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President-elect Donald Trump final week introduced the nomination of Florida’s former lawyer basic, Pam Bondi, to go up the Justice Division, touching off a flurry of hypothesis as to how Bondi, a longtime prosecutor and shut ally of Trump, may lead the division.
Former colleagues who knew her finest throughout her time as a Florida prosecutor, together with a Democrat opponent for state lawyer basic who she later tapped to be her drug czar, described Bondi in a sequence of interviews as an skilled litigator whose management model is extra consensus-builder than bridge-burner and whose tenure might generate much less friction amongst rank-and-file profession workers on the Justice Division than early critics may worry.
If confirmed, these near Bondi advised Fox Information Digital that she is going to probably espouse lots of the identical priorities she did in her years as a prosecutor in Florida, primarily in cracking down on drug trafficking, illicit fentanyl imports and in working a Justice Division that enforces honest remedy of each political and profession appointees alike.
“From a lawyer’s standpoint, this lady is aware of how one can be a lawyer and a trial lawyer,” Nicholas Cox, Florida’s statewide prosecutor, advised Fox Information Digital of Bondi’s report. “There’s simply not a query about it.”
Listed here are a number of the methods her time in Florida might inform her tenure as lawyer basic.
President-elect Donald Trump and nominee for AG Pam Bondi (AP | Getty)
Drug crackdown:
In Florida, Bondi rapidly earned a repute for cracking down on opioids and the numerous “tablet mills” working within the Sunshine State when she was elected because the state’s lawyer basic in 2010. On the time, Florida “was the epicenter of the opioid disaster,” Florida statewide prosecutor Nicholas Cox stated in an interview.
It was additionally a hub for so-called drug tourism: Out-of-state residents traveled to Florida from throughout the nation to buy opioids in bulk, counting on the state’s many-house pharmacies, “cash-only” clinics and a scarcity of statewide prescribing legal guidelines to buy the addictive drugs, largely with out restriction.
When Bondi took workplace, opioids have been killing round seven folks every day, Dave Aronberg, the state lawyer for Palm Seashore County, who previously served as Bondi’s drug czar, stated in an interview.
There have been additionally “extra ache clinics than McDonald’s places” in Florida on the time, he stated, illustrating the magnitude of the issue.
Aronberg, a Democrat who ran in opposition to Bondi for lawyer basic in 2010 earlier than she appointed him to the submit, credit his former boss as being the particular person “most answerable for ridding the state of Florida of damaging tablet mills.”
He and others level to Bondi’s push for laws that helped eradicate tablet mills within the state, her crackdown on docs and clinics answerable for prescribing the ache capsules en masse, and her work in imposing Florida’s “Statewide Prescription Drug Diversion and Abuse Street Map” to finest coordinate federal, state and native efforts as serving to finish the disaster.
Later, she served in Trump’s first presidential time period as a member of his Opioid and Drug Abuse Fee.
If confirmed as U.S. lawyer basic, Bondi has made clear she plans to stay targeted on drug trafficking points, together with cracking down on drug cartels, trafficking and extra.
Now, these folks advised Fox Information Digital they anticipate Bondi will carry the identical playbook to Washington as lawyer basic, this time with an eye fixed to drug trafficking and illicit fentanyl use.
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Florida Lawyer Common Pam Bondi shows a courtroom order granting Trump’s marketing campaign extra entry to vote counting operations in Philadelphia. (AP Photograph/Matt Slocum)
Working throughout the aisle:
Bondi has spent years as a prosecutor in Florida, first as a prosecutor within the Hillsborough County State Lawyer’s Workplace earlier than being elected in 2010 because the state’s lawyer basic.
Cox, the Florida state prosecutor, famous that Bondi’s profession was additionally closely formed by her 18 years working within the Florida District Lawyer’s Workplace, a profession place that was not knowledgeable by politics.
“All of us labored collectively, and it made for a extremely robust legal justice system,” Cox stated.
Aronberg echoed this evaluation.
In Florida, Bondi “was not seen as a really partisan particular person,” he stated, citing her “robust working relationship with Democrats,” which continued even after being sworn in as state lawyer basic.
“She would assist laws no matter whether or not it was supported by Democrats or Republicans,” Aronberg stated, and in return, she was well-liked throughout the aisle.
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Pam Bondi (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Name through Getty Pictures)
TRUMP ‘ENEMIES’
In saying Bondi as his nomination for lawyer basic, Trump once more took goal on the Justice Division, which he characterised as being “weaponized” in opposition to him.
“Pam will refocus the DOJ to its supposed objective of preventing Crime, and Making America Protected Once more,” Trump stated within the assertion.
However these near Bondi stated they don’t consider her as a very political particular person, saying they imagine the numerous years she spent as a litigator and state lawyer basic will assist her deftly navigate the distinctive political pressures within the position, together with Trump’s calls to go after his so-called “enemies” throughout the Division of Justice.
Although Bondi herself has echoed calls to “examine the investigators” concerned within the particular counsel investigations into Donald Trump, former colleagues stated they assume she has realized from former Justice Division leaders earlier than her, together with former Lawyer Common Invoice Barr and former Particular Counsel John Durham, who was tapped by Barr to analyze alleged misconduct within the Trump-Russia probe.
“I’ve advised my Democratic mates to not overreact as a result of we’ve got been by way of this earlier than,” Aronberg stated, citing the particular counsel probe led by Durham.
Within the subsequent 4 years, he stated, “I feel we are going to see extra of that.”
However Aronberg sees a distinction between Bondi and others, together with Trump’s former lawyer basic nominee, Matt Gaetz.
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Bondi “shouldn’t be going to burn the home down,” Aronberg stated. “She’s not going to fabricate proof as a method to stroll Trump’s enemies out in handcuffs.”
Breanne Deppisch is a politics reporter for Fox Information Digital masking the 2024 election and different nationwide information.
As Florida’s high prosecutor, Pam Bondi cracked down on drug trafficking, pi
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