President Donald Trump said Thursday that Pam Bondi is out as his attorney general, ending the contentious tenure of a loyalist who upended the Justice Department’s culture of independence from the White House, oversaw large-scale firings of career employees and moved aggressively to investigate the Republican president’s perceived enemies.
Donald Trump has fired Attorney General Pam Bondi. pic.twitter.com/kWliA192J8
— Pop Base (@PopBase) April 2, 2026
The departure followed months of scrutiny over the Justice Department’s handling of files related to the Jeffrey Epstein sex trafficking investigation and failed efforts to meet Trump’s unwavering demands for criminal cases against his adversaries. As Trump’s own frustrations mounted, he began privately discussing firing Bondi, people familiar with the matter say.
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“Pam Bondi is a Great American Patriot and a loyal friend, who faithfully served as my Attorney General over the past year,” Trump said in a statement. He added, “We love Pam, and she will be transitioning to a much needed and important new job in the private sector, to be announced at a date in the near future.”
Trump named Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, one of his former personal lawyers, as the acting attorney general. Three people familiar with the matter told The Associated Press on Thursday that he has privately discussed Lee Zeldin, the head of the Environmental Protection Agency, as a permanent pick.
In her own statement, Bondi called the job “the honor of a lifetime” and said she would be working over the next month to transition the position to Blanche.
Bondi came into office 14 months ago, pledging that she would not play politics with the Justice Department. But she quickly set out to do Trump’s bidding, heaping lavish praise at congressional hearings and White House events, firing prosecutors deemed insufficiently loyal to the president and opening investigations into his political foes. The intense turmoil contributed to the resignations of hundreds of employees, with the norm-breaking actions stirring concern that the department was being wielded as a tool to advance Trump’s personal and political interests.
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