SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
todd blanche
'No, I'm Not Going to Pledge That': Blanche Refuses to Vow Independence From Trump
"The only reason Blanche is AG is because he will cross any ethical/legal line to defend Trump," said one Democratic senator.
Aug 16, 2026
US Attorney General Todd Blanche refused on Sunday to pledge that his Justice Department would "act independently of the White House," underscoring critics' warnings that Blanche is running the nation's top law enforcement agency as if it were President Donald Trump's personal legal office.
"No, I’m not going to pledge that. And no attorney general should ever pledge that," Blanche, who previously worked as Trump's personal lawyer, said during an appearance on NBC's "Meet the Press."
Blanche went on to suggest, absurdly, that prioritizing independence at the DOJ would mean declining to do anything that aligns with the president's stated goals.
"If I were to pledge I will be independent of the White House, what that means is that if President Trump says, 'I want the Department of Justice to go after every violent criminal in this country,' which is what he has said, what you’re saying to me is I should say, 'No, sir, I’m not going to do it,'" said Blanche, who was confirmed as attorney general earlier this month.
WELKER: Can you pledge the DOJ will always act independently of the White House?
BLANCHE: No, I'm not going to pledge that, and no attorney general ever should
WELKER: So if the president asked you do to something that you feel crosses an ethical or legal line, would you do it?… pic.twitter.com/vPrJdnAQ9l
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) August 16, 2026
Blanche insisted that Trump "never has" and "never will" ask him to do "something unethical" or unlawful, rejecting what he described as "this narrative... that the president’s going to pull me aside and ask me to do something illegal."
"There is this extraordinarily false narrative that the president wakes up in the morning and calls me and says, 'Todd, go prosecute X or Y.' He does not do that. He has never done that," Blanche said.
When Blanche was deputy attorney general under former AG Pam Bondi, Trump publicly pressured Bondi to pursue cases against former FBI Director James Comey, New York Attorney General Letitia James, and Democratic Sen. Adam Schiff of California. (Trump reportedly believed the Truth Social post he made castigating Bondi was a private message.)
Watchdog organizations and former Justice Department employees opposed Blanche's confirmation as attorney general on the grounds that he would put loyalty to Trump over all else.
“Since his confirmation as deputy attorney general, Todd Blanche has shown time and again that his guiding star is fealty to the president, not the Constitution,” said Stacey Young, the founder of Justice Connection who worked at the DOJ for 18 years.
Sen. Andy Kim (D-NJ) said Sunday that "the only reason Blanche is AG is because he will cross any ethical/legal line to defend Trump."
"He proved it as Trump's personal attorney. He proved it as deputy and acting AG," said Kim. "Now we are going to see even more unprecedented levels of corruption at the American people's expense."
Days after his confirmation—which was delayed as the Justice Department dragged its feet on abandoning a proposed slush fund for Trump allies—Blanche appeared at a political rally with the president and spoke favorably of Bruce Blakeman, the Republican challenging incumbent New York Gov. Kathy Hochul.
Democracy Docket noted that the rally "marked the second time Blanche has participated in a norm-shattering political event. Speaking at the Conservative Political Action Conference last year, Blanche downplayed fears over deploying federal agents to the polls this November."
Keep ReadingShow Less
'Trump Is Scared': DOJ Executive Privilege Memo Decried as Effort to 'Shield' Inner Circle
"This opinion is about protecting Trump and his allies from any real accountability, no matter where the questions come from—Congress, the courts, or investigators of any kind."
Aug 11, 2026
Just days after Senate Republicans confirmed US Attorney General Todd Blanche, the Department of Justice this week issued a legal opinion on executive privilege that was swiftly condemned as an attempt to unfairly protect some of President Donald Trump's top advisers from any accountability.
Historically, the president has been allowed to assert executive privilege over communications with executive branch staff, protecting them from disclosure.
However, the DOJ’s Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) said in a Monday memo that "presidential communications with private advisers can fall within the scope of executive privilege so long as they relate to official presidential decisionmaking, involve or reflect communications with the president or his direct advisers, and are confidential."
The memo is signed by Assistant Attorney General T. Elliot Gaiser. HuffPost reported that a DOJ official "argued its veracity by comparing it to a similar one made by President George W. Bush's attorney general in 2007."
"While the issue has not been litigated frequently, the opinion reaffirms the long-standing position of the office going back at least as far as Paul Clement in 2007 and arguably as far back as 1972," the unnamed official said.
Jonathan Shaub, a University of Kentucky School of Law professor who served in the Obama administration’s OLC, told CNN: "I would say it's not inconsistent with past positions... But it's never been stated publicly."
Shaub also told Axios that "it really could be a pretty significant weapon" for the second Trump administration "to deflect a lot of that congressional investigation of private parties."
Republicans are at risk of losing control of both chambers of Congress in the November midterm elections, and if they do, Democratic majorities could move to impeach Trump a historic third time—for everything from the Trump family's profiteering off of the presidency to his illegal war on Iran.
The Not Above the Law coalition's co-chairs—Brett Edkins of Stand Up America, Praveen Fernandes of the Constitutional Accountability Center, Lisa Gilbert of Public Citizen, and Kelsey Herbert of MoveOn—said Tuesday that "Todd Blanche's Justice Department is doing what it always does: attempting to shield Donald Trump and the people around him before anyone can hold them accountable."
"This opinion is about protecting Trump and his allies from any real accountability, no matter where the questions come from—Congress, the courts, or investigators of any kind," they argued. "Every senator who voted to confirm Blanche knew exactly what kind of Justice Department they were signing off on. They own it now."
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY)—who may not have enough support to lead Democrats even if they reclaim the upper chamber in November—was similarly critical, concluding: "Donald Trump is scared. He knows accountability is coming."
"He’s using his newly installed attorney general/personal lawyer, Todd Blanche, to cover up his communications with private advisers and special interest cronies," Schumer said on Facebook. "These are the actions of someone with something to hide. And it shows he is petrified of the questions a Democratic Congress will demand answers to. We will not let Trump escape the accountability he deserves."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Ex-Trump Lawyer Says 'We're Screwed' if Trump Pressures New AG Blanche to Subvert Elections
"There's no circumstance under which we shouldn't expect Blanche to seize ballots and seize voting machines and try to interfere in the process of the upcoming election."
Aug 09, 2026
One of the many questions swirling around new US Attorney General Todd Blanche is whether he'd go along with President Donald Trump's efforts to subvert the result of another election.
In 2020, when Trump attempted to overturn his loss to former President Joe Biden, his attempts to claim the result was marred by systemic fraud were met with resistance from then-Attorney General William Barr.
But under Blanche, who served for two years as Trump's personal defense attorney, things may be very different.
That's according to another of Trump's former lawyers, Ty Cobb, who served as White House special counsel for nearly a year during Trump's first term, as he came under investigation by then-special counsel Robert Mueller over his campaign's alleged coordination with the Russian government.
Cobb, who has been an outspoken critic of both Trump and his appointment of Blanche, appeared for an interview released Saturday on Zeteo's "Mehdi Unfiltered." Host Mehdi Hasan asked Cobb, "Come 2028, does American democracy survive Donald Trump?"
"I’m not sure they survive it in 2026,” Cobb responded.
Meet the Former Trump White House Lawyer Who Says Our Democracy Could Be ‘Screwed’ in 2026 by Mehdi Hasan
Ty Cobb, who represented the Trump White House during the Mueller investigation, questions whether democracy will survive the midterms and accuses Trump of 'unprecedented' corruption.
Read on SubstackNoting Barr's resistance to Trump in 2020, Hasan asked: "If the midterms don’t go Trump’s way this fall, is there any world in which Todd Blanche stands up to Trump if he’s asked to find some fake evidence of voter fraud, or are we screwed now?”
“We’re screwed,” Cobb said bluntly.
“Great,” Hasan said. “That’s what I suspected.”
Trump has, on multiple occasions, floated the idea of canceling the midterm elections outright and has enacted measures aimed at blocking mail-in voting and seizing voter information from states. He has also said he wants Republicans to "nationalize" elections in Democratic-leaning locales.
Cobb noted that Blanche "has already echoed [former Trump chief strategist] Steve Bannon's view that [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] should be on the street during the election," adding, "I think we'll almost certainly see that."
Hasan pointed out that the administration has routinely ignored court orders, especially with regard to its immigration enforcement. Cobb predicted that "the level of noncompliance" so far "is nothing compared to what we're about to see."
He said that if Democrats take the US House of Representatives and begin pursuing investigations, he suspects there will be "a number of contemptuous acts" by the administration. "We can count on the Justice Department to pursue zero of those referrals."
"That's assuming that the midterms actually produce a Democratic Congress," he continued, noting that even if one were elected legitimately, "whether they get seated or not by [Republican House Speaker] Little Mikey Johnson and his service to the president, that remains to be seen."
Cobb said that's in addition to other "dangers" around the election, including the presence of ICE agents. "Blanche has suggested that people should be happy to see ICE at the polls."
Where Barr refused Trump's requests to do so in 2020, Cobb said, "There's no circumstance under which we shouldn't expect Blanche to seize ballots and seize voting machines and try to interfere in the process of the upcoming election."
"I think that the president has made it very clear that he doesn't want immigrants or people of color to have the ability to go to the polls," Cobb said. "He's going to do everything he can in blue states and elsewhere to try to prevent this election from going smoothly."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Senate Confirms 'Personal Servant to Donald Trump' Blanche as AG in Late-Night Vote
"If he is tasked with leading Trump’s revenge agenda against his political enemies and critics, we have every reason to believe he will execute this mission with eagerness and fealty."
Aug 08, 2026
Early Saturday, outgoing Sen. Bill Cassidy cast the deciding vote to confirm Todd Blanche as US Attorney General shortly after outlining a litany of reservations about the nominee.
Around 4:30 am ET, the US Senate voted 50-49 to confirm Blanche, President Donald Trump's former personal attorney and acting attorney general since April, as the nation's chief law enforcement officer. It did so despite widespread concerns, including among some Republicans, that he would use the office primarily to carry out the president's whims.
Sen. Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), one of two Republicans who voted against Blanche, outlined her concerns in a social media post Friday ahead of the vote, saying Trump had "accelerated" the "politicization—even weaponization" of the US Department of Justice (DOJ) and that Blanche had played a part.
"I take issue with the handling of the release of the Epstein files; the sweeping immunity protections granted to the president, his family, and their businesses; the statements that have been made to anti-abortion groups; and the repeated targeting of individuals ranging from former administration staff to sitting US senators," Murkowski said.
Murkowski also expressed doubt about Blanche's promise to eliminate the department's so-called $1.8 billion "weaponization fund" for Trump's supporters and allies—including January 6 Capitol insurrectionists. Referring to it as a "slush fund," she said confirming Blanche would cost the Senate any "leverage" to prevent it from being revived.
In a speech Friday ahead of the vote, Cassidy (R-La.)—who lost his Senate primary in May after being attacked by Trump as "disloyal"—raised similar concerns about Blanche, but ultimately said they did not prevent him from supporting the nominee.
"Mr. Blanche showed poor judgment in approving the anti-weaponization slush fund and exempting the president from [Internal Revenue Service] audits," Cassidy said on the Senate floor. "Mr. Blanche said these were mistakes and has made efforts to kill the slush fund."
To secure his confirmation, Blanche struck a deal with Republican holdouts, including Sens. Thom Tillis (NC) and John Cornyn (Texas), earlier last week and issued an order to eliminate the $1.8 billion fund, but did not agree to end the exemption from tax audits of Trump's past activity.
Cassidy also said he was concerned about "DOJ bringing suits against political enemies," but argued that Trump's "unrelenting" targeting of his foes meant any attorney general he appointed would face the same pressure.
To address the allegation that Blanche would act as a "yes-man" for Trump, Cassidy quoted William Barr, who served as attorney general during Trump's first term: "Because of his previous client-attorney relationship with President Trump, Mr. Blanche would be precisely the person to push back on President Trump."
Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.), who sits on the Senate Judiciary Committee, said on CNN Friday night that the Republicans who were voting to confirm Blanche despite their reservations "know better" than to trust him and would ultimately "regret" the decision.
"He advanced... this $1.8 billion slush fund. That's a terrible idea. And frankly, that my colleagues and friends, John Cornyn and Bill Cassidy, accept this paper-thin excuse of a signed deal by Todd Blanche doesn't pass the smell test because, frankly, President Trump is the one who continues to berate and push for that weaponization fund," he said. "I have no confidence that Todd Blanche won't just turn around and give it to him once confirmed."
Asked about Cassidy's reasoning that Blanche, as Trump's former attorney, would be more willing and able to constrain the president, Coons said, "I don't buy that at all."
"What I've seen from Todd Blanche in the role of [acting] attorney general and in his confirmation hearing was that he still thinks of himself as President Trump's personal lawyer, not the person who is trying to protect the Department of Justice and the Constitution from presidential overreach," Coons said.
Ultimately, just two Republicans joined every Democrat to vote against confirming Blanche—Murkowski and Sen. Susan Collins, who faces a difficult reelection battle against Democratic nominee Troy Jackson in Maine. Cassidy, Tillis, and Cornyn all voted yes.
Former Ambassador Norm Eisen, the co-founder and board member of Democracy Defenders Action, said that Blanche's confirmation was "a dark day for the rule of law."
"Senate Republicans sounded the alarm, rightfully so, calling out the ‘fund that would pay people who beat police officers,’ and exposing a nominee who has never stopped serving the personal and political interests of Donald Trump. Yet, at the precipice, they lost their nerve and the majority voted for him anyway."
Praveen Fernandes, vice president of the Constitutional Accountability Center, said that approving the slush fund was "one of the most brazen attempts to circumvent the law and benefit Trump and his cronies."
She added that every senator who voted for Blanche "cast a vote in support of the Blanche-led Department of Justice’s continued failure to comply with the Epstein Files Transparency Act and its unconscionable treatment of Epstein survivors, its efforts to wipe clean the records of those who participated in January 6th violence against lawmakers and law enforcement officers, its record of weaponized prosecutions, and its brazen rejection of the notion of prosecutorial independence from White House pressure."
Lisa Gilbert, co-president of the watchdog group Public Citizen, said that "Moving forward, our country has to contend with an attorney general who sees himself as a personal servant to Donald Trump instead of a public servant to the American people."
"If he is tasked with leading Trump’s revenge agenda against his political enemies and critics, as he likely will be," she said, "we have every reason to believe he will execute this mission with eagerness and fealty."
Keep ReadingShow Less
'Mainers Aren't Stupid': Troy Jackson Says Voters See Through Susan Collins' Charade
"Susan has voted with Trump 96% of the time. The other 4%? She waits until her vote won’t change the outcome."
Aug 07, 2026
Democratic US Senate candidate Troy Jackson on Friday accused rival Sen. Susan Collins of trying to pull the wool over Maine voters' eyes with her decision to vote against confirming Todd Blanche as the next US attorney general.
In a social media post, Jackson pointed to a statement from right-wing radio host John Fredericks praising Collins' (R-Maine) "very savvy team" for having her vote against Blanche while already knowing the former personal attorney for President Donald Trump would have enough support in the US Senate to be confirmed.
"They know that even without her, Blanche has the votes to get confirmed," Fredericks said. "So this was a vote to help her get elected, to help her with Maine voters, but it does nothing to hurt Todd Blanche because he’s already got the votes."
Jackson accused his Republican opponent of participating in a shell game where she arranged to be shielded from what would have been a very damaging vote.
"Weak sauce," wrote Jackson. "Susan has voted with Trump 96% of the time. The other 4%? She waits until her vote won’t change the outcome."
Jackson, the former president of the Maine state Senate, predicted that voters would see right through Collins' ploy.
"Mainers aren’t stupid," wrote Jackson. "We deserve a fighter who will actually stand up to Trump."
Collins earlier this week announced her intention to vote against Blanche, who as assistant attorney general orchestrated Trump's widely criticized $1.8 billion slush fund for political allies.
On Friday morning, Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) announced he would be the final vote needed to drag Blanche's confirmation over the finish line, which led some critics to speculate that Collins knew all along that her vote would not be needed.
Collins in 2018 was a decisive vote in favor of confirming US Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. During her speech announcing her vote for Kavanaugh, she insisted that he would uphold the precedent set by Roe v. Wade establishing the constitutional right to an abortion.
Four years later, however, Kavanaugh joined the Supreme Court majority in overturning Roe, and Jackson has been hammering Collins' decisive confirmation vote as a major reason why she must be unseated this fall.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Cassidy's Yes on Blanche Again Shows Collins Only Votes Against Trump 'When Her Vote Doesn't Matter'
"The moment Collins announced she was a no on Blanche, you knew they had the votes," said MS NOW host Chris Hayes.
Aug 07, 2026
Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana announced Friday that he would vote yes on Todd Blanche's nomination for US attorney general, rendering vulnerable Sen. Susan Collins' opposition to President Donald Trump's former personal attorney effectively meaningless.
Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) on Friday morning came out in opposition to Blanche's confirmation—but Cassidy hours later announced that he would vote in vote in favor of the former personal attorney to President Donald Trump.
In a speech announcing the decision, Cassidy acknowledged that Blanche—who as deputy attorney general arranged for convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell to be transferred to a minimum-security jail and who orchestrated the widely criticized $1.8 billion slush fund for Trump allies—is "not perfect."
I will support Todd Blanche for U.S. Attorney General. pic.twitter.com/PKWr3atuvA
— U.S. Senator Bill Cassidy, M.D. (@SenBillCassidy) August 7, 2026
"But the choice is not between perfection and Mr. Blanche," Cassidy continued. "It is between Mr. Blanche and another acting attorney general who may not run the department effectively under President Trump, and who indeed may not be as good as Mr. Blanche."
The Louisiana Republican added that he expected to "be criticized for this vote," before adding, "What's new?"
The sequence of Collins (R-Maine) and Murkowski announcing their opposition to Blanche, only for Cassidy to clinch his confirmation shortly after, made MS NOW host Chris Hayes suspicious that the fix was in from the start.
"The moment Collins announced she was a no on Blanche," Hayes wrote, "you KNEW they had the votes."
The social media account of Susan Collins Watch, a website that has tracked the Maine Republican's voting patterns for decades, made a similar observation.
"Of the thousands of GOP nominees Susan Collins has voted on over a 29-year career, NOT ONCE has she cast a tie-breaking vote against the GOP," they wrote. "But she's cast dozens of tie-breaking votes for GOP nominees, bills, etc. Are we supposed to believe this is some quirky statistical anomaly?"
Sam Stein, reporter for The Bulwark, argued Cassidy's yes vote on Blanche "doesn't help Collins" politically, as she "will continue to be tagged with only voting against Trump when her vote doesn't matter."
Collins in 2018 was the decisive vote in favor of confirming US Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. During her speech announcing her vote for Kavanaugh, she insisted that he would uphold the precedent set by Roe v. Wade establishing the constitutional right to an abortion.
Four years later, however, Kavanaugh joined the Supreme Court majority in overturning Roe.
Former Maine state Senate President Troy Jackson, who is running against Collins as the Democratic Party's nominee for the US Senate, has highlighted the vote to confirm Kavanaugh as a major reason why she must be unseated.
“When Susan Collins was helping overturn Roe v. Wade,” Jackson said in a recent interview, “here in Maine... I co-sponsored one of the most progressive reproductive rights bills in the country—fought incredibly hard for it."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Ahead of Confirmation Vote, Groups Blast Blanche Vow Subject 'Every Single State' to Anti-Abortion Laws
"Anti-abortion zealots like Todd Blanche would not stop until they could restrict our bodily autonomy to the furthest degree," said one critic.
Aug 05, 2026
Reproductive rights groups are sounding the alarm about a recent pledge made by acting US Attorney General Todd Blanche to make every state adhere to anti-abortion laws passed in red states.
In a phone call last week hosted by the White House Faith Office, Blanche told a religious group that he would work would work to ensure the US Supreme Court's Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization decision that overturned the constitutional right to an abortion “becomes permanent in every single state.”
During the call, Blanche hinted that the Trump administration would place restrictions on the ability to mail drugs such as mifepristone to states that have outlawed abortion.
"If states have said, ‘We are going to protect the unborn and we’re going to protect every life from the moment of conception,’ we’re putting practices and policies in place so that other states and other organizations can’t attack that,” Blanche said. "They can’t do things like they’re doing with mailing in mail-order drugs."
In an analysis published Wednesday, journalist Jessica Valenti argued that Blanche's pledge would not result in a nationwide ban on abortions, but rather "stopping the shipping of abortion medication under the auspices of adhering to Dobbs."
"If we lost telemedicine abortion, there would be devastating national consequences," Valenti emphasized. "You could even argue—and I have!—that banning the shipping of abortion pills amounts to a backdoor national ban."
In a Tuesday social media post, Sen. Tina Smith (D-Minn.) highlighted Blanche's call and warned that confirming him as AG permanently would be a green light to assault women's rights.
"Todd Blanche made clear in these secret calls with anti-choice activists that he wants to resurrect the Comstock Act—an antiquated anti-vice law from before women had the right to vote—to ban sending medication abortion in the mail," wrote Smith. "Republicans will likely do what they always do and confirm Blanche as attorney general despite all of this, and once again, women across America will pay the price."
Mini Timmaraju, president and CEO of Reproductive Freedom for All, accused Blanche of "making dangerous promises behind closed doors to weaponize the Justice Department to enact a national abortion ban."
"We must believe Blanche when he says he will come for our rights," Timmaraju added. "Republicans are using every lever of government to attack reproductive freedom, and voters will make their voices heard this November to take our Congress back from these extremists."
Nourbese Flint, president of All* Above All, called Blanche's promise "an open declaration of his intention to use the Justice Department to stop the delivery of abortion medication."
"The lie they told us in the aftermath of Dobbs was that it was about sending abortion law back to the states," Flint said, "but we have known all along that anti-abortion zealots like Todd Blanche would not stop until they could restrict our bodily autonomy to the furthest degree."
Keep ReadingShow Less
'Guess Senate Republicans Have the Votes': Facing Tough Reelection, Collins to Oppose Blanche
"Typical Susan Collins: Votes against Trump when her vote doesn't change the outcome but lock-in-step when it does."
Aug 04, 2026
After Senate Judiciary Committee Republicans advanced Todd Blanche's nomination to be US attorney general, attention shifted to a few GOP senators, including Maine's Susan Collins, who—as she faces a formidable Democratic challenger in November—said late Tuesday that she would vote against President Donald Trump's former personal lawyer leading the Department of Justice.
Collins has been in office for nearly three decades and often played the part of a "concerned moderate" while voting with her party when it needs her. Perhaps the most notable example was when the senator, who claims to support abortion rights, helped confirm US Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh—and then he helped overturn Roe v. Wade.
Now Collins—along with some other Republicans, such as Sens. Lisa Murkowski (Alaska) and Bill Cassidy (La.), who lost his May primary to a Trump-backed candidate—must contend with a DOJ nominee who, in a recent phone call hosted by the White House Faith Office, said that "we have a lot of work to do" rolling back the Biden administration's progress on abortion rights, and "some of that is taking longer than we want."
Blanche, who is currently acting AG, assured those on the call—a recording of which was posted online by the religious group Intercessors for America, according to Politico—that the DOJ is "working hand in hand" with the White House, Department of Health and Human Services, and Food and Drug Administration to ensure that the Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization ruling, which reversed Roe and let states enact total abortion bans, "becomes permanent in every single state," promising "victory."
Politico reported that when "asked to explain what Blanche meant by 'victory' and by making the high court decision 'permanent in every single state,' the Justice Department said his comments were made solely 'with respect to mail order abortion drugs' and did not elaborate further."
Collins, who is running against former Democratic state Senate President Troy Jackson, had not said how she planned to vote on Blanche before the panel weighed in on Tuesday; he advanced out of committee after striking a deal with a pair of GOP senators on blocking the so-called "Anti-Weaponization Fund" sought by Trump for his allies, including January 6, 2021 insurrectionists.
A spokesperson for the Maine Republican told the Bangor Daily News on Monday that she was waiting for the results of the panel's vote and "also holding off on a decision until confirming all the details of the agreement hammered out between Blanche and the two senators who were previously holding out, Sens. John Cornyn of Texas and Thom Tillis of North Carolina."
There are 53 Senate Republicans, and although Sen. Darline Graham (R-SC) has taken over for her late brother, former Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) remains hospitalized, meaning that with otherwise full attendance, losing three GOP votes could block Blanche's path to the permanent post.
In a lengthy statement on social media Tuesday evening, Collins said that "I have carefully reviewed Todd Blanche's qualifications," and "while I believe Mr. Blanche is a capable lawyer, the Department of Justice has become increasingly political."
"Mr. Blanche has taken several actions that have further eroded the department's independence, and that is the basis for my vote to oppose his confirmation," she continued, citing his approval of an immunity deal for the Trump family and the Anti-Weaponization Fund, his promise to "prohibit the mailing of abortion medication to women nationwide," attempted indictments of Democratic senators over their video encouraging resistance to unlawful military orders, and opposition to Blanche within the DOJ.
Brendan Duke, a former Biden administration economic adviser who's now senior director at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, responded, "Guess Senate republicans have the votes."
Collins said less than two months ago that "I do not regret" voting for Kavanaugh, despite the fallout that followed. At the time, she was running against Democrat Graham Platner, who had responded to the senator, "You should." Like the Supreme Court Justice, Platner was accused of sexual assault, which he denied; unlike Kavanaugh, Platner stepped aside. He was recently replaced on the ballot with Jackson, via a convention process.
Jackson, a 58-year-old logger by trade, "began his political career as an abortion opponent, having grown up in a Catholic family in the socially conservative St. John’s Valley area of Aroostook County," the Portland Press Herald noted last month. The Democrat has talked openly about his transformation on the issue, influenced by conversations with women, doctors, and rights advocates.
In a July opinion piece endorsing Jackson, Andrea Tirrell and Amanda Gavin, University of Maine PhD candidates who have volunteered at Bangor's Mabel Wadsworth Center, a reproductive healthcare nonprofit, wrote for the Press Herald opinion that "his seven-year streak (2018-2024) of 100% ratings from Planned Parenthood shows a track record we can trust."
Appearing on MS NOW's "Morning Joe" last week, Jackson touted that record and called out Collins for her contribution to the Roe reversal, as well as GOP attacks on healthcare access more broadly.
"When Susan Collins was helping overturn Roe v. Wade,” Jackson highlighted, "here in Maine... I co-sponsored one of the most progressive reproductive rights bills in the country—fought incredibly hard for it."
"I was wrong" to oppose abortion rights many years ago, he said. "But I'm very proud of my record over the past decade or more fighting for access across the state."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Critics Demand Full Senate Block Confirmation of 'Trump Crony' Blanche After GOP Advances AG Nomination
"Todd Blanche has one client, and it’s not the American people," said one coalition of advocacy groups.
Aug 04, 2026
Senate Democrats and advocacy groups are making the case for the full Senate to block Todd Blanche from being confirmed as US attorney general after Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee voted to advance his nomination Tuesday along party lines.
Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) said Blanche, currently President Donald Trump's acting attorney general, "has aided and abetted the most corrupt administration in the history of the United States."
Democratic colleagues described Blanche's support for Trump's $1.8 billion "weaponization fund," his neglect of survivors abused by Jeffrey Epstein, and his obstruction of investigations into killings and misconduct by immigration agents, as evidence that he is, in the words of Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), "probably the most discreditable person ever to seek the office of attorney general."
Their criticisms were echoed by anticorruption watchdogs and rights groups, who argued that Blanche, who was previously Trump's personal lawyer, was still acting like it even while serving as Acting Attorney General.
“Senators must urgently do the right thing and block Blanche," said Lisa Gilbert, the president of the watchdog group Public Citizen, who referred to him as a "Trump crony."
"If we make Todd Blanche America’s lawyer at the head of the Justice Department," Gilbert said, "we are accepting a man... who rubberstamped the corrupt IRS deal that Trump made with himself to shield all the Trumps and their businesses, not only from enforcement of any taxes they may have dodged or any fines or payments they may owe to American taxpayers, but from ‘any and all’ related consequences for violating any federal criminal or civil law."
In recent days, Blanche committed to kill the so-called "slush fund" in exchange for support from Republican holdouts like Sens. John Cornyn (Texas) and Thom Tillis (NC).
Gilbert and other co-chairs of the Not Above the Law Coalition—a collective of anticorruption advocacy groups—said that the agreement was "an unenforceable piece of paper that Trump never signed" and have warned that Blanche will revive efforts to pay government funds to Trump supporters, including those who took part in the January 6, 2021 Capitol insurrection, as soon as he is confirmed.
Following Tuesday's vote, Cornyn said that Blanche "gave us the assurances that [the fund] was dead and would not be revived, and in this case we have no alternative but to take his word."
Arisha Hatch, the executive director of the women's organization UltraViolet, said the Republicans who voted for Blanche had also sided against "the majority of the American people, who demand integrity from our elected leaders and want everyone involved in Jeffrey Epstein's network—including those who enabled it—to be held accountable."
Epstein survivors have criticized Blanche for his role in overseeing the DOJ’s highly scrutinized release of files related to his alleged crimes, including the department's exposure of victims’ private information and intimate photos while omitting information that identified prominent associates, including Trump himself.
At the urging of Tillis, Blanche held an hour-long meeting where he met with victims of Epstein's abuse, who said in a letter published Tuesday that he appeared dismissive of their concerns.
"When we met with Todd Blanche, he interrupted us. He told us to 'get to the point.' He told us to report what happened to us to the FBI. We already have," the survivors said. "Some of us have been reporting these crimes for decades. This was a check-the-box meeting designed to secure Senator Tillis' vote."
Maya Wiley, the president of the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, added that Blanche had "pursued baseless claims against civil rights organizations, sought sweeping access to state voter data, permitted a lawless [Immigration and Customs Enforcement]," echoing criticisms about the DOJ’s withholding of evidence from Minnesota prosecutors related to the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti by federal agents.
Republicans control the Senate by a margin of 53-47 and are down a vote with Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) currently absent, meaning that just three defectors could be enough to block Blanche's confirmation, which could come to a vote within days.
"The Senate doesn’t need unanimous courage to block Blanche," said Brett Edkins, managing director for policy and political affairs at the progressive advocacy group Stand Up America. "It needs a few Republicans willing to put country over party.”
Gilbert, Edkins, and the other co-chairs of the Not Above the Law coalition—Praveen Fernandes, vice president of the Constitutional Accountability Center and Kelsey Herbert, campaign director at MoveOn—noted Blanche's own statements that the DOJ, long described as a politically neutral agency, was not independent from the president, and a slip-up during a confirmation hearing during which he referred to himself as Trump's lawyer.
"Todd Blanche has one client, and it’s not the American people," the advocates said. "Committee Republicans just chose not to see it. The full Senate now has the final word, and every senator should use it to reject this nomination.”
Keep ReadingShow Less
'Follow the Money': Senate Report Reveals How Wall Street Banks 'Protected Epstein'
“This report is a ready-made roadmap for prosecutors, investigators, and members of Congress to finally start holding the Epstein class accountable," said Sen. Ron Wyden.
Aug 04, 2026
A yearslong Senate investigation released on Tuesday revealed how some of the world's largest banks allegedly broke federal money laundering laws by failing to stop or promptly report financial transactions that allegedly helped sustain the sex trafficking of children and young women by Jeffrey Epstein, the late billionaire and former friend of President Donald Trump.
Released by Senate Finance Committee Ranking Member Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), "Looking the Other Way" examines "how years of complicity by top officials at multiple Wall Street Banks enabled Jeffrey Epstein to transfer hundreds of millions of dollars around the world to finance his sex trafficking operation."
"Major compliance failures at several Wall Street banks enabled Epstein for years," the publication states. "By failing to report—or choosing not to report—his suspicious financial transactions to federal law enforcement, these banks allowed Epstein to send cash payments and wire transfers to his victims, friends, and collaborators around the world. The bankers who needed to be asking questions didn’t ask them. Jeffrey Epstein’s crimes were hiding in plain sight."
"The investigation found significant evidence that JPMorgan Chase (JPMC), Deutsche Bank, and Bank of America violated federal anti-money laundering laws by failing to screen and report Epstein’s suspicious financial transactions in a timely manner," the report continues.
"A review by Sen. Wyden’s staff of records housed at the US Department of the Treasury as well as internal bank records determined that top executives at major Wall Street banks were aware of Epstein’s suspicious financial activity for years but withheld information from the US government and protected Epstein from federal scrutiny," the publication says.
According to the report:
Wall Street banks looked the other way as Epstein withdrew millions of dollars in cash with no clear business purpose and was party to thousands of suspicious wire transfers worth more than $1 billion. These banks failed to conduct appropriate due diligence on more than $170 million in payments to Epstein from billionaire Leon Black. In fact, documents reviewed during this investigation demonstrate that JPMC’s senior leadership repeatedly protected Epstein as a client despite repeated warnings from internal compliance personnel.
The documents also show that even after JPMC formally terminated Epstein as a client due to human trafficking concerns, the bank still waited years to report his activity to regulators, and top bankers eagerly continued to work with him informally and through other channels where he could continue to be a source of referrals for other ultrawealthy clients.
The three banks were among four financial institutions from which House Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) last year demanded records concerning over $1.5 billion in “suspicious” financial transactions tied to Epstein’s trafficking ring.
“I said from the start that if you want to get to the bottom of the Jeffery Epstein cover-up, you had to follow the money," Wyden said Tuesday in a statement announcing the report's publication.
"My small team of investigators did what Trump’s attorney general and treasury secretary said was impossible: They connected the dots and found evidence of multiple crimes related to Epstein’s associates," the senator continued. "Bank records they reviewed, along with public court filings, detail a shocking pattern of the biggest Wall Street banks in the country choosing to ignore clear evidence of sex trafficking and money laundering, just to keep a wealthy client on the books."
"This report is a ready-made roadmap for prosecutors, investigators, and members of Congress to finally start holding the Epstein class accountable," Wyden added.
That's highly unlikely to happen under the current Republican-controlled Congress. Republicans spent years insisting the Epstein case exposed elite corruption, promising full transparency, and rallying behind Trump's 2024 reelection bid in part because he vowed to release every file.
Trump, former Attorney General Pam Bondi, FBI Director Kash Patel, and others promised transparency. Instead, the Trump administration has missed legal deadlines, released heavily redacted records, and withheld millions of pages in what critics say are violations of the bipartisan Epstein Files Transparency Act. Signed by the president last year, the law compelled the Department of Justice (DOJ) to publish all unclassified Epstein-related records within 30 days and explain every omission to Congress.
Acting US Attorney General Todd Blanche, Trump's former personal attorney, angered many Epstein victims and others by announcing that there was no evidence of a secret client list, by falsely claiming that the DOJ was fully complying with the law, and by meeting with Epstein’s co-conspirator Ghislaine Maxwell in prison shortly before she was suspiciously transferred to a lower-security prison.
The Senate Judiciary Committee voted 12–10 Tuesday along party lines to advance Blanche's nomination to become permanent attorney general, sending it to the full upper chamber for a confirmation vote expected later this week.
As the Trump administration fails to fully comply with the Epstein Files Transparency Act, its authors—Reps. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) and Thomas Massie (R-Ky.)—recently proposed an updated version of the legislation, which strengthens the original by allowing state attorneys general, Epstein victims, members of Congress, and certain prosecutors to sue the DOJ if it fails to release required records.
The business-focused news site Bloomberg sought comment from the three banks. Deutsche Bank declined to respond, JPMC said it began notifying regulators “after the full scope of [Epstein's] crimes became public in 2019," and a spokesperson for Bank of America said that "we take our legal and regulatory responsibilities seriously and, as we have previously said, the bank did not facilitate wrongdoing.”
An attorney for Black told Bloomberg that the report's assertions “outrageous and false.”
Wyden's report came on the same day that The New Republic's Ellie Quinlan Houghtaling revealed that CBS' "60 Minutes" killed its own scoop on Wall Street's long-standing financial ties to Epstein after the network's incoming Trump-aligned boss, Bari Weiss, fired correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi, who led the investigative report. Alfonsi had interviewed Wyden for the segment.
Yep. Earlier this year I was interviewed by Sharyn Alfonsi of 60 Minutes about my Epstein investigation. Subsequently, CBS pulled the segment and fired the reporter. The MAGA buyout of media is aiding the Trump administration’s Epstein cover up.
[image or embed]
— Senator Ron Wyden (@wyden.senate.gov) August 4, 2026 at 7:17 AM
"Yep," Wyden said on Bluesky, confirming his interview with Alfonsi. "The MAGA buyout of media is aiding the Trump administration’s Epstein cover-up."
Keep ReadingShow Less
See More
Most Popular
To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good.
News & Opinion
Trending
Common Dreams, Inc. Founded 1997. Registered 501(c3) Non-Profit
Privacy Policy