Interim AG named after Trump confirms Pam Bondi ousted

[0:00] All right, let's get straight to the White House again. Peter Doocy is standing by. [0:04] Peter, what are you hearing was the main frustration of President Trump's when it [0:08] came to Pam Bondi, obviously making it very clear that the relationship was still intact, [0:13] but he no longer wanted her to run the place. [0:17] Sandra, I can tell you that I phoned President Trump to ask him once these reports started [0:22] coming out that the attorney general had been told that her time, it was nearing the end of [0:28] her time at the Justice Department, and the president said he was preparing some remarks. [0:32] We think that it is going to be the official announcement about the attorney general Bondi [0:37] leaving the Justice Department. She will not be leaving the administration. [0:42] They are going to find a different job for her. So President Trump thinks that she did a good job. [0:47] President Trump still likes her, but at the time, at this time, he feels like Todd Blanche [0:54] should be elevated in an interim role. [0:57] So thank you. [0:58] The plan, at least as of the last couple of minutes, and a lot of things are changing, [1:02] is to name Todd Blanche in an interim role as the country's top law enforcement officer [1:10] running the Justice Department. We are hearing a lot of different things about why this might [1:18] happen. We think President Trump will elaborate on that more. But when you talk to people here [1:22] at the White House, it is very important to them just to reiterate that there's not bad blood right [1:28] now. [1:28] With Bondi leaving. And we know that she was in the front row at the president's remarks last [1:35] night during his address to the nation. So she is somebody that he still wants to have around, [1:41] but he wants Todd Blanche, who has been with the president during some of the hardest times of his [1:47] political life, when he was dealing with all these many, many lawsuits during the four years in [1:52] between his first term and his second term. Todd Blanche was right there with them, fighting on [1:58] the president's defense. [1:58] Legal defense. And now Todd Blanche gets a crack, at least temporarily, as the attorney general of [2:06] the United States. Peter, we were just showing the video, a reminder to our viewers yesterday, [2:10] when the president appeared at the Supreme Court to hear the government's arguments. [2:15] In his case, he arrived with Pam Bondi. Yeah, I wonder what they talked about in the car, [2:23] because that was just more than 24 hours ago. And again, it seems like she, [2:30] she and the president still have a good relationship, but she will no longer be his [2:36] attorney general. Yeah, and I know certainly just in the last few days, President Trump has praised [2:39] her and said, Attorney General Pam Bondi, he said, is a wonderful person and she is doing [2:43] a great job. So certainly still support for her there. When you look back at her time as attorney [2:49] general, what sort of stands out to you? You know, she is somebody who was pretty much in [2:57] lockstep with President Trump on just about all of his legal priorities, but she wound up, [3:02] you know, taking as much incoming as anybody from congressional Democrats. Every time that [3:10] they would haul her before Congress for whatever the issue was, it seemed like she had to be the [3:15] one that was taking the most incoming. And she never really deviated from the line that folks [3:21] here at the White House were using. But it just, they want to shake things up. And we expect to [3:28] hear some specifics about why they want to shake things up. [3:32] But all that we know at this moment is that the president feels like it is time. [3:38] Yeah. And that he informed her last night before the speech. So, Peter, you can obviously hear [3:43] the media fired up on all sides of you there at the White House. Is the Todd Blanchie an interim [3:50] replacement? Obviously, he's the deputy AG. Or will he step in for the time being? Or is that, [3:56] do you think, a full-time replacement for Bondi? I am told that Todd is going to be the temporary [4:03] replacement, the interim replacement. There are some names that are out there. The New York Times [4:07] is reporting that Lee Zeldin has talked to the president about the possibility. We know that [4:11] there are also a bunch of former state attorney generals who are serving as Republicans in the [4:17] Senate right now. We don't know how seriously President Trump would look at any of them. Or [4:22] if there's somebody from outside the administration, not an elected lawmaker, [4:26] who the president might like for this. But it is an important job. And the president's going to have [4:34] a lot of time because he is elevating Todd Blanchie, somebody that he has known for a long time, [4:37] somebody that he really trusts, at least temporarily. And as for what comes next for [4:42] Bondi, we don't know. But she's not just going home to Florida. She is going to have some other [4:48] job within the administration. We don't know what that is. And we don't know if she knows [4:52] what that is. Because this is all happening just in the last couple of minutes. [4:57] Looks like we're getting a little bit more color on the situation through our reporter, Aisha Hassi, [5:04] she says she just spoke with Bondi before you broke the news, Peter. She said she's working [5:09] right now in Florida filming a child ID kit for abducted children with the NFL. She flew into [5:15] Tampa this morning and went straight to work. They will share those pictures soon, but no specific [5:20] comment on the firing. So we'll see what comes from the president here shortly. Peter, stand by [5:27] with us on the breaking news. Yeah, thanks, Peter. And for now, let's go to Fox News justice [5:32] correspondent David Spunt. Hi, David, what have you heard? [5:34] Well, we knew that Pam Bondi, the former attorney general, was on thin ice for a long time with this [5:40] administration, though she has a personal close relationship with President Trump. She's known [5:45] him for years. She was the attorney general in the state of Florida. He's a resident of Florida. [5:51] She was his attorney during his impeachment trial in the Senate during his first term. So President [5:57] Trump and Pam Bondi have a good personal relationship. But we know administration [6:02] officials were not happy with the way [6:04] the Epstein files were handled. This is something that has really hurt the attorney general since [6:10] she came into office in February of 2025. Just some history there. She comes into office February [6:16] 2025. And then a few weeks later, in an interview with John Roberts, I believe it was during this [6:21] hour on Fox News, with John and Sandra said the Epstein files were on her desk or the files were [6:27] on her desk when she was asked about the Epstein files. She later clarified and said that she meant [6:32] the JFK files, the RFK files, the Markup files, the Epstein files. And she said that she was [6:34] interested in the Martin Luther King files, as well as the Epstein files. But there were so many [6:38] more questions just about the overall handling of the Justice Department dealing with the Epstein [6:46] files. And the Epstein files story really never went away from Attorney General Bondi. Over the [6:51] summer, DOJ put out a release, and they said that there would be nothing further warranted from the [6:57] Epstein files. No charges would be filed. The case is essentially closed. And then Deputy Attorney [7:02] General now, I guess we could call him Interim Attorney General Bondi, is now in office. And [7:05] then Deputy Attorney General Bondi, is now in office. And then Deputy Attorney General Bondi, [7:07] a former former U.S. Attorney General, met with Ghislaine Maxwell, Jeffrey Epstein's former [7:15] girlfriend and co-conspirator, convicted co-conspirator. So the story never fully went away. [7:21] In fact, Bondi was supposed to testify before Congress in a deposition about Epstein on April [7:28] 14th in just a couple of weeks. So she clearly will no longer have to do that. The video on the other [7:33] side of the screen as I look right there, that was her on St. Patrick's Day, March 17th. That's after coming out of a [7:35] of a closed-door briefing with members of the House to talk about the Epstein files. [7:40] But members of Congress, they were not satisfied with the answers they were getting from the [7:45] administration. [7:46] And Bondi ultimately had to answer those questions when she came out and would have had to answer [7:53] during a deposition. [7:54] Guys? [7:55] NICK SCHIFRIN David Spunt, thanks so much, David. [7:57] We appreciate it. [7:58] DAVID SPUNT All right, let's bring in our chief legal [8:00] correspondent and host of FOX News Sunday, Shannon Bream, is here on the breaking news [8:03] as well. [8:04] She joins us by phone. [8:05] Shannon, your thoughts as we learn more details. [8:07] SHANNON BREAM Yeah, guys, I think that there had been such [8:10] pressure on the attorney general on so many different fronts to deliver for the president. [8:14] As David referenced these things, there were a lot of promises coming in about the RFK [8:20] or JFK files, about Martin Luther King Jr. files, about Epstein. [8:24] And there was so much pressure that some folks thought she got ahead of what they were able [8:28] to deliver at the DOJ, that there were times that there were promises that leveled a lot [8:34] of expectations. [8:35] And the president had his own expectations. [8:37] We remember the odd tweet that went out that many people believed was supposed to be a [8:41] direct message to her, asking about possible cases involving possible political rivals [8:48] or settling scores, those kinds of things. [8:50] And the president clearly wanting her to be aggressive on a number of fronts. [8:54] And maybe that's why some of the promises that she made felt like they were getting [8:57] ahead of what DOJ was able to deliver. [8:59] But she's got a long, deep experience in Florida as attorney general there and is being [9:05] known as a very effective prosecutor, but also just very loyal to President Trump. [9:10] And it may have been at some point that, you know, the selection this time around with [9:14] a lot of his closest circle was a lot about loyalty. [9:18] The first time around, he trusted other people. [9:20] He trusted the experience and the recommendations. [9:22] He wanted people around him like Pam Bondi, who he trusted to have his back. [9:27] But I think he felt so much pressure on so many fronts to deliver and felt like she hadn't [9:31] done it. [9:32] And maybe this is a time where you look at your poll numbers and you say, that's not [9:34] going to happen. [9:35] How do I shake things up? [9:36] Shannon, so Todd Blanche is taking over in an interim position. [9:40] What do we know about him? [9:41] What do you think? [9:42] How different might he be moving forward? [9:44] Well, listen, he is a tough litigator, too, and he's been close to the president [9:48] litigating a number of issues very important to the president in his private life and in [9:54] other places before he joined the DOJ. [9:57] He's also someone seen as very hard charging, very loyal to the president, somebody who [10:02] may have different experience than the outgoing Attorney General Pam Bondi when it comes to [10:06] litigation and the ways that he's been linked to the president's legal efforts. [10:11] He's definitely a President Trump loyalist. [10:13] There's no doubt about that. [10:14] So he may pick up this mantle with some tougher investigations and different probing than [10:20] maybe Attorney General Bondi had done in a way that I think the president definitely [10:24] trusts him. [10:25] And so we'll have to see his vetting process now. [10:28] What do you think was the final straw here as we wait to hear directly from President [10:32] Trump about this ousting? [10:33] I mean, that's a great question. [10:35] Attorney General Bondi is a great person. [10:36] He's a great person. [10:36] Attorney General Bondi has been in a number of these very heated Capitol Hill hearings. [10:41] David talked about this, too. [10:43] And there were times when there's a lot of pressure on those close to the president when [10:47] they go to the Hill and they start coming under this really tough questioning. [10:51] And the president is watching. [10:53] That's really your audience. [10:54] And you want to know that you are performing to the levels that he's going to be happy [10:58] with the way that you handle things. [10:59] And she got a lot of praise from MAGA World for being very combative and being able to [11:03] stand up and take the incoming and those kinds of things in these hearings. [11:05] But there's always a lot of reflection after they're there and they're on the Hill. [11:11] How did they perform? [11:12] How did they do defending the president's policies? [11:15] And we know the president had been asking his inner circle in recent days about her [11:19] and possibly some other people within the administration. [11:22] Was it time for a change? [11:23] Sort of taking the pulse of people around him. [11:26] And once he does that, many times it turns into an exit path for somebody that he thinks [11:31] may need a change. [11:32] But she's been incredibly loyal to him. [11:33] And I would imagine that he's going to do that. [11:34] I think that's a great thing. [11:35] I think it's going to be very complimentary to her and maybe like Secretary Noem finds [11:41] another position for her that he may be able to say is a better match. [11:45] And I suppose, you know, a few weeks ago, Kristi Noem, you know, we moved on and now [11:50] Pam Bondi and some talk perhaps about Tulsi Gabbard at some point. [11:53] Do you think it's a sort of a redirection, perhaps, you know, heading into the midterms? [11:56] Do you think President Trump is looking ahead? [11:57] Yeah, Ben, I think that's a great question, especially when the polling has been really [12:01] tough on a number of issues, not only on including the war and the economy. [12:06] All of those things that people are feeling the daily effects when they go to the gas [12:11] pump, when they go to the grocery store, those things weigh on any midterm election. [12:14] They always almost always end up in a severe punishment for the current sitting president. [12:20] But I think when he looks around at some of these other things that are bubbling there [12:23] as well, including his overall approval rating, he may feel like, all right, if I'm going [12:28] to do this, this is the time for a reset. [12:30] If he's lacking confidence in some particular policy or person carrying out that policy, [12:34] you know, the midterms are getting closer. [12:35] Right. [12:36] They're getting closer every day. [12:37] And there's only so much time to show that you're going to do a pivot, make a big change. [12:42] And that may have been weighing on his mind. [12:45] You know, you're reminded, as we did a moment ago with Peter Doocy, Shannon, that we just [12:50] saw her yesterday alongside the president as they appeared together at the Supreme Court. [12:55] Yeah, I mean, I was sitting there. [12:58] I saw them and everybody looked very chummy. [13:00] It was her along with Secretary Letnick sitting with the president. [13:03] Very dialed in. [13:04] Obviously, this first right citizenship, a huge issue for the president. [13:07] One of his first executive orders, a very big issue for him legally. [13:12] For him to show up as the first sitting president telegraphed a lot of weight on this argument [13:18] yesterday. [13:19] And so they were sitting there together, clearly, as his top law enforcement officer, as the [13:23] attorney general. [13:24] She was a part of that A-list bench that was there together. [13:28] And they looked very chummy. [13:30] At one point, there was actually some passing of notes. [13:33] And you wouldn't have, from seeing them together in court yesterday, imagine that there was [13:37] something. [13:37] That was something that could have happened. [13:38] That was something that could have happened. [13:40] So, you know, it was very, very important to see that. [13:41] And you know, we've heard the case is very close to being in the offing. [13:42] We've heard the name Lee's Elden perhaps suggested as a possible full term replacement. [13:44] What do you think Lee's Elden? [13:45] What role would he play? [13:46] How different would he be? [13:48] Well, listen, he's also a very experienced lawyer, too, and has had all kinds of different [13:53] things in his background. [13:54] As EPA administrator, he's tackled regulatory bottlenecks and all kinds of different things. [13:59] He's somebody, again, that the President very much trusts. [14:01] He's a loyalist to President Trump, but an experienced attorney as well. [14:05] And, you know, they're all going to have their different ways that they tackle the issue. [14:07] different ways that they tackle this particular list of to-do things within the DOJ. But gosh, [14:13] the DOJ is endlessly busy. Not only is the administration being sued on so many fronts [14:19] in a way that has just exploded during the first and second Trump administrations, [14:24] going to court seems to be the very popular way to go after the president's policies. And they [14:29] know that. A lot of the policies that they've launched, they did so knowing it would go to a [14:33] legal challenge. And they want that answer on the boundaries of the president's executive power. [14:37] So there's a lot of incoming, but there's a lot of outgoing as well with the DOJ litigation with [14:43] respect to different states, their policies with respect to transgender policies, educational [14:49] higher ed institutions. So it is an all-encompassing job, this role of attorney general that is [14:56] balancing so many fires essentially to handle and to put out at one time that whoever steps [15:02] into this job permanently. [15:03] It's going to be exceptionally busy. [15:06] All right, Shannon, I'm sure we're going to get a lot more detail here in the coming moments, [15:10] either directly from the president or his team at the White House. It appears that our reporters, [15:16] David Spunt and Ayesha Hosni, are saying that they still haven't gotten Bondi herself to [15:20] acknowledge that she has been ousted or even comment about it. So we'll also wait to hear [15:27] directly from her as well. Shannon, thank you very much. [15:30] Be sure to like and subscribe for all the Fox News [15:34] latest. [15:34] On YouTube and catch full shows streaming now on Fox One.