Trump Transition Warns DoJ Lawyers: Resistance Is Futile

Sometimes it takes the Borg to beat the Borg. Count that as one lesson learned from Donald Trump’s first attempt to drain the swamp, and the success of the “Resistance” to prevent it from happening. This time the presidential transition has room to operate, and this time Trump’s team wants to ensure that remains the case. 

A Politico report this weekend caught the attention of Trump adviser Mark Paoletta, a key member of the transition team. Department of Justice attorneys expressed their (anonymous) determination to fight what they saw as policies that might be illegal or “unethical,” according to their own values. Paoletta made it clear that the new administration will implement their policy choices and will cashier anyone engaging in “resistance” within the DoJ. Paoletta reminded them that voters elected Trump, not DoJ attorneys:

President Trump was elected by the American people to carry out his agenda, which includes:

Securing the southern border, mass deportations of illegal aliens (beginning with rapists and murderers), surging resources to process immigration/asylum claims to clear out backlog and… https://t.co/n7yeUvRM2H

— Mark Paoletta (@MarkPaoletta) November 11, 2024

And he also reminded them that their “ethics” radar seemed to be mainly turned off the past four years:

These are all positions President Trump campaigned on and that career DOJ lawyers may be working on to accomplish President Trump’s lawful agenda that was approved by a landslide vote of the American People. DOJ career employees do not set the agenda. In fact, they are required to help implement this agenda.

Hopefully, they will be as committed to helping President Trump implement his agenda as they did for President Biden. Of course, political leadership welcomes feedback to help improve a project. But once the decision is made to move forward, career employees are required to implement the President’s plan.

Of course, no one will push them to implement flagrantly illegal actions like President Biden did with his student loan plan, where he thumbed his nose at the Supreme Court’s ruling and then tried to implement another illegal plan which was struck down. (In fact, the media was cheering on his law-breaking).  I don’t recall reading any stories about career attorneys being concerned about working on this blatantly illegal action.

If these career DOJ employees won’t implement President Trump’s program in good faith, they should leave. Those employees who engage in so-called “resistance” against the duly-elected President’s lawful agenda would be subverting American democracy.

Paoletta graciously refrains from mentioning their ethics-radar failures on a president prosecuting his political opponent for the first time in American history, too. Funny how few of these same lawyers failed to object to those norms being shattered, eh?

Paoletta can make it stick, too. As Josh Gerstein notes for Politico, he’s expected to play a major role in the incoming administration on DoJ and law-enforcement policies. One of his key policy aims will be to put an end to the weaponization of government, which puts the DoJ and its careerist lawyers squarely in his sights:

Paoletta recited a laundry list of Trump goals, including mass deportations, ending birthright citizenship, issuing pardons and commutations to Jan. 6 defendants, reversing “lawfare and persecution of political opponents,” and “holding accountable those who weaponized their government authority to abuse Americans.”

Paoletta, a former counsel to Vice President Mike Pence and to the Office of Management and Budget during the first Trump administration, is playing a role in drafting potential changes in Justice Department policy to be put into effect after Trump is sworn in as president in January.

Paoletta may not have a high enough profile to get nominated for Attorney General. That will most likely go to a governor or Senator with enough closeness to Trump to be trusted with the nod. However, there are any number of secondary positions where Trump can install Paoletta to be the AG’s hatchet man, with Deputy AG being the most comprehensive and powerful. The next step down would be Associate AG, which would not have formal oversight over the FBI, ATF, or US Attorneys — where much of the “Resistance” might form — but still would have the Civil Rights Division and other interesting orgs in portfolio. Trump could keep Paoletta in the White House too as a means to keep an eye on the political appointees at DoJ. 

If Trump appoints Paoletta as Deputy AG, then this message will become amplified all the way to 11. If DoJ lawyers don’t want to comply with policies implemented by the duly elected administration, they should resign and then run for office themselves if they want to implement their own agendas. If any new policies are actually illegal rather than just not to the taste of careerist bureaucrats, those can be challenged in court. But to deliberately act to undermine the policies of a duly elected administration is an affront to self-governance and democracy. They don’t have to choose assimilation, but resistance should be futile.