Sheldon Whitehouse: “I sit on the Judiciary Committee and was present for the confirmation hearing of Pam Bondi in her quest to be Attorney…”

“I sit on the Judiciary Committee and was present for the confirmation hearing of Pam Bondi in her quest to be Attorney General of the United States. I have to say that there is a lot to admire. She had been a competent prosecutor for many years. She was the twice-elected attorney general of a major State. And she said a lot of the right things about independence of the Department and rule of law. What I couldn't get over was how things changed when she got to a topic that would have been sensitive to Donald Trump--something that would have gotten Donald Trump all twitchy. When she hit those topics, it was like, watching the plane fly into the Bermuda Triangle and all the navs and coms go crazy. She couldn't say obvious things--things like: Did President Biden win the 2020 election? That is an easy answer: Yes, he did, sir--or ma'am. Super simple. When she can't say that, that is a sign. When she told us that there had been a peaceful transfer of power--a roomful of Senators who have had to flee this Chamber because of the violence of January 6 and go and shelter in a secret location, and she had to tell us that there had been a peaceful transfer of power. Again, haywire. No predication, she said. She couldn't say there was no predication to go after somebody like Liz Cheney or Jack Smith. Predication is the key to being able to opening a case like that.…”