Updated October 7, 2025 at 4:34 PM CDT
Attorney General Pam Bondi faced sharp questions from Democrats over mounting concerns that the Justice Department under her leadership is being weaponized to go after President Trump's perceived political enemies.
During a more than four-hour hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee Tuesday that often turned combative, Bondi defended her work at the helm of the Justice Department, rejecting allegations that its investigations and prosecutions — including the recent indictment of former FBI Director James Comey — are driven by politics.
"I took office with two main goals: to end the weaponization of justice and return the department to its core mission of fighting violent crime," Bondi told lawmakers. "While there is more work to do, I believe in eight short months we have made tremendous progress towards those ends."
The Justice Department has undergone enormous change since Bondi took charge.
During her tenure, career prosecutors who worked Capitol riot cases or investigated Trump have been pushed out or fired, as have senior officials at the FBI. The section that investigates public corruption has been gutted, while the bureau's premier public corruption unit has been disbanded.
And the department has opened investigations into some of Trump's most vocal critics, and dropped prosecutions of his allies.
Lawmakers broke on party lines in their views on the direction the department has taken under the Trump administration. Democrats sought to zero in on the turmoil and the departure from department traditions and norms to highlight what they say is the dangerous direction Bondi is taking the DOJ.
"Our nation's top law enforcement agency has become a shield for the president and his political allies when they engage in misconduct," said Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin, the committee's top Democrat.
"In eight short months, you fundamentally transformed the Justice Department and left an enormous stain on American history. It will take decades to recover."
Republicans, in contrast, argued that the department was in fact weaponized by the Biden administration against Trump and conservatives more broadly. And they said Bondi was cleaning up the mess they left behind.
"Focusing on crime and getting tough on criminals is a welcome change from four years of Biden administration soft-on-crime policies," the panel's top Republican, Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley said.
He pointed to information he said he and other lawmakers have obtained that shows the FBI in 2023 analyzed phone data of more than a half dozen Republican lawmakers, including members of the Judiciary Committee, as part of the investigation into Trump's efforts to overturn the 2020 election.
"Can you tell me why my phone records were sought by the Jack Smith agents?" Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said, referring to the special counsel who investigated Trump.
Grassley, meanwhile, called it an "outrage" and an "unconstitutional breach," and called on Bondi and FBI Director Kash Patel to address the matter. Several Republicans called for Bondi to appoint a special counsel to investigate.
Democrats press Bondi on Comey indictment
Democrats tried to press Bondi on their concerns that she's turned the department into a tool in Trump's promised campaign of vengeance on his perceived enemies.
They pointed to the decision to indict Comey less than two weeks ago following public demands from the president to do so.
Comey, who faces one count of making false statements and one count of obstruction of justice stemming from congressional testimony in 2020, is scheduled to be arraigned Wednesday in federal court in Alexandria, Va.
The indictment — and the machinations that led to it — are the latest, and arguably most concerning, example of what many legal observers point to as the politicization and weaponization of the department under Bondi.
Traditionally, the Justice Department enjoys a degree of independence from the White House, particularly in investigations and prosecutions to insulate them from partisan politics.
But critics say that firewall has been bulldozed since Trump returned to office and put Bondi and other loyalists in top DOJ jobs. Last month, Trump openly directed Bondi to go after his perceived political adversaries, including New York Attorney General Letitia James, California Democratic Sen. Adam Schiff of California, a Senate Judiciary Committee member, and Comey.
"We can't delay any longer, it's killing our reputation and credibility," Trump said in a social media post, addressing the directive to "Pam." Adding, "JUSTICE MUST BE SERVED, NOW!!!"
When asked by Sen. Mazie Hirono, D-Hawaii, whether Bondi was "the Pam that the president was referring to," Bondi replied, "I'm sure I was."
"It's very clear to me that when the president posts something like that, that he considers the DOJ to be his law firm, and you his lawyer," Hirono said.
"President Trump is the most transparent president in American history, and I don't think he said anything that he hasn't said for years," Bondi replied.
Shortly before Trump's post on Truth Social addressed to Bondi, the president pushed out the top federal prosecutor in the Eastern District of Virginia, Erik Siebert, a career prosecutor Trump tapped for the role earlier this year. Siebert's office was leading investigations into both James and Comey, and Siebert had expressed concerns about the strength of the evidence in both cases.
Trump then installed Lindsey Halligan, a former insurance attorney and White House aide with no prosecutorial experience, as U.S. attorney to replace Siebert. She sought and secured an indictment against Comey, overruling career prosecutors who questioned the strength of the case.
Minnesota Democrat Amy Klobuchar asked Bondi about the promise she made at her confirmation hearing to keep the department independent and keep politics out of prosecutions.
"I absolutely have upheld that commitment, senator. I pledged that I would end the weaponization also, of the Justice Department, and that America would once again have a one-tier system of justice for all, and that is what we are doing in this country."
Bondi also pushes back when asked for answers about the border czar
Throughout Tuesday's hearing, Bondi was asked about the decision to close a federal probe into White House border czar Tom Homan, and sidestepped questions about reports that he accepted $50,000 in cash from an undercover FBI agent.
In response, Bondi told lawmakers that FBI and DOJ prosecutors conducted a "full review" of Homan's case and "found no credible evidence of any wrongdoing," but directed questions to Patel.
When asked by Schiff whether she would support the request by Democratic lawmakers to make public any recordings of Homan allegedly accepting the cash, the exchange grew heated. Bondi responded by asking Schiff: "Will you apologize to Donald Trump for trying to impeach him?" Schiff led the first Trump impeachment inquiry.
The exchange was one of several moments where Bondi took aim at a specific Democratic lawmaker instead of providing substantive answers to their questions.
Schiff ticked off a list of topics that he said Bondi had refused to answer, including questions related to the Comey indictment, the administration's handling of the Epstein files, the decision to pardon Jan. 6 rioters and the administration's military strikes on suspected drug boats in the Caribbean.
"These are just some of the questions you've refused to answer — or answered with personal attacks on members of this committee," Schiff said.
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