Sen. Whitehouse clashes with Todd Blanche over his relationship with Trump: "It takes 2 to collude"

[0:00] Senator Whitehouse. [0:01] Morning, Mr. Blanche. [0:03] Good morning. [0:04] Why won't you tell us what became of the $50,000 in confidential money that the FBI reported that it gave to Tom Homan? [0:17] I'm not aware of what you're speaking about. [0:20] To the extent that there have been public reporting about an investigation, I know nothing about it. [0:25] Well, the public reporting is that the FBI reported giving $50,000 in the nature of a bribe to Tom Homan, and there's been no report of what became of that $50,000. [0:36] Will you answer that question? [0:39] Not now, but will you answer that question? [0:40] We've been asking for a long time now. [0:42] Your department certainly knows what's happening. [0:44] I'm not aware that that's true. [0:48] Well, take a look at it, and it's publicly reported, and the FBI reported it, and you should answer the question. [0:56] That's not the only one. [0:59] Here's a list of unanswered questions that I have just asked. [1:06] I don't know how it is that the chairman thinks that you've cooperated with the committee or that you've been transparent with the committee. [1:15] That is not my experience. [1:17] You said earlier that you welcome our questions. [1:20] Great. [1:21] Answer our questions. [1:22] That's the real point. [1:23] Where we've failed to get answers to our oversight questions, we've actually had to revert to the Freedom of Information Act, the general law of government transparency, to try to get answers from the Department of Justice. [1:39] Here's how we did. [1:43] Not well. [1:43] We have this stack of questions that you haven't answered in the nature of oversight. [1:54] We have this stack of FOIA requests that you haven't answered. [2:00] And I think it's important for us to believe that you actually take seriously your constitutional oversight responsibilities in order to confirm you, [2:13] that you actually take seriously your obligations to this committee, irrespective of party, majority or minority, in order to confirm you. [2:21] So I will ask before we get to a vote on this that you take a look at these and get us answers. [2:27] Where we have had answers, Mr. Blanche, they have not been informative. [2:31] They have been blowoffs. [2:32] So let's move on to Trump versus IRS. [2:42] Our research indicates that senior DOJ officials have never in the history of the Department before faced a judicial inquiry into a fraud on the court participated in by the Department of Justice. [3:00] That was the inquiry opened in Florida. [3:03] The question about fraud on the court committed by the Department of Justice remains open in the judge's decision. [3:11] Here's what she did find. [3:16] She found that the Department of Justice colluded with the Trump plaintiffs. [3:22] That the Department of Justice violated DOJ policies in that collusion. [3:28] That department attorneys were derelict in their responsibilities as DOJ attorneys. [3:34] That the department failed to zealously advocate on behalf of the United States of America, its true client. [3:44] And as I said, the fraud on the court question remains open, an unprecedented allegation about the department. [3:55] As a result of that, the order was transmitted to the New York State Bar for potential disciplinary proceedings. [4:04] I would like to ask, in addition, since this is new news, the decision was, what, two days ago? [4:12] I would like to ask that you say to us that you will be willing to provide all of the documents and communications between the Department of Justice and the Trump plaintiffs in that matter. [4:25] I'm not aware of any communications. [4:28] I didn't have any. [4:29] So if you put a request in, we'll look at it. [4:32] I mean, obviously, that's active, continued litigation in the Southern District of Florida. [4:37] So it depends on. [4:40] Explain how it is active, continued litigation in the District of Florida. [4:45] Well, there's been several indications that the parties of. [4:49] I never entered notice of appearance, but the parties intend to appeal the judge's Monday 56 page decision. [4:58] Well, it'll be interesting. [5:01] Do you intend to appeal the Department of Justice? [5:03] We weren't really even part of that decision. [5:07] So to the extent there's something that we can appeal, I very vigorously will encourage the Department to do so. [5:14] Well, here's the tell. [5:15] In that case, the Department of Justice filed no answer, filed no agreement with respect to the extension of time, [5:26] filed no response to the case or controversy amici, [5:30] filed nothing related to the withdrawal of the complaint, [5:36] filed no settlement, [5:38] and filed no response to the fraud on the court inquiry. [5:43] To me, as a one-time litigator, that looks like really weird behavior. [5:48] And when for the first time in history there's inquiry into fraud upon the court committed by the Department of Justice, [5:54] the silence from the Department in response to that is deafening, Mr. Blanche, deafening. [6:00] And it strikes me that the stratagem here was to file no pleadings to try to keep the Department out of the authority of the court [6:13] when what the Department knew to be a collusive and false enterprise was blown up in that court. [6:23] Now, it didn't work because the court found collusion, and it takes two to collude. [6:29] And they also went on and made the other adverse findings about the Department's conduct. [6:35] And the problem here, Mr. Blanche, is that it's not just that one occasion. [6:40] Between judges appointed by every president harshly criticizing the Department's work in your tenure, [6:48] grand juries rejecting indictments, judicial findings of outright misconduct, [6:53] capable lawyers fleeing the stinking ship, [6:56] this seems to be the most troubled Department of Justice in history. [7:02] Here are some of the misconduct findings against your U.S. attorneys. [7:09] And if I haven't put it up yet, here's a word cloud of the commentary by federal judges about the conduct of your DOJ. [7:19] These are red flag words that when I was a U.S. attorney would have provoked at minimum [7:23] an internal conversation about what the hell went wrong [7:27] and very likely a conversation with O.P.R. and maybe O.P.R. pursuit. [7:34] Words like pretext mean a lot coming from a judge about a government argument, [7:39] usually enjoying the presumption of regularity. [7:43] We need answers. [7:45] I need you to be able to tell me that this kind of misconduct is going to stop if you're confirmed as Attorney General. [7:52] Can you say that? [7:53] The Department of Justice works hard. [7:56] The prosecutors work hard every day. [7:58] And I appreciate the hand-picked words that you have behind you right now, [8:03] but that's not reflective of the 100,000 indictments and informations that have been filed [8:10] to do the work that I talked about earlier today. [8:13] And so while cherry-picking a few isolated words from district court or magistrate judges in certain districts [8:20] is something that you're entitled to do, [8:22] it's absolutely false to suggest that this Department of Justice is not executing as we should [8:28] and doing the right thing every single day. [8:30] I will tell you that you are wrong, that in the history of the department, [8:35] this kind of criticism by federal judges is unprecedented, [8:39] and it comes from judges of every different political persuasion. [8:46] Let me ask about the FBI. [8:53] How long do you intend to put up with that Kash Patel character? [8:57] Are you good with his airplane jaunts? [8:59] Are you confident he's not drinking on the job? [9:01] Are you sure none of his travel is a pretext for vacation activities like snorkeling Olympics and visiting girlfriends? [9:08] Are you sure he knows what he's doing? [9:09] Do you vouch for him? [9:11] Are you willing to look at whether he lied to this committee? [9:14] That's an extraordinarily obnoxious question, Senator, [9:18] and I have full faith in Director Patel and the work that he's doing every day. [9:22] Great. [9:23] You get to own that. [9:26] One last thing, if I may. [9:29] You have refused to exclude January 6 rioters from your anti-weaponization fund. [9:35] You have refused to put in writing that the slush fund is dead. [9:39] Indeed, you signal to allies that payouts are still on track. [9:43] You have vacated seditious conspiracy convictions against members of the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers. [9:49] You hired January 6 writer Jared Wise, who had urged the mob to kill police officers. [9:55] You scrubbed press releases about January 6 prosecutions and called the releases partisan propaganda. [10:02] You denied that Trump encouraged any violence on January 6. [10:07] You've cleaned house of every attorney who worked on a case related to Trump. [10:12] And you've bragged that bringing justice for violent rioters meant that every one of them was either pardoned or had their sentence commuted. [10:19] I hope that our colleagues who are concerned about what happened on January 6 take that into account. [10:25] Thank you. [10:26] Would you like to respond? [10:28] I would. [10:29] Almost everything the senator just said, and he's protected. [10:33] He's allowed to lie. [10:34] But almost everything he just said was absolutely false. [10:38] Okay. [10:38] Starting with the fact that I have never, I have never said that any sort of violence against law enforcement is appropriate. [10:45] I have never said that publicly. [10:46] I have never said that in a speech. [10:48] And I certainly do not believe it. [10:50] I did not hire the person referenced. [10:53] And that is, again, something that just happens not to be true. [10:57] When I talk about what happened with the convicted January 6 defendants, I talk about what President Trump did. [11:05] He had the absolute right to pardon anybody for any reason he sees fit. [11:10] And every one of them got pardoned or commuted. [11:13] I am not celebrating that. [11:14] It is a fact. [11:15] And the fact that my department had to take action in response to those pardons by dismissing some cases is exactly what I have to do under the law, and it's what I did. [11:25] So the narrative that the senator just suggested and put on me as something I believe is absolutely not true. [11:34] Since he accused me of lying personally, Mr. Chairman, let me ask that I put this series of concerns into a question for the record, [11:45] and that you, under oath, one by one, tell me where there's a lie. [11:50] I'm happy to do that. [11:50] We'll get that to you. [11:51] I'm happy to do that.