trump dropped his months-long opposition to opening the books on the scandal. He subsequently signed legislation compelling the DOJ to release all documents in its possession related to Epstein within 30 days.
Millions of documents were released the following month.
But the release was criticised for being too slow, along with the redactions of names of people who may have committed crimes and the release of information about survivors, including names and photographs.
The Epstein files fumbles led to a stunning public criticism from White House chief of staff Susie Wiles, a close friend of Bondi’s, who told Vanity Fair that the attorney general “completely whiffed”.
A fiery, five-hour committee hearing before Congress in February this year saw Bondi clash with several US politicians about her handling of the files, with her calling one a “washed-up loser lawyer” and saying another was suffering from “Trump-derangement syndrome”.
After the hearing, some Epstein survivors who had been present expressed their frustration to US news outlets.
“Bondi didn’t even turn around and acknowledge our existence,” Danielle Bensky told CNN, while Sharlene Rochard said she felt “humiliated” when Bondi did not turn to look at them.
Bondi was Trump’s second choice to lead the DOJ, picked for the role after former representative Matt Gaetz of Florida withdrew his name from consideration amid scrutiny over sex trafficking allegations.
US media began reporting recently that Trump had become frustrated with Bondi’s handling of the Esptein files.
Before he confirmed on Truth Social that she was no longer attorney general, a number of outlets had said the US president informed Bondi yesterday that she would not be in the role much longer, with some sources suggesting
Despite her sacking, she may still testify before the House Oversight Committee next week.
Last month, the committee voted – with the support of five Republicans – to subpoena Bondi to testify again about the DOJ’s handling of the Epstein files.
“Pam Bondi still has to testify, under oath, in front of the Oversight Committee regarding the Epstein Files,” Republican congressman for Florida Maxwell Frost wrote on X.
“This does not get her out of that bipartisan, lawful subpoena. We will see her soon.”
With reporting from Press Association
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