Donald Trump’s attorney general nominee Pam Bondi, who represented the president during his first impeachment trial, was voted out of the Senate Judiciary Committee Wednesday morning in a party-line, 12-10 vote.
The former Florida attorney general is expected to be confirmed on the Senate floor. Her confirmation hearing earlier this month went fairly smoothly — so much so that Democrats repeatedly attacked Trump’s pick to run the FBI Kash Patel, who was not even in the room and will have his own confirmation hearing Thursday morning.
Democrats have acknowledged Bondi’s qualifications, even as they questioned her role in the effort to overturn the results of the 2020 election and her staunch loyalty to the new president.
“Her record and her testimony showed the American people that she will follow through and enforce the law fairly, without fear or favor,” Senate Judiciary Chair Chuck Grassley, an Iowa Republican, said at the start of the committee meeting. “Several members of this committee characterized Ms. Bondi as an election denier. This is inconsistent with her own statements.”
“It’s absolutely critical that any nominee for the position be committed first and foremost to the Constitution and the American people, not the president and his political agenda,” said ranking member Sen. Dick Durbin, an Illinois Democrat. “Unfortunately, I’m unconvinced that Ms. Bondi shares my belief.”
