Former Justice Department pardon attorney Liz Oyer described the “bizarre scene” that took place at Attorney General Todd Blanche’s swearing-in.
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During a Saturday interview with former CNN anchor Jim Acosta, Oyer described how DOJ employees had to come out of their office to applaud Blanche after he was sworn in by Emil Bove, another former personal lawyer of President Donald Trump.
“He was sworn in in a private event at the White House that was not open to the press,” Oyer told Acosta. “You would know better than I, but I think that’s unusual that the press is not invited to the swearing-in of the Attorney General.”
Oyer suggested that the event was private because Blanche was sworn in by Bove, who was Blanche’s junior co-counsel on Trump’s criminal defense, then a top Justice Department official. Bove is now a federal appeals judge with a lifetime tenure after being installed by Trump.
“Todd Blanche was like the senior partner representing Donald Trump, and Bove was the junior partner. And they worked very closely together,” Oyer said. “Now Bove is an appellate court judge…and Todd Blanche, his other personal lawyer, is now the Attorney General.”
Oyer described it as, “The whole gang back together, the whole Trump legal team back together, but this time they’re in the Oval Office.”
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After Blanche was sworn in at the Oval Office, he went back to the Justice Department headquarters, known as Main Justice, and “people are summoned, people who work in the building are summoned out of their offices to stand there and clap for him while he walks into the building.”cha
Oyer noted that the summoned applause was filmed and put on social media, and it shows, “All these people who are being forced to stand there and clap for him, and then he gets to work.”
She pointed out that Blanche’s first act as Trump’s AG was to “quietly issue this new memo…that massively expands the scope of executive privilege” by allowing the president to keep internal advice secret.
Blanche’s swearing-in, she said, “was just an incredibly bizarre scene and really just so unbelievably inappropriate.”
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