The Corruption of the DOJ

In Conversation with Joyce Vance

[Transcript edited for clarity, flow and length]

Mary Trump: I had a great conversation with the always amazing Joyce Vance, whose SubStack is Civil Discourse. We discussed the importance of what’s happening with the $1.776 billion slush fund, how it relates to Todd Blanche’s role as Acting Attorney General, and the continued cravenness of Republicans who, unbelievably, voted to move Blanche’s nomination out of the Judiciary Committee and on to the full Senate for confirmation. Sadly, it looks like this guy is going to get in.

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Joyce Vance: One of the reasons I wanted to have you on is because you have not let go of this entire $1.776 billion slush fund. I think part of the problem with the era we’re living through is that there is simply so much happening. There’s so much corruption, so much incompetence, so much cruelty, and on and on it goes. It feels overwhelming, and I know it’s difficult for people to stay engaged.

Every once in a while, though, an issue comes along that crystallizes what’s really happening, what is being done to us, and why it matters. I think, in a slightly different way, the reflecting pool is one of those issues. So too is this horrific slush fund because it encompasses self dealing, grift, the final nail in the coffin of Justice Department independence, the Acting Attorney General of the United States functioning as the president’s personal defense lawyer, and, of course, the president’s willingness to use his office and federal agencies to enrich himself and his family while enjoying complete impunity for financial crimes.

There is a tremendous amount wrapped up in this one issue. That’s exactly why I think it’s such an effective lens through which to understand what’s going wrong. Today, Todd Blanche’s nomination, unbelievably, or perhaps believably, made it out of the Judiciary Committee and will now go before the full Senate.

I’d love for you to walk us through where we are, how we got here, and what this entire situation says about the capitulation and, frankly, the treasonous behavior of Senate Republicans.

Joyce Vance: By the end of this conversation, we’ll probably all be lying on the floor in tears because that’s really where this leads.

You know what I try to do at Civil Discourse. I always try to follow the through lines because I share exactly the concern you’ve described. There is so much happening simultaneously that it’s easy to become overwhelmed. I actually believe that’s intentional. I think the constant flood of chaos is designed to make people unplug.

How many people have said to you, “I just can’t take it anymore”?

That’s exactly why I try to identify the common threads running through all of these events so that people can better understand what’s really happening instead of feeling consumed by every individual outrage.

This particular issue is the mother of all through lines, especially for someone like me who spent a career as a federal prosecutor.

What we’re witnessing is the corruption of the Department of Justice itself.

I still remember when Eric Holder got into trouble simply for joking that he was President Obama’s wingman. He didn’t mean it literally. If anything, he probably meant he had the president’s back on the basketball court. Even so, there were calls for his resignation.

Now we have someone who isn’t merely the president’s wingman.

He’s functioning as the president’s criminal defense attorney.

He’s literally giving away taxpayer money to Donald Trump and getting away with it.

Mary Trump: I think what’s equally disturbing is the number of people lining up to help make all of this possible.

That’s something we have to remember throughout this entire regime.

There are so many people who know better, who are either looking the other way or actively enabling what is happening.

Even people who owe Donald Trump absolutely no personal allegiance, people like Tom Tillis and John Cornyn, continue covering for him despite the fact that Donald himself has done enormous damage to their political careers.

It’s the shamelessness of it all. The openness.

Could you also talk a little about the judge’s ruling and just how obvious it is that we’re dealing with a situation in which the same individual effectively controls both sides of the dispute while simultaneously claiming to have been harmed?

You wrote about this recently, echoing something you’d written back in May. You said there’s ordinary corruption, and then there’s the second Trump administration.

Joyce Vance: That really was my immediate reaction because this situation struck me as being extraordinarily corrupt from the very beginning, specifically when we saw that settlement agreement bearing Todd Blanche’s signature.

Let’s rewind the legal history for a moment.

Donald Trump filed a lawsuit against the IRS in the Southern District of Florida.

After a considerable amount of procedural maneuvering, the judge recognized something fundamental. Donald Trump was effectively on both sides of the lawsuit. He was both the plaintiff and, through his public statements asserting control over the IRS, essentially directing the defendant as well.

The judge recognized that this raised serious concerns about manipulating the judicial process.

But here’s why all of this matters.

The lawsuit itself should never have succeeded because Donald filed it after the statute of limitations had already expired. Under ordinary circumstances, it should have been dismissed almost immediately.

Instead, before the IRS even filed an answer, Donald voluntarily dismissed the case himself, something he was entitled to do procedurally.

Then came the truly extraordinary developments.

We suddenly saw the creation of the so called 1776 Fund, what many people continue referring to as the $1.8 billion slush fund, although I think it’s important to call it by its actual name because that name itself carries enormous significance.

The very next day, Todd Blanche signed an extraordinary document providing that Donald Trump, his family, and his businesses could not be investigated, prosecuted, or compelled to pay certain tax liabilities. While people often describe it narrowly as applying only to IRS matters, the language is considerably broader than that.

This entire chain of events began with a lawsuit that should never have survived in the first place.

That’s why Todd Blanche has become such a central figure in all of this. Donald Trump has nominated him to become Attorney General of the United States. The problem is that Todd Blanche is behaving as Donald Trump’s personal lawyer.

That is not the job of the Attorney General.

The Attorney General represents the American people, not the president. Todd Blanche was once regarded very highly by many of the lawyers who worked with him in the Southern District of New York. They considered him a good lawyer and a good person.

Somewhere along the way, though, he lost his way.

As people often say, everything Donald Trump touches dies.

Mary Trump: I always say that every person who chooses to be in Donald’s orbit destroys themselves. It isn’t involuntary. People sign up for this. To me, Todd Blanche is the Heinrich Himmler of the Trump regime. He presents himself as this seemingly mild mannered guy who simply got a taste of power, became addicted to it, and is now willing to do the most despicable things despite knowing exactly what his role is supposed to be and what he has chosen to do instead.

Just to remind people, this slush fund, as Joyce correctly points out, is the $1.776 billion slush fund. The entire thing began with Todd Blanche insisting that the amount was simply the number they happened to arrive at when assessing damages. He claimed it was merely a coincidence that it totaled $1.776 billion.

From the very beginning, the corruption has been obvious. And again, it’s important to remind people what this money is actually intended to do. This is compensation for people who betrayed this country. It is compensation for people who, on January 6, 2021, at Donald Trump’s direction, attacked our Capitol, endangered the lives of everyone inside that building, and, in some cases, committed sedition.

As though that weren’t bad enough, we’re also witnessing extraordinary financial self dealing. Had this agreement not been reached, Donald already owed the IRS roughly $100 million. That obligation simply disappears. Don’t we all wish our tax debts could be wiped away so easily?

There is so much wrapped up in this story, which is exactly why I think it’s one of the clearest examples of everything that’s wrong with this administration. It also brings us directly to Republican complicity.

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We now find ourselves in a situation where Republicans know exactly how wrong all of this is. Yet we have people like John Cornyn saying, “There’s nothing we can do to rein in this president.” Nothing we can do. Coming from a United States senator, that’s an extraordinary statement.

More importantly, they’re pretending Todd Blanche’s confirmation rises or falls on this one issue alone, when time and again he has demonstrated such breathtaking corruption that, even without the slush fund, he should never be confirmed as Attorney General.

Joyce Vance: Todd Blanche has been at the center of virtually every major abuse we’ve seen inside the Justice Department.

He was in the room when the department ignored a federal judge’s order to turn the deportation flights around in the early immigration cases. His fingerprints are on the release of victims’ photographs and identifying information during the handling of the Epstein files, while, at the very same time, continuing to shield some of the perpetrators from accountability. His fingerprints are all over what happened in Minneapolis as well.

The Attorney General possesses enormous authority. He has the ability to hold ICE agents accountable when they unlawfully kill American citizens on American streets. Todd Blanche has done nothing. He has not lifted a finger.

If anyone still believes Todd Blanche might possess redeeming qualities, it’s worth remembering that he also stood by while career prosecutors, many of whom he knew personally and had worked beside for years, were fired simply for doing their jobs and following the rule of law.

We watched respected attorneys in the Southern District of New York lose their careers because they refused to compromise their professional ethics. Todd Blanche remained fully complicit throughout all of it.

That’s because Todd Blanche doesn’t believe in the rule of law. He believes in the rule of Donald Trump. He believes in the unitary executive, in an all powerful presidency.

I honestly don’t know that there are enough adjectives available to describe how dangerous this is.

So let me say it plainly.

This is the end of the Department of Justice as we’ve known it.

There will continue to be outstanding career prosecutors throughout the country doing everything they can to uphold the law. I have complete confidence in their professionalism.

But Todd Blanche, as the head of the Department, will so severely undermine public confidence in the institution that rebuilding it will take years.

I remain optimistic that it can be rebuilt. We need to be prepared to begin that work immediately when the opportunity comes.

But there is no question that the damage being done right now strikes at one of the most fundamental institutions supporting American democracy.

Mary Trump: I can’t imagine how painful this must be for you after serving as a United States Attorney. As you know, my wife, Ronda, worked in the Disability Rights Section of the Civil Rights Division at the Department of Justice, a division Harmeet Dhillon is now doing her utmost to dismantle.

Like you, I remain optimistic that the Department of Justice can ultimately recover. But I think that recovery depends, in large part, on making sure the American people understand exactly what’s happening and who is responsible.

Americans, unfortunately, have notoriously short memories. My sense is that unwinding this damage, rebuilding the institution, and restoring public confidence will take an extraordinarily long time.

That brings me back to Republicans.

I want your thoughts on what they’re thinking because it’s difficult to understand. People like Tom Tillis and John Cornyn are already on their way out. They could have chosen to stand up for the institution they swore to protect.

Instead, it feels as though they’re doing what we’ve seen so many Republicans do. Susan Collins, who may face a difficult reelection campaign in Maine, votes no, providing herself with political cover. To me, that’s a tell. It demonstrates that they understand exactly how corrupt and indefensible Todd Blanche’s confirmation truly is.

Joyce Vance: I have a very cynical view of what’s happening in the Senate because I think many of these senators are putting their own personal futures ahead of the country.

Susan Collins was only given permission to vote against Todd Blanche because Republican leadership was already confident they had enough votes to confirm him. With Mitch McConnell gone, Republicans can afford to lose two votes, but not three, unless someone like John Fetterman crosses over and votes in favor of Blanche. That’s how close this confirmation is likely to be.

As for what I sometimes call the “weeble wobbles” on the Judiciary Committee, John Cornyn and Thom Tillis both had an opportunity to demonstrate genuine courage. Neither of them is returning to the Senate. This could have been the moment when they stood up for the institution they claim to respect.

Instead, I believe they’re negotiating for their futures.

They may want to become lobbyists. Former senators enjoy access that very few lobbyists ever have, simply because of the relationships they’ve built over years of service. We don’t know exactly what conversations took place behind closed doors or whether any promises were made. There’s no way for us to know the precise nature of any agreement.

But what we do know is that John Cornyn publicly insisted he needed a written retraction regarding both the slush fund and the immunity agreement. Then Todd Blanche posted a statement on social media at 11:09 p.m. on a Sunday night, and suddenly Senator Cornyn declared, “That’s good enough for me.”

John Cornyn is a lawyer. He’s extremely well educated. He understands precisely what’s at stake here.

From where I sit, it appears he has chosen to place his own interests ahead of the country’s interests.

Mary Trump: That increasingly seems to be the defining principle of today’s Republican Party.

It’s an indictment of the party itself and of the extraordinary betrayal of the people these senators were elected to represent. Their constitutional responsibility is to uphold the Constitution, to serve as a coequal branch of government, and to provide checks and balances on executive power.

John Cornyn actually said, in effect, “I don’t understand what my job is. I don’t understand what my constitutional authority is because what could we possibly do?”

The answer is obvious.

You’re a United States senator.

You are part of a coequal branch of government.

Your job is to provide oversight and accountability.

The frustrating part is that these people aren’t ignorant. They aren’t unfamiliar with the Constitution. They’ve read it, unlike the person to whom they continue deferring.

I also wanted to ask about the broader calculation here because Todd Blanche has repeatedly demonstrated that he cannot be trusted. This is someone willing to negotiate with Ghislaine Maxwell, Jeffrey Epstein’s co conspirator in the trafficking and abuse of young women. Time after time, he has shown exactly who he is.

Yet the senators responsible for deciding whether he becomes Attorney General continue overlooking all of it.

At some point we have to stop asking why and instead recognize what this tells us.

Republicans simply don’t care.

I agree with your assessment that much of this is driven by personal ambition. Some want to become lobbyists. Others want lucrative corporate board positions or television contracts after leaving office.

What this administration has done, perhaps more than any previous administration, is expose the weaknesses in our system. It has shown us exactly where the guardrails failed and, in doing so, has handed us a roadmap for rebuilding those institutions.

One thing I do know is that we should stop borrowing Republican framing. Let’s not talk about “Project 2028.” Let’s use our own language.

But we do need meaningful reforms.

Serving in the Senate should be understood as an extraordinary privilege. It gives people enormous influence over the future of the country and tremendous power to improve people’s lives, assuming that’s why they sought office in the first place.

For that reason, I think we need stronger ethical safeguards.

If someone serves as a United States senator, perhaps they should have to wait five years after leaving office before they can become a lobbyist or immediately begin cashing in on the public trust they were elected to uphold.

Joyce Vance: I couldn’t agree more.

I’ve long believed that kind of cooling off period should apply not only to senators but also to United States Attorneys and other senior public officials.

If you’re going to devote yourself to public service, then your motivation should actually be public service.

Obviously, everyone has to earn a living. Everyone needs to support themselves and their families.

But when you’ve had the privilege of serving as a United States senator, you already possess countless opportunities. Becoming a lobbyist isn’t the only path available to you.

We’ve seen many senators arrive in Washington with relatively modest financial means and leave office extraordinarily wealthy. I remember looking at the financial disclosures for Jeff Sessions after he left the Senate to become Donald Trump’s first Attorney General, and the numbers were astonishing.

Public office inevitably provides financial opportunities.

But with that privilege comes an obligation to conduct yourself ethically, honestly, and transparently.

Perhaps we should be encouraging people to seek public office because they genuinely want to serve the country rather than because they see it as a stepping stone to increasing their personal wealth.