Todd Blanche is “the right man for the right time,” a letter from 77 former Department of Justice officials declares in urging the Senate Judiciary Committee to support President Donald Trump’s pick to serve as the 88th U.S. Attorney General.
The former high-ranking DOJ officials — spanning multiple administrations — sent the letter Sunday to Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, and Ranking Member Sen. Dick Durban, R-Ill., in advance of Blanche’s confirmation hearing, beginning Wednesday morning.
Blanche has served as acting U.S. attorney general since early April, following Attorney General Pam Bondi’s abrupt departure.
“His exemplary record as Deputy Attorney General — and now as Acting Attorney General — demonstrates he is the right man for the right time,” states the letter signed by dozens of former DOJ deputies, assistant AGs, U.S. attorneys, and others. The group includes Gary Barnett, former acting chief of staff and senior counselor to the attorney general; Ketan Bhirud, former associate deputy attorney general; Rachel Bissex, former deputy chief of staff and counselor to the attorney general; and Jonathan D. Brightbill, former acting assistant attorney general.
The recommendation notes Blanche’s rise up the ranks, beginning with his service with the DOJ as a paralegal in the Criminal Division and at the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York. He did so while going to law school at night and supporting his young family, the letter states. He went on to become an assistant U.S. attorney in the SDNY’s violent-crimes division, “where he prosecuted serious offenses for eight years,” ultimately serving as co-chief of the unit. He “supervised dozens of prosecutors handling murder, kidnapping, and other violent crimes.”
“This hands-on experience as both a line prosecutor and supervisor gives him an unparalleled understanding of how the Department actually operates — from the streets to headquarters,” the letter asserts.
‘Clarity and Resolve’
A Trump loyalist, Blanche successfully served as the president’s legal counsel during the left’s relentless lawfare campaigns against Trump and his allies — political witch hunts stopping at nothing to stop the businessman’s return to the White House. Blanche began Trump’s second term as the DOJ’s deputy attorney general.
As the letter notes, in his role as acting AG, Blanche has overseen the day-to-day operations of a department with more than 100,000 employees in the main DOJ office, the FBI, the DEA, U.S. Marshals, ATF, and 93 U.S. Attorneys’ Offices.
“Under his leadership, the Department has advanced President Trump’s core priorities with clarity and resolve: confronting illegal immigration and dismantling the transnational criminal organizations that exploit our borders; combating the fentanyl crisis and violent crime that devastate American communities; and protecting taxpayers through aggressive fraud enforcement,” the letter states.
Blanche “launched the National Fraud Enforcement Division, which has already driven the recovery of billions of dollars stolen from programs like Medicare and COVID relief, while prioritizing the prosecution of those who prey on American taxpayers,” the support letter states.
‘He Knows What Works’
Democrats hate him. They will do all in their power to make Blanche’s confirmation a bruising battle, if not a living hell.
But the leftist activist groups strongly opposed to Blanche’s confirmation might just be an even more powerful endorsement of his candidacy. The list includes the far-left New York City Bar Association, Democrats Abroad, and the absurdly named Justice Connection, launched in 2024 to respond to “supposed heightened concerns among DOJ personnel regarding political retaliation, reassignments, and threats to the apolitical nature of civil service,” according to nonprofit tracker InfluenceWatch. Funded by the Government Accountability Project, a font of left-wing causes, Justice Connection seems to have a severe blind spot for the sweeping and unprecedented “political retaliation” perpetrated by the Biden Justice Department under corrupt Attorney General Merrick Garland.
The Justice Connection and founder Stacey Young, a former long-time DOJ attorney and darling of the Trump-hating corporate media who holds a seething hatred for Trump, released a letter last week listing the names of 1,200-plus Justice Department employees urging the Senate to vote against Blanche’s confirmation. It’s standard leftist fare, twisting the rule of law into “corruption” and confusing accountability and justice with weaponization.
Blanche has confronted and fought against actual weaponization. The former DOJ officials standing up for him note that he gets the DOJ’s mission, to deliver justice — “not to serve political interests.” That must be a refreshing change for the pro-life faithful prosecuted for praying, the parents harassed for speaking out against woke school board policies, and the Republican senators Biden’s DOJ spied on.
“He has shown the courage and institutional knowledge to restore focus on public safety, law enforcement support, and the rule of law,” the letter states. “His career path — from paralegal to prosecutor to the second-highest position in the Department — gives him a perspective few others possess.
“He knows what works because he has lived it at every level.”
