SerpApi.Org
President Donald Trump is desperately searching for more staff who can help with his ongoing effort to target his foes.
Bloomberg Law reported on Wednesday that the DOJ is quietly recruiting new prosecutors for a public corruption unit working inside the White House itself. Currently, the Justice Department has its own public corruption unit under the Public Integrity Section within the criminal division. It goes after elected and appointed public officials at all levels of government — federal, state, and local — who are suspected of criminal activity.
The new program will be run by non-lawyer Vice President JD Vance under his "National Fraud Enforcement Division." The new White House prosecutors will specifically examine how state politicians and officials are misusing taxpayer dollars. They hope to examine both whether they're participating in the fraud or whether they're ignoring it.
The move will likely escalate investigations into Trump's political enemies, who have increased after his former personal lawyer, Todd Blanche, took over the Justice Department.
Trump has targeted several of his political foes, but thus far, all but one case has struggled to gain traction in court, and one against a Republican foe ended in a plea deal. What continues to fail under the DOJ's efforts are the politically directed wave of investigations and prosecutions as a result of prosecutor misconduct, wrongful appointments, weak legal theories and investigations that look outright political from the start.
“Under this theory that they’re going to go after state officials that are asleep at the wheel, they’re going to have to come up with a good theory of fraud liability to be able to pursue that,” said Ed O’Callaghan, who previously worked in the DOJ under Trump's first administration.
“The Supreme Court has narrowed criminal liability under the theft of honest services approach. There are other corruption statutes that they can look at, but that’s going to be a challenge," he added.
In June, Vance referred Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz (D) and Attorney General Keith Ellison (D) for criminal investigation over alleged failure to address public benefits fraud.
“If state officials in Minnesota or anywhere else in the country facilitated fraud or looked the other way,” Vance said at the time, “they must be held accountable.”
However, his enthusiasm does not appear widespread. A judge quashed the grand jury subpoenas and determined the DOJ was trying to "harass" Minnesota officials over immigration policy debates.
The Public Integrity Section has long been known as an apolitical office operating at the highest ethical standards. There is now a larger concern, the report said, that this new effort will turn it into a partisan-driven unit.
“I can understand why some people would look at the way they’re doing it and think it’s kind of quietly setting up a public corruption task force to target particular states,” O’Callaghan said. “But my sense is that’s not really the intent; it’s to target where the biggest fraud is.”
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