President Donald Trump fired Attorney General Pam Bondi on Thursday, capping weeks of mounting frustration with her leadership at the Justice Department and escalating tensions over the handling of the Jeffrey Epstein files and politically sensitive prosecutions.
Trump named Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche as her interim replacement.
The decision follows a period in which Trump privately expressed dissatisfaction with what he viewed as a lack of aggression in carrying out his agenda, according to multiple reports this week.
Trump is expected to move quickly to name a replacement and has previously discussed elevating Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin, a close ally who has earned a reputation inside the administration as a reliable executor of the president’s agenda.
Bondi’s ouster comes after she faced months of political pressure tied to the DOJ’s handling of records related to Epstein, an issue she inflamed last year by falsely claiming she had the “Epstein files” on her desk and by inviting conservative influencers to the White House to receive binders full of what turned out to be already public documents. The House oversight committee had subpoenaed Bondi to testify about the department’s actions in the case, with a deposition scheduled for April 14.
The Epstein matter had become a particular source of frustration for Trump, who, according to multiple reports in recent days, had grown increasingly critical of how Bondi managed the matter and the broader political fallout surrounding it.
In the hours leading up to her firing, however, administration-aligned sources pushed back on the notion that Bondi’s position was in jeopardy, underscoring the fluid and at times contradictory nature of the situation.
“This narrative is driven by special interests of people who are not even in the administration,” a DOJ source familiar with the matter told the Washington Examiner just hours before her removal.
A separate source close to the White House was even more blunt, saying Thursday when asked about reports of her removal: “Not happening.”
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Despite those denials, Trump had voiced concerns about the DOJ’s performance in pursuing cases involving what he views as accountability for his political opponents.
The president had also sent mixed public signals about Bondi in the days before her dismissal, calling her “a wonderful person” who was “doing a good job,” even as frustrations mounted behind the scenes.
This is a breaking news story and will be updated.