Pam Bondi is on her way back home to Florida after a swift and brutal outing by President Trump. The former Attorney General of the United States’ departure comes on the heels of disastrous Congressional hearings, failed prosecution of Trump’s enemies, and an embarrassing display at the Supreme Court on Wednesday. Is her firing a sign that the American justice system may soon return back to “normal?”
Andrew Weissman, former federal prosecutor, pops in to say that, unfortunately, this may the Presidential Cabinet version of musical chairs. In his conversation with Jen, Weissman mulls over the DOJ’s descent into litigious madness, pinpointing mechanisms to reinstate judicial independence and public trust in the DOJ. The pair also weigh what Bondi’s final nail in the coffin actually was and why, come January 2029, the country must reckon with this administration’s crimes in favor of just “looking forward.”
Andrew Weissmann is a professor of practice at NYU school of law who served as a lead prosecutor in Robert S. Mueller’s Special Counsel’s Office and as General Counsel for the FBI. Stay connected with Andrew on his Substack here.
The following transcript has been edited for formatting purposes.
Jen Rubin
Hi, this is Jen Rubin, editor-in-Chief of The Contrarian. You know, we always have Andrew Weissman on when something bad has happened, but something good happened, and we still have him on, so that’s much nicer. Andrew, welcome! Good to see you.
Andrew Weissmann
Nice to be here. I, I was just saying, while we were in the quote-unquote green room, meaning the virtual room of not being on, you are swamped. There is just so…
Jen Rubin
That’s true.
Andrew Weissmann
cheers.
Jen Rubin
It has, been quite a legal week, and topped off, of course, by the ouster of Pam Bondi. Big picture, what do you think her legacy is going to be at the Justice Department, and how damaging and long-lasting will that be?
Andrew Weissmann
So, my big picture takeaway is to remove myself from… when I… let me start this way. When I got to Washington, D.C, the first time, I thought… I’d come from New York, and I thought, isn’t this great? Instead of talking about real estate and square feet, which is the topic in New York. We’re gonna talk about politics and policy issues, and isn’t it nice that that’s what the town focuses on? And you get to Washington, and while there, of course, are pockets where that happens, there’s also just a lot of, sort of, parlor game of who’s in and who’s out, and who’s close to power, and who’s gonna get what job, and sort of things that you just go. this is high school, except that with dire consequences. And so, the reason for that preamble is my big picture to this is this is like the announcement that we’re changing who is going to be head of ICE, or that Bovino is out. It’s like, this is moving the deck chairs around. If, if, this was an announcement that we’re changing policies and procedures to get back to normal, and to actually have the rule of law in this country, that we’re going to comply with the Epstein law. We’re gonna turn over the federal evidence to Minnesota so that they can do an investigation of the Alex Prett and Renee Goode, killings and the other individual who was shot. If they were announcing all of that, you would say, okay, this is actually meaningful. But that’s not what’s happening. This is just moving the deck chairs around, because the problem with the Department of Justice is the Oval Office. Pam Bondi is not being fired, or has not been fired, because she was like Attorney General Sessions, who was willing to bend, but not break. There were things that he understood the Department of Justice, would not do and could not do to be the Department of Justice, and that’s why he was outed, like, by, Trump in the first, administration. So I just sort of view this as… As sort of… not… it’s not a big nothing, it’s that it doesn’t… in sort of big picture, it’s not that relevant.
Jen Rubin
Yes. She does completely, as you pointed out, compromised the independence of the Justice Department. Judges have said openly to Justice Department lawyers, we can no longer believe you, you’ve lost the trust of the federal bench. There will be a time when Donald Trump leaves office. And that’s when the hard work of restoring the Justice Department would begin. Let’s fast forward to January 2029, let’s say there’s a Democrat in the White House, and they say, Mr. Wiseman, you are Attorney General. What do you do?
Andrew Weissmann
So, there are a lot of things to do, but one of the things that I… Think that we have to learn. is, sort of… and again, I’m gonna answer this in a big picture way. There, obviously, you could go on and on about all sorts of… smaller things that have to be done. Is… the… The inclination that people have had in the past, and without denigrating them, and because they’re… we’ve learned a lot. The inclination to just say, let’s look forward. And not backwards. if the CIA has violated the law, let’s look forward. If there was torture, let’s look forward, in the enhanced interrogation techniques. I’m sort of taking things from the past, where the incoming administrations have said, let’s look forward. That is not the rule of law. Now, obviously. you have to be talking about things that are serious. The… you have to accord people due process. Facts matter. I’m not saying you don’t look forward if you’re talking about a speeding ticket. In other words, obviously there’s facts and proportionality matter, but… To ignore it is to encourage it. Yes. And I think you… one of the things that I learned from… years as, you know, obviously a prosecutor and a defense lawyer, but also working in the Mueller investigation, is the moment you change standards. That you normally apply, To accommodate some… small P political goal, meaning, like, ugh, the country needs to move on, things like that. there’s enormous harm that comes from doing that. And there’s enormous… pluses and upsides from holding everyone to the same standard. You know, individual prosecutions come with all sorts of really horrible collateral consequences, to family members. When you hold companies to account, there can be all sorts of innocent people who… Suffer, but… but it is… it doesn’t give the… perpetrator. again, I’m assuming liability, that you can prove it, and it’s real, and it’s a serious offense. So I don’t… no one should take this as sort of, like, oh, there should be, like, political prosecutions, that, of course, this should never happen. But there’s huge consequences if you just let it slide. I mean, you were then de facto saying, that there will be a green light. The message for the next administration, the next people, is that, essentially, it’s, like, too big to fail.
Jen Rubin
Yes.
Andrew Weissmann
too important to fail. And… I’ve been writing a book that’s very much looking at… other countries, and what other countries have done in this situation, and we’re… I won’t say an outlier, but there are many… countries that I think a lot of people respect. That are much better at holding political leaders to account. England, France, Brazil.
Jen Rubin
I can’t.
Andrew Weissmann
whose leader is remarkably similar, was remarkably similar to Donald Trump, except the big difference is he was held to account. Yeah. So there are models that we can follow, to… Lead us to ways forward in our country.
Jen Rubin
Alright. It strikes me that when this chapter, is closed, that they need a Justice Department to do what Merrick Garland refused to do, which is really a top-to-bottom review Of what occurred. A full accounting of where they’ve gone awry, what they have done that is wrong. And then some recommendations for, guardrails and belts and suspenders. One of the areas that I think doesn’t get enough attention is the degree to which OLC has been completely corrupted. OLC is the Office of Legal Counsel, which is sort of the constitutional lawyer for the executive branch. They have come out with justifications for the most ridiculous positions, including that the Presidential Papers Act is unconstitutional, trying to justify the extrajudicial killings In the Caribbean. You can go on and on and on. What do you do about that, and how do you restore OLC as a respected interpreter of the Constitution.
Andrew Weissmann
So, I think that, I don’t think that we can… Try to say, oh, let’s just go back to norms that we’ve had before, because they haven’t worked. And one of the… One of the many issues is what you put your finger on. And… The problem with the Office of Legal Counsel, and obviously people are very smart, and they’ve been… and it’s… and it’s had very ethical people acting in good faith, but also there are a lot of pressures To figure out… Sort of… pro-executive branch authorities. And… One thing you could have to sort of figure out, is there a way to essentially have a version of OLC outside of the Department of Justice, or even outside of the executive branch. And so that… there’s a way for, let’s say, in the legislative branch, that they have an OLC where they could opine on something. In other words, people outside. You know, I can give you a few examples. I mean, it’s complicated because there’s lots of constitutional restrictions, but OLC is not a constitutionally mandated group.
Jen Rubin
Right.
Andrew Weissmann
And it sort of operates as a norm, which is they’ll say internally what they think the law is, but the president, obviously, is free to not follow it, or to follow it. And you could have that same kind of, sort of group. or a separate group that is reporting within the legislative branch to do that. You know, in France, they have a very different system, which I think is kind of wise, which is, if there is an issue that the kind that you just raised, which is whether a law is… constitutional or not. That can… you don’t have to wait. to find a case, and have somebody challenge it, and see whether they have standing, and, is it ripe, and who could bring the case. There are all sorts of procedural rules we have. In France, there’s a constitutional court, and one of its main focuses is when, let’s say, the Senate passes a law, it can immediately go to the court to say, thumbs up, thumbs down, does it work or not? Which is, to me, a very smart thing, and so…
Jen Rubin
Yeah.
Andrew Weissmann
So for instance, in the tariff case, that could have happened immediately. You know, Donald Trump likes to complain about, oh, look how much money we have to give back.
Jen Rubin
There’s…
Andrew Weissmann
you know, I don’t have any sympathy for that, because there are all sorts of ways he could have waited to implement until he saw whether it was going to pass muster or not. But… That you could have a system where you, try and get answers faster. And again, there… this is, ruth Bader Ginsburg talked about this a lot, so I… I feel like I’m… I won’t just say in good company, I’m sort of following her lead, which is, she was like, look, you don’t have to do what other countries do, but you certainly shouldn’t shut your eyes to it. And so, why not learn and see if there are examples that could be useful, good or bad? In other words, laws that you say, oh, we don’t want to do that, because look what happened. Or is there a law, and could we adapt it to our system to figure out a better way? But OLC is one of those things, that I think… I would say that’s true for Democratic or Republican administrations. You don’t want sort of a captive group, either consciously or sort of unconsciously, sort of putting their thumb on the scale. for the White House. And so… that would be one sort of reform. I can give you one very quick example of a group that I thought was within the executive branch, but was very separate, which was the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board. When I was at the FBI, this is a separate group, they did not report in to any of the intelligence community. They reported directly to the president. They were made up of very, very eminent people. It’s a small group. Some were very identified as sort of, you know, liberal, and some were very identified as conservative, but they were all super smart. And when there were the Snowden leaks, and there were lots of issues about programs the government was doing under lots of numbers, 215, 702, I remember I was sort of the lead person, the point person for the FBI, and I was so impressed with them. And I also thought it was so useful to have an outside group Who we had to report to and make presentations to, and be honest with, and talk about what we were doing, what was useful, what we worried about, what mistakes we’d made, and to a person They were so… thoughtful. I mean, you didn’t feel… any political overtones whatsoever. If you had a good answer, it was a good answer for everyone, regardless of how they might identify… they might be identified publicly. So that was, I thought, an incredibly useful model, and they didn’t have institutional pressures, to sort of, quote, get the job done. In other words, oh, if you do this, will we be able to do X search, or will we be able to prosecute, or to advance a certain goal? They… that was not their mission, and it was such a useful… tool. To do, President Obama was, I think, a big fan of it, and so was I. I mean, just having seen it in operation at a lower level.
Jen Rubin
Right. One of the mechanisms that we’ve tried in the past to create separation, for example, at the FBI, was to give longer terms to those people so that they weren’t going to coincide with the president. That has been abolished because Trump has just gone ahead and fired and put the worst flunkies, Kash Patel being an example, in place. Looking back on your old bureau, what in particular do you think might help insulate the FBI from this kind of crass. partisanship hackery, or do we simply have to rely on better people as president and as FBI chiefs? Is there not any kind of mechanism we can come up with to protect it?
Andrew Weissmann
Well, you know, the problem is, that the courts are wrestling with right now is the FBI is part of the Department of Justice, the Department of Justice is, you know, part of the executive branch, reports in to the President, and under the, the current administration, they’re currently litigating the issue, and may well win on the idea that civil service doesn’t even protect people at the Department of Justice. and that they can fire people with no cause, and we’d be back to a patronage system, which is the reason for civil service, is that you don’t have, like, a Democrat coming in and saying, everybody out, and I just want Democrats in, and, you know, Republicans doing the same, is that you want expertise in people, and also you need longevity there, so that Right now, that’s something I’m particularly worried about, given that we’ve made ourselves an enemy of so many people around the globe, and some very dangerous people around the globe, that the intelligence community has to be… Monitoring this, you know, up one side and down the other, and that means you need the best people there. well, you fired a lot of those people, or they left, and so I’m extremely worried about that. I think it’s a… I think it’s a difficult issue. I think one of the things you could try and do is have, sort of, mandatory disclosures, and so that you don’t have this, sort of, this… just to take it back to Pam Bondi. The kind of disgraceful hearings but just to be clear, you can… you can… legislate that. And there might be some issues, but if Congress isn’t willing to… stand by that legislation, it’s for naught. This is, Justice Robert Jackson, who very famously warned us in his famous Youngstown Concurrence about the growth of executive power, and that was in the 1950s, and it’s only gotten worse. And he voted to say that, President Truman did not have the power to seize steel mills, even though he said he needed the steel to fight a war. And he said, you know, we can strike this down, and we can give the tools… to Congress, but if they don’t use them, it doesn’t matter.
Jen Rubin
So…
Andrew Weissmann
that he was saying, look, we as a court can vindicate Congress’s rights here, but, I mean, my God, we’re at a war right now, and it’s illegal, because the Constitution says that the president has no power to declare this a war. And we have the President of the United States at a press conference saying, oh, wait, I can’t call it a war, I’m gonna call it something not a because I’ve been told if I say it’s a war, then it’s… I’d have to go to Congress. Well, I didn’t go to Congress, and now I’m not going to call it a war, so we’ll just call it some… you know, he made up some other words. But it’s… it’s so… it’s so blatant, and it’s… so part of this issue is… I know this sounds facile, but it means that the people listening to this, people have to sort of Vote, and they have to… And again, this is not a political issue. This is… the people in Congress need to take their jobs seriously. And so you really… that’s why right now you so much see only two branches of government in action, not three.
Jen Rubin
Exactly. So, perhaps it’s not fair, … to put some of this on the courts, but since the other two branches are not, doing their jobs. The court’s been too lax in failing to sanction, failing to hold accountable the Justice Department lawyers, all the way up to the Attorney General for bringing spurious, vindictive prosecutions, for advancing ridiculous arguments. Can the courts be more robust here?
Andrew Weissmann
So, the answer is yes, they can be. I do think that, I just think it’s a matter of training and what you want in terms of temperament on the bench. you really don’t want them to go from 0 to 60, obviously, unless it’s something absolutely egregious. But it has been absolutely egregious, and the thing that you really haven’t seen too much of, although I think we’re gonna see more, is the sort of pulling of the trigger. So where you did see it was, for instance, with Lindsay Halligan, when she was installed to bring the indictments by all account of James Comey and Letitia James. But a court said she was improperly put there, because under the way the statutes work, there was no power to put her there. It was the judge’s choice, not… the presidents at that point. And so she was removed, but then she kept on appearing, and… She, she was appearing, and her name was on the papers, and finally, two federal judges said she was committing, could be found to have committed a fraud, and the attorneys who appear with papers, and filing papers with her name as, as the U.S. Attorney. risk having sanctions and being referred to the disciplinary committee. And you know what? She then left. And so, it shouldn’t have to take that, and as somebody who has served under Republican and Democratic administrations, just having one conversation where, Jen, you would say, now let’s talk about the case where the judge talked about holding the government potentially in contempt. Front page news, house on fire, biggest… Because you know who should not be violating the law? Let’s see, that would be the Department of Justice.
Jen Rubin
Yes, sure.
Andrew Weissmann
So, you are, though, seeing more of it. Do I think that there at times should be more? And just to be… I just want to make sure, at times. It won’t necessarily be the… the federal prosecutor who is the problem, it’s going to be the agents who told the federal prosecutors what to happen. So, by the way, I don’t know if you’ve covered this, but there is a recent blow-up in the Southern District of New York, because, for almost a year, ICE has had a policy, a written policy, about, that they can go to immigration court, and they can seize people. dismiss their immigration cases, and while these people are showing up in court, they can use that as an opportunity to seize them. And there was a challenge to this, by, I believe it was the ACLU in New York. before Judge Castell, a respected federal judge, and part of the challenge was that they hadn’t followed… the government had not followed the right procedures, and And so the prosecutors show up, and they say, well, here’s the memo, here’s the process, here it’s all written, this explains why we’re doing it and what’s happening, and the judge agrees. and says, you know, you may not think it’s a wise policy, you may think it’s cruel and unfair, that’s not my issue, that’s not what I can weigh in on, but they’ve complied with the what’s called, like, the Administrative Procedures Act. I’m giving you sort of an overview. Well, last week… This remarkable letter. is filed by the Southern District of New York prosecutors saying, we just learned This morning. So, like, and they do… they file it. That the memo that we gave you Judge. And the memo you relied on. And the memo that we briefed, and the plaintiffs, the ACLU briefed, We are told. Never applied to this situation. At all. And so, for months and months and months, we’ve been saying this. They made it very clear that they had no idea… that the prosecutors had no idea. They’re very much saying, ICE just told us this. Of course, what they didn’t say is, How did that happen? who first said it does apply? Who then decided it changed their mind, or said there was a mistake made? Like, how did this come about? There clearly are going to be hearings, but that’s one where there could easily be an issue of contempt.
Jen Rubin
Yeah.
Andrew Weissmann
again, on the federal prosecutors, because I think they appear to… appear to have been told something, I would also assume they kicked the tires on it before you make a representation to the court. But you could end up with those prosecutors being witnesses against people at ICE and higher-ups as to what happened. And the judge, just to be clear, in terms of your point that the judges are doing really well, immediately issued an order saying everybody needs to freeze every document. Like, do not destroy anything. Like, you are on notice that everything has to stay intact, which clearly suggests this is going to be… like, the… I think the legal term is a shitshow.
Jen Rubin
Yes. I think that points, Andrew, to the fact that any one of these items in any other administration would have been, as you say, a causal labor, a complete repudiation of the administration, the justice system, the way in which the executive branch operates. And because the standard has been so lowered, this doesn’t even make the front pages anymore. And I think whoever comes in after the Trump crew leaves town. It’s gonna have an enormous task to try to figure out not ways to undo the damage, but ways to ensure that those people are held accountable. And that there are some mechanisms going forward, and maybe they need a public advocate, maybe they need, as we have in state courts, there are people whose job it is to advocate on behalf of the ombudsperson. There are all kinds of mechanisms that could be, come to fruition. I want to close on this. It seems to me that anybody… who Trump appoints to replace Bondi will, per se, be unqualified to take the job, because such a person would have promised to pursue these vindictive prosecutions. to continue to justify the unjustifiable. We haven’t even talked about these ridiculous executive orders that purport to, turn domestic groups into terrorist organizations and all of that. So, if you’re a member of the Senate, don’t you have to vote against anyone who comes forward who does not repudiate this?
Andrew Weissmann
Well, you have so many, questions that you would have, but let’s… let’s start with a bill that, Donald Trump was forced to sign, and just say, are you going to turn… if you are confirmed. Are you going to turn over, the Epstein documents? Yes. And do you understand that claims of privilege were rejected under this law, and that the Department of Justice and the Trump administration is in contempt? And, get them to… I mean, to me, they… Congress now has leverage. On that issue. I also think that’s one reason that I don’t think that we’re gonna see Todd Blanch anytime soon being nominated, because I… because he would have to go through a separate confirmation hearing, and, you know, that could be extremely difficult in his situation because of his track record. The other, which you’ve seen with federal judges, is, senators saying… who won the election And I know a lot of people go like, oh, are we gonna go back to that? But it’s… I think the answer is yes.
Jen Rubin
Yes, it’s fundamental.
Andrew Weissmann
If you’re not willing to tell the truth about that, how can you expect to be a federal judge? You’re supposed to be independent. If the Senate is looking for an independent attorney general. then they can make an assessment of… that’s… is much more than just, oh, this is… this is who was installed as president. That’s, of course, not the issue. The issue is who won. Is there any evidence that the person is aware of? That there was outcome-determinative fraud. And if they can’t answer that, how can they expect to be independent in their role, let alone tethered to the facts, which is… you know, has to be the most important criteria, in addition to following the law, that there is for being the Attorney General of the United States. And instead, you have this sort of Faustian bargain, which is, I’m… I expect you to lie for me. I know you’re lying, you know I’m lying, but what it tells me is that you’re willing to, you’re willing to do that for me, and so I know that you will be loyal to me over your obligations in terms of your oath of office. So that’s sort of the sort of what’s going on. when that happens, but, you know, the Senate doesn’t have to confirm there’s people.
Jen Rubin
Exactly, exactly. Well, I… the only thing that I… keeps me going, I suppose, is the notion that there’ll be people like Andrew, and many other people you see on the contrarian, who will think of very smart ways to clean up, or at least minimize the legacy of the Pam Bondys, and to figure out how to rebuild the Justice Department. We can’t function as a democracy without a Justice Department that has credibility and integrity and stands for the principle of justice. It’s the only department that has its mission stated within its title, and if it can’t do that, then we’re really lost.
Andrew Weissmann
So one thing on just personnel, I’m just gonna give a quick shout-out to Robert Mueller, because, a lot of people have talked about the fact that it’s sort of the end of an era, and they don’t see somebody with that level of integrity. And smarts, and so many… and experience in Washington today, and that’s certainly, you know, in large measure true. But I do think there’s another way to look at it, which is he instilled in so many people in the Department of Justice in the intelligence community, both people who are there now, and former people like me and Mary McCord and lots of people you know, that his legacy so lives on in terms of… Exactly what you’re talking about, and people who are committed to, what it means to be a public servant, and… And again, that’s apolitical, just… I want to make sure people understand, you know, he was not a Democrat, he was a Republican. He didn’t operate in any sort of political sphere. He was very much a facts and law kind of guy, and he instilled that rigor and that excellence, and also the… What it means to have the privilege The absolute privilege. Of being a public servant, and what it… what obligation it meant that you took on when you were in that role.
Jen Rubin
Perhaps she was.
Andrew Weissmann
that is something that I think is ex… like, it’s easy to think that that’s gone, but it really isn’t. There are so many people where they…
Jen Rubin
Exactly.
Andrew Weissmann
than us.
Jen Rubin
And let’s hope that the legacy of Robert Mueller, not the legacy of Pam Bondi, is what goes on into the future, and you are absolutely right that Robert Moeller is the model for public service. So thank you again, Andrew. It’s always good to talk to you, in troubling times, and we look forward to the day Gwen, I’ll be interviewing a high-level person within the Justice Department by the name of Andrew Weissman, who will be in charge of cleaning up the mess.
Andrew Weissmann
Or somebody else who’s…
Jen Rubin
Or somebody else.
Andrew Weissmann
Yes.
Jen Rubin
Yes, very good. Well, thanks so much, Andrew, great seeing you.
Andrew Weissmann
Nice seeing you.
