Todd Blanche has fans. Just don’t ask who they are.
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2026/7/15/800070004/news/todd-blanche-has-fans-just-dont-ask-who-they-are/
Todd Blanche has fans. Just don’t ask who they are.
We all know that everybody hates Todd Blanche, President Donald Trump’s favorite lawyer stooge and attorney general pick.
Like, really, really hates. And they’re not shy about saying so.
In fact, 101 former state and federal judges signed a bar complaint against him, and 1,200 Justice Department alumni sent a letter asking the Senate not to confirm him.
But wait! Aren’t there people who love, love, love Blanch? Sure, but they seem to want to keep it on the down low, which isn’t really a sign of full-throated endorsement, is it?
So you should take The Federalist’s recent piece with a grain of salt, as it claims that 77 former DOJ officials sent a letter urging the Senate to confirm Blanche—with no link to the alleged letter. Apparently, it goes to another school … in Canada.
So unlike the 1,200 who put their name on the letter urging the Senate to toss Todd, these 77 people who apparently love him aren’t actually bold enough to say so.
Instead, The Federalist names just four people: Gary Barnett, former acting chief of staff and senior counselor to the attorney general; Ketan Bhirud, former associate deputy attorney general; Rachel Bissex, former deputy chief of staff and counselor to the attorney general; and Jonathan D. Brightbill, former acting assistant attorney general.
Gosh, such recognizable and important names! Seriously, who are these people?
Well, it was probably easy to get both Barnett and Brightbill on board since they already signed a letter urging senators to support a different sleazy Trump lawyer who ascended to the DOJ, Emil Bove, when Trump tapped him for a lifetime seat on the Third Circuit Court of Appeals.
And Bissex was a “White House liaison” during the first Trump administration, so there’s no doubt that she is also very ethical and impartial.
Fox News is also hyping Blanche, saying that he “racks up massive support.”
Per Fox, GOP Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa provided information on everyone who wants the most corrupt lawyer imaginable to be attorney general. But like The Federalist piece, it doesn’t appear to provide any links, and there are no details about it on Grassley’s official news feed.
But, gosh, how could you argue with the massive support of “670,000 sworn officers, 300 angel families, families who lost a loved one to crimes committed by undocumented immigrants and 100 bipartisan U.S. attorneys and DOJ officials”?
Still no names—just spokespeople for various organizations, like one that pretends that illegal immigrants are murdering everyone.
There’s also one from the National Fraternal Order of Police, which boasts more than 300,000 members. But most law enforcement officers are employed at the state and local level, so this is just boasting that a bunch of cops like Blanche.
Then there’s a “group of 78 former DOJ officials,” none of whom are actually named.
Look, I get it. I wouldn’t want my name on something supporting Blanche either.
The “massive support” for Blanche is basically about what a great crimefighter he is and how he imprisons imaginary gang members or whatever, but it completely skips over how he’s behaved in the most unethical manner possible, been called out by courts, deliberately blocked the release of the Epstein files, and turned the DOJ into Trump’s personal law firm.
To be perfectly fair to the tens of people rushing the barricades to defend the honor of Todd Blanche, none of those things are bugs; they’re features.
So on the one hand, we have secret support from people ashamed to make their names public, and on the other, we have public, repeated, full-throated denunciations of Blanche—complete with everyone’s government names.
It’s pretty clear what should be given more weight, but that would require Judiciary Committee Republicans to do their jobs—and that’s something they haven’t really been keen on doing, instead just rubber-stamping the very worst Trump appointees.
We’ll have to wait and see if that includes Blanche.
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