Concerns Regarding the Nomination of Todd Blanche for Attorney General
Confirmation vote postponed to July 30
By Denise Rivette
The Senate Judiciary Committee (SJC) rescheduled the vote on advancing Todd Blanche’s nomination for U.S. Attorney General to July 30, 2026, at 9:00 a.m. after too many Republicans didn’t show up on Thursday, July 23, for the vote, which Senator and Chair of the Committe, Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, described as rude. The SJC consists of 21 members, 11 Republicans and 10 Democrats. Blanche’s nomination needs every Republican vote to advance from the Senate Judiciary Committee to a full floor vote.
The SJC heard testimony from and questioned Todd Blanche for approximately five hours on July 15 followed the next day by several hours of additional testimony from others.
Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina stated he would not vote for confirmation until Blanche met with survivors. Blanche scheduled a meeting within hours; however, survivors called the July 16 meeting an insufficient, “box-checking exercise” in a letter sent to Republican Sens. Tillis and John Cornyn of Texas (see below). Cornyn and Tillis have still not committed to voting for Blanche’s confirmation.
Ashley Murray, reported for States Newsroom:
Grassley praised the selection of Blanche and said the Justice Department under his leadership as deputy and acting attorney general “has protected Americans at every turn,” but that committee Democrats “like clockwork, sought to defame him.”
Democratic committee member Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey led a forum Wednesday featuring former Department of Justice officials and a survivor of abuse by the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and co-conspirator Ghislaine Maxwell.
There were many hours of testimony and questioning in the Todd Blanche confirmation hearings including victims and former members of the DOJ.
The concerns about Blanche’s nomination for head of the DOJ are summmarized in Liz Oyer’s statement; a 31-minute video (below) Oyer did with Dani Bensky, one of over 1,000 survivors of Jeffery Epstein’s sex trafficking ring; and a 30-minute video clip from a meeting with SJC members you can WATCH HERE. In the SJC clip, a panel consisting of Elisabeth Haub School of Law Adjunct Professor Perry Carbone (0:00) who is also the Chief of the White Plains Division for the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Southern District of New York in his 34th year as a prosecutor; Liz Stein (8:15), sex trafficking survivor; Peter Carr (18:20), longtime Justice Department spokesman terminated by Todd Blanche and writer at the Substack Justice Connection; and Claire Finkelstein (24:50) the founder and faculty director of the Center for Ethics and the Rule of Law, a non-partisan interdisciplinary institute affiliated with Penn Carey Law, express their concerns with confirming Blanche to the most important law enforcement position in the country.
Oyer and Bensky testified on a separate panel. After testifying they teamed up and produced the below entry for Oyer’s Is This Really Legal? It’s a good conversation not just about the subject but also how we discuss the subject and make progress. While the Epstein Files may have only recently reached the awareness of most of the population, the survivors have been fighting for justice from our government for three decades.
Liz Oyer, who authors the Lawyer Oyer and Is This Really Legal Substacks, testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee on July 16 regarding the confirmation of Todd Blanche as Attorney General of the United States. Her written testimony as submitted is linked to below. Her introductory and concluding paragraphs with the main points summarized in her own words are presented below the link.
Chairman Grassley, Ranking Member Durbin, and Members of the Senate Judiciary Committee:
Thank you for the opportunity to provide my testimony on the important matter of the nomination of Todd Blanche to serve as the next Attorney General of the United States.
I am one of the many career Justice Department employees fired or forced out by Mr. Blanche after he was confirmed as Deputy Attorney General. But the concerns I want to raise with this Committee are much bigger than myself. As a longtime public servant, I am deeply concerned about where Mr. Blanche is leading the Department. The Department’s reputation and credibility have already suffered greatly under his leadership, as has its ability to perform its important work of keeping Americans safe. I have outlined my concerns below for your consideration.
Mr. Blanche fired me after I refused to rubberstamp a political favor for a friend of the President.
Mr. Blanche has laid waste to the Department’s most valuable assets: its credibility and its talented workforce.
Mr. Blanche has repeatedly placed the President’s personal interests ahead of the interests of the country.
Mr. Blanche is treating the Department of Justice as Donald Trump’s personal law firm.
Mr. Blanche has afforded special treatment to the wealthy and well-connected, at the expense of crime victims and consumers.
Mr. Blanche has attacked federal judges and fueled dangerous conspiracy theories.
Mr. Blanche misrepresented his intentions to this Committee and misled another Senate Committee.
Moreover, a federal judge this week found that Mr. Blanche misled Congress about the Department’s settlement of President Trump’s IRS lawsuit. Referencing Mr. Blanche’s testimony before the Senate Appropriations Committee in May, she determined that DOJ “offered misleading explanations of the facts and the law.” The court elaborated:
The Court is extremely troubled by the testimony given by Acting Attorney General Blanche on May 19, 2026. In response to why the “settlement agreement” had not been submitted to this Court for review, he stated that “there is no judge” because the case had been dismissed and, therefore, there was “no mechanism” for reviewing the agreement. While temporally accurate, this answer is, at best, misleading and, at worst, disingenuous. The Court was available to review any pleading by any Party at any time during this lawsuit. And if Acting Attorney General Blanche had thought the dismissal was improvidently granted or thought Plaintiffs misspoke when they said, “no judicial analysis is appropriate,” he only had to file an appearance and ask for relief.
These issues should alarm Americans across the political spectrum.
These are not partisan concerns. Americans across the political spectrum rely on DOJ to deliver equal and impartial justice, and to keep us all safe and free. Mr. Blanche has demonstrated that he is willing to put all of that at risk to serve a political agenda. I urge the Members of this Committee to think about what this is costing our country. Confirming Mr. Blanche as Attorney General would be an endorsement of the corruption and politicization of the Justice Department and the dangerous consequences that come with it.
How to Contact Your Senators
Senator Steve Daines: https://www.daines.senate.gov/contact/
Senator Tim Sheehy: https://www.sheehy.senate.gov/contact/
