- Pam Bondi previously served as Attorney General for Florida
- Bondi nominated after Matt Gaetz withdrew his nomination
- A 2013 case involving Bondi and a donation from Trump has been revived on social media
Pam Bondi will serve as Donald Trump’s newest Attorney General nomination, after Matt Gaetz withdrew from his own nomination earlier today (November 21).
Ex-Florida Attorney General Bondi is a longtime ally of Trump’s, helping with the incoming president’s first impeachment defence, back in 2020. The 59-year-old Florida lawmaker also attended Trump’s criminal trial in New York earlier this year, in which the 45th (and soon to be 47th) president was found guilty on 34 counts of falsifying business records in relation to hush money payments made to adult film star Stormy Daniels.
Bondi, who regularly parrotted Trump’s false claims about the 2020 election being stolen, is no stranger to questionable ethical practices. No sooner had the former Florida AG been confirmed as Trump’s replacement pick for Gaetz, than a controversial story from Bondi’s past was being resurrected on the TL, by Tristan Snell, a lawyer who once worked at the New York Attorney General’s office.
Back in 2013, it turns out, Trump University – a Trump Organization-operated company that ran a real estate training program between 2005-2010 – was being prosecuted by New York’s Attorney General for $42 million in fraud. Shortly after the prosecution was filed, the New York AG office made contact with Florida’s, who were interested in joining the case. The Sunshine State had one of the largest numbers of people defrauded by Trump University and, just after Labor Day, 2013, the AG’s office in Florida received all the key documents from New York’s case.
Unbeknownst to the New York office, only a few days earlier, Rhona Graff, Trump’s assistant had exchanged emails with the finance director for the Pam Bondi campaign and obtained payment information to donate $25,000 to one of Bondi’s PACs.
Said donation would arrive on September 13 of that year, via a check from Donald Trump himself, with Bondi’s name spelled incorrectly and the accompanying message, “Dear Pam, you are the greatest!”
Pam Bondi and Florida never joined New York’s case, despite the number of Trump U victims across the state. Trump’s donation would even come from the Trump Foundation, a tax-exempt charity that Trump and his family were running at the time. This practice, however, was illegal, which led to the foundation being prosecuted by the New York AG’s office, along with other offences, and subsequently shut down.
The story has now gathered a substantial amount of traction, although it doesn’t appear to have made Pam Bondi as unpalatable a nomination as Gaetz, who appeared to be loathed by many Democrats and Republicans alike.
However, even with Bondi likely to be confirmed as the next Attorney General, it is still another Trump pick for his incoming government who has a high profile legal controversy attached to their name, much like future Education Secretary and former WWE President Linda McMahon.
