Senate Judiciary Dems have pressing questions for Pam Bondi
They may not be able to stop her confirmation, but Committee Democrats can lay a foundation to later second-guess the GOP for approving Trump’s AG pick under barely little scrutiny.

First Things First
👋🏾 Hi, hey, hello! Welcome back to Once Upon a Hill. By this time next week, Donald Trump will officially be president again. On another note, the Senate is moments away from another procedural vote to bring the Laken Riley Act up for floor consideration. Over 30 Democrats joined all voting Republicans last week to advance debate on the controversial measure. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) reiterated the call of several members of his caucus for a robust amendment process. Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) told Migrant Insider’s Pablo Manríquez this evening that he is “open to that.”
In this evening’s issue, details on the Senate Judiciary Committee Democrats’ strategy to expose the risk of confirming Pam Bondi, President-elect Donald Trump’s second pick to be his attorney general. Bondi is one of over a dozen nominees receiving confirmation hearings this week.
But let’s start with an update on the California wildfires. President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris are meeting with senior administration officials to discuss how federal resources are supporting the state and local response. Biden held similar meetings on Saturday and Sunday afternoon.
The fires have killed at least eight people and spread to more than 23,000 acres, destroying the Pacific Palisades neighborhood of Los Angeles and Malibu, the nearby beach city. As of yesterday morning, more than 24,000 people had registered for the FEMA assistance that was unlocked by a major disaster declaration Biden signed last week. Mis- and disinformation remain challenging for officials attempting to share accurate information and people looking to consume it, as with hurricanes ravishing the southeast US last fall. Republicans have publicly and privately floated attaching conditions to emergency disaster aid in an unfortunate politicization of catastrophe born from the GOP’s belief that the fires are especially devastating because California is a blue state. You’ll hear crickets on this front the next time disaster strikes a red country though.
Before Biden’s latest briefing this afternoon, he gave the final foreign policy speech of his presidency at the State Department, the location of his first address on the topic four years ago. The president made the case that US alliances are stronger under his watch, America’s adversaries are weaker, the nation is better positioned to compete with China, and the defense industrial base has been revitalized. And he did it all while keeping America out of war. This is a legacy that papers over the disastrous withdrawal from the Afghanistan war and the political fallout from the war in Gaza, which critics are quick to note.
The speech is part of Biden’s final week, during which he will give a farewell speech on Wednesday, attend the Department of Defense Commander-in-Chief farewell ceremony with First Lady Dr. Jill Biden on Thursday and speak at the US Conference of Mayors on Friday.
Speaking of legacies, the president surely hopes to be remembered for his administration’s work on canceling student loan debt despite the Republican states and federal courts complicating these efforts almost at every turn. This morning, the Education Department announced that it wiped out the debt of more than 150,000 public servants and borrowers with disabilities, bringing the administration’s final tally to $183.6 billion for more than five million borrowers.
If Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) has her way, Biden will also cement his legacy as the president who stretched the limits of his awesome clemency power. Pressley will host a press conference with Rep. Mary Gay Scanlon (D-Pa.) tomorrow morning on the Hill to call on the president to continue to extend acts of mercy and compassion in the final days of his presidency to address the stain of mass incarceration. Biden has already granted clemency to more than 1,500 people and commuted the death sentences of 37 people on federal death row since last month. Biden also pardoned his son Hunter for all federal offenses committed during a decade-long window, including potential crimes yet to be discovered.
“If President Jimmy Carter’s funeral was a testament to anything, it is that great legacies will live on and get better with time,” a House Democrat told me when I asked what they thought Biden would be remembered for the most. “Biden has been a good man and true servant of the people. I hope he will be remembered for his fight for working people and unions and his willingness to evolve—and sharing the best of Dark Brandon with us.”
The Evening Report
It’s far from an overstatement that President Biden and President-elect Trump view the role of the Justice Department differently. Biden, a former longtime chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, views Main Justice as an independent body exempt from political influence. Trump, a convicted felon who mainstreamed an insidious brand of grievance politics, sees the Justice Department as a tool to settle scores and politicize the civil rights division, the FBI and the Executive Office for Immigration Review, among others, to advance conservative causes and ensure loyalists, instead of career civil servants, are the final decision-makers on key issues.
His success on that front largely depends on whether Pam Bondi, his backup plan for attorney general, is confirmed for the post. Bondi, the former AG of Florida, can clear one of the final hurdles between her and confirmation on Wednesday when she sits for questioning from the Senate Judiciary Committee.
And while Democrats may not be able to prevent her from ultimately assuming the powerful perch as the nation’s top law enforcement official, a committee aide told me Democrats are likely to raise several concerns that could lay the foundation to second-guess later the GOP for approving Bondi under barely little scrutiny.
What’s more appealing to Trump than Bondi’s previous state attorney general experience is her fierce loyalty, media savvy and photogenic appearance. I obtained the questionnaire she submitted to the committee, which detailed a significant history of media appearances across conservative platforms such as Fox News, Newsmax and podcasts, advocating for causes like the opioid crisis in one hit while peddling the Big Lie in the next, a topic a committee aide told me will likely be raised by Democrats.
Committee Democrats are also expected to question Bondi, who prominently campaigned for Trump, represented him at his first impeachment trial and publicly engaged in 2020 election denialism, on how she will conduct herself when the president-elect inevitably expects her to promote his interests even at the expense of her upholding their oath to protect and defend the Constitution.
Bondi reportedly has several conflicts of interest that worry Committee Democrats. In her Senate Judiciary Questionnaire, Ms. Bondi notes that as Chair of the Center for Litigation and Co-Chair of the Center for Law and Justice of the America First Policy Institute, she has provided legal services on behalf of clients as parties and as amici curiae in cases and other legal matters where the United States, its agencies, and officers are or were parties. But Democrats say she failed to recognize her current position as a partner at Ballard Partners, where she completed significant lobbying work for clients that might implicate her role as attorney general, including representing Amazon, Uber and a private prison company.
Another one of Bondi’s clients at Ballard partners was the government of Qatar, a country Senate Republicans have criticized in the past and that reportedly paid Bondi over $100,000 per month to represent the West Asian nation on human trafficking issues ahead of the 2022 World Cup.
Meanwhile, civil-rights-minded committee Democrats are expected to call out Bondi’s record from her time as Florida attorney general, including on LGBTQ+ rights, reproductive rights, police brutality, the death penalty, the Second Amendment, immigration, and First Amendment rights.
In addition to Bondi, former Rep. Doug Collins of Georgia (Secretary of Veterans’ Affairs), Fox News host Pete Hegseth (Secretary of Defense), Gov. Kristi Noem of South Dakota (Secretary of Homeland Security), Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida (Secretary of State), former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe (CIA Director), Fox Business co-host Sean Duffy (Secretary of Transportation), energy business executive Chris Wright (Secretary of Energy), former Deputy Director of the Office of Management and Budget Russell Vought (Budget Director), businessman and former professional athlete Scott Turner (Secretary of Housing and Urban Development), former Rep. Lee Zeldin of New York (Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency) and investor and hedge fund manager Scott Bessent (Secretary of Treasury) will also receive confirmation hearings this week.
Former Gov. Doug Burgum of North Dakota and Trump’s nominee to lead the Department of the Interior is also scheduled for a hearing tomorrow. But Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.), the ranking member of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee and all eight committee Democrats wrote a letter to Chair Mike Lee (R-Utah) requesting he postpone the hearing for at least one week to give members enough time to review the standard financial disclosure report, ethics agreement and additional documents the committee has yet to receive.
The hearing has been postponed until Thursday.
Do you have questions about the new Congress or the incoming Trump presidency? Drop me a line at michael@onceuponahill.com or send me a message below to get in touch and I’ll report back with answers.
Today in Congress
The House is in and will take votes this evening on several bills considered under suspension of the rules.
The Senate is in and is voting to advance debate of the Laken Riley Act.