U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi made good on her promise to support President Donald Trump’s agenda and swiftly signed a flurry of orders Wednesday that included investigating his legal adversaries.
That includes New York state Attorney General Letitia James and Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg.
One of the 14 memos written by Bondi serves as a direct acknowledgement from the Trump administration of James and Bragg’s role in leveling legal challenges against him during the 2024 presidential campaign.
The document specifies the civil fraud case that James opened against Trump, which resulted in $355 million in fines against him and undercut his claims about his personal wealth and business acumen. Bondi’s memo also references Bragg’s prosecution of Trump through 34 felony counts of falsified business records in attempt to conceal a payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels. Trump did not face major fines or penalties for the felony counts.
The legal battles gave space for the public to consider if Trump — who became the first former American president to be convicted of felony counts because of the hush money trial — was unfit for office because of alleged election interference, sexual misconduct, and fraud. In contrast, Trump and his loyal supporters saw the cases spearheaded by New York lawyers as proof that he was being persecuted by the nation’s judicial systems.
The state’s top lawyers were directly mentioned in one of Bondi’s orders, which called for a newly formed “Weaponization Working Group” to examine “federal cooperation with the weaponization” by James and Bragg, “their respective staffs, and other New York officials to target President Trump, his family, and his businesses.”
The working group’s broader mandate is to review “the activities of all department and agencies exercising civil or criminal enforcement authority of the United States.”
Special Counsel Jack Smith was the only other person to be named by Bondi for allegedly weaponizing the legal system against Trump.
A spokesperson for James said that her office would not comment on Bondi’s memo, while Bragg’s office did not respond to a request for comment.
Since Trump started his second term, James has continued in leading the legal charge against him, but this time regarding his executive orders. The White House has rolled those policies out with rapid speed to immobilize Democrats through a “flood the zone” approach.
In response, James has joined lawsuits blocking Trump’s birthright citizenship ban, challenged his freeze on federal funds, and issued warnings about his policies on gender-affirming health care and immigration.
James made her intentions clear last month while joining with other Democratic prosecutors to speak on Trump’s immigration policies: If Trump violates the law through his agenda, she’d be ready.
“We are not individuals who are the face of resistance,” she said during a Jan. 23 news conference. “When it comes to any violation of the United States Constitution,” she said, “or the rights of vulnerable and marginalized populations, including but not limited to the immigrant communities, we will enforce the law.”
For years, Trump has said prosecutions brought against him, ranging from sexual misconduct to civil fraud, were Democrats’ way of unfairly leveraging the judicial system to undermine and discredit him.
"We must not criminalize dissent or demonize political disagreement, which is what’s been happening in our country lately, at a level that nobody has ever seen before,” Trump said in accepting the GOP presidential nomination last July in Milwaukee. “In that spirit, the Democrat Party should immediately stop weaponizing the justice system and labeling their political opponent as an enemy of democracy. Especially since that is not true. In fact, I am the one saving democracy for the people of our country.”
Trump has not withheld his criticisms of both James and Bragg. He called the civil suit that James launched against Trump a “witch hunt” and called her a “political hack” and racist.
“This is the opposite of fraud,” Trump said of the civil case. “The fraud is her.”
