Global Courant
WASHINGTON –
On his first day as attorney general, Merrick Garland promised a return to what he called Justice Department “standards” and said he would work to eradicate the perception of political interference. But in the two years since taking office, the former federal judge has found himself in the midst of a political storm of historic proportions.
The case against Donald Trump — the first former president to face criminal charges — sparked a wave of protesters at the Miami courthouse last week, as well as an outpouring of Trump social media comments and criticism from Republicans.
The decision to impeach Trump, who is running for president again, may be the most sweeping in Justice Department history. The ultimate call came from Garland, whose attitude leans toward the soft-hearted.
Even on the day prosecutors informed Trump of the allegations, the halls of the stately headquarters of the Justice Department were silent in appearance. That silence continued into the night amid the furor that erupted when the former president broke the news on his social media platform.
It was hardly the first time Garland had kept a poker face while under conspicuous stare. He had remained a mom when his 2016 Supreme Court nomination by President Barack Obama languished long enough to break an age-old record before it expired.
Garland was a judge for 20 years, and that experience seemed to be reflected in his clasped hands and stoic expression as he made his public remarks Wednesday about the charges against Trump. The attorney general stressed that he had adhered to special counsel rules and regulations and scrutinized every word as he defended investigator Jack Smith as a “veteran career prosecutor.”
“We live in a democracy. These kinds of things are adjudicated by the judicial system,” Garland said, answering about three minutes’ worth of questions from two of the assembled reporters at the start of a meeting with US lawyers on violent crimes.
That repeated mantra of commitment to the rule of law has failed to reassure Republicans who stand behind the indicted former president and reframe the charges as unfair political persecution.
Those close to Garland say he has long had a careful, thoughtful presence and does what is necessary, with little outward display of emptiness. Still, this moment probably isn’t easy, said friend Robert Post, a Yale Law School professor who first met Garland when they served together as clerks in the late 1970s.
“I’m sure he’s saddened by the spectacle of a former president being charged with the kinds of crimes Trump is being charged with,” Post said. “He’s the least partisan person I know. He cares about the law first.’
Smith’s appointment as special counsel after Trump announced his 2024 presidential campaign was another effort to uphold Justice Department standards and uphold the principle that the agency follows facts and law, not politics said Anthony Coley, who previously served as Garland’s chief spokesperson on the department. .
“For the Attorney General, the rule of law is not just a lawyer’s pun. For him, the rule of law is a fundamental part of our democracy,” he said.
It was Smith, a former war crimes prosecutor, who stood alone behind a podium the day after the Trump indictment was made public to declare, “We have one set of laws in this country and they apply to everyone.”
That appearance also carried visual cues to Garland and Smith’s divorce.
Smith did not speak from the neoclassical headquarters where Garland works, but held his press conference in the sleek building across town where he works. The special counsel attended the arraignment where Trump pleaded not guilty to illegal hoarding of classified documents. Smith sat in the front row behind his team of prosecutors.
He is empowered to decide whether to press charges, though Garland retains ultimate oversight of his work.
Trump announced on June 8 that he had been charged, and according to the White House, Biden learned through news coverage of the 37 felonies against the former president. Biden was asked the next day if he had spoken to Garland about the matter. “I haven’t spoken to him at all,” Biden told reporters. “I’m not going to talk to him.”
Garland was confirmed by the Senate in March 2021 after a bipartisan vote, with both Democrats and Republicans saying he had the right track record and temperament at the moment. He served as a judge on the federal appeals court for more than two decades after a stint with the Justice Department, where he gained a reputation for his meticulous preparation in the prosecution of the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing that killed 168 people.
Garland’s handling of the release of another special counsel investigation was also low-key. The origin review of the FBI’s 2016 Trump presidential campaign investigation, conducted by Special Counsel John Durham, originally began under Trump. When completed under Garland, the report was released with few redactions.
Trump’s last Attorney General, Bill Barr, took a very different approach with the release of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference in the election and Trump campaign. Barr released his own memo on the report and later held a press conference largely favorable to Trump before making the report public. The episode came during tumultuous years when Trump insisted that his attorney general and the entire Justice Department remain personally loyal to him, undermining his reputation for political independence.
Garland will still have to contend with more findings from special counsel to come. Smith examines Trump’s role in the January 6, 2021, riot at the Capitol and efforts to reverse the 2020 election he lost to Biden.
Garland has appointed a special counsel to investigate the presence of classified documents found in Biden’s Delaware home and former Washington office dating back to his time as vice president.
In announcing that move, Garland used wording identical to Smith’s nomination, words he used again in his brief post-indictment remarks: “independence and accountability.”
