PALM BEACH, Fla. — Former President Donald Trump, the leading Republican candidate for the 2024 presidential election, told Breitbart News that the person actually pulling the strings at the Department of Justice (DOJ) is Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco. , and not Attorney General Merrick Garland, exclusively said. .
President Trump, while expanding on earlier points about how Democratic President Joe Biden is “surrounded by bad people,” said the real head of the Justice Department appears to be Monaco and Garland. He pointed out that he was just a figurehead.
“Lisa Monaco, she's actually running the Department of Justice pretty badly and pretty illegally, and I expect that to become clear within the next year and a half,” Trump said for more than two hours. He spoke on Breitbart News over the years. Exclusive interview at Mar-a-Lago in late December.
Trump said Monaco is “very friendly” with Andrew Wiseman, who served as general counsel for the FBI and later became special counsel Robert Mueller's top official in investigating Trump. Mr. Wiseman currently works for a private company.
“Mr. Wiseman is her boss,” Trump said. “Weissman has severe Trump Derangement Syndrome. All of these guys do. They've been after me for seven years. They haven't been doing well.”
Monaco served as Homeland Security Advisor to former President Barack Obama for several years in his White House.she was Especially close to Susan Rice was President Obama's national security adviser and later joined Biden's White House as a domestic policy adviser. Rice has since left Biden's White House.
Multiple Republican officials inside and outside Congress have long talked about how Monaco plays a larger role as deputy attorney general, overseeing the Justice Department. One former congresswoman told Breitbart News that it will eventually become clear that she is involved in far more of the Justice Department's decisions than it appears.
Mr. Garland, a former appellate judge, was nominated by Mr. Obama to the Supreme Court, but Senate Republicans refused to confirm him before the 2016 election, and he was later nominated by Mr. Biden to be attorney general. Mr. Garland's time as attorney general was marred by controversy over the politicization of the Justice Department, particularly his decision to allow various investigations and prosecutions of Mr. Trump, Mr. Biden's chief political opponent, to continue.
After the FBI's highly controversial Mar-a-Lago raid, Garland finally It came out It was unusual for him to publicly say to television cameras that he personally gave permission.
For its part, until just a few weeks ago, Monaco had been defending its people at the Justice Department against President Trump's weaponization and politicization claims.
Monaco told Trump: “These allegations bear no resemblance to the Department of Justice that I know.” interview Co-authored with Pierre Thomas of ABC News, published just before Christmas 2023:
The Department of Justice that I know is full of dedicated men and women, investigators, lawyers, prosecutors, analysts, professional staff who wake up every day, Pierre, and they're trying to figure out who's in the White House, who's in Congress. I wake up every day, whether I'm there or not.
Several major Congressional committees are also investigating Monaco's role within the Justice Department and the ongoing politicized nature of law enforcement. 2023 House Judiciary Committee Chairman Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) asked for Congressional briefing from Monaco regarding the findings of special counsel John Durham's investigation into the FBI's targeting of President Trump while he was president. Mr. Monaco's role in the situation is expected to become a more central focus of the Congressional investigation in the coming weeks and months, as lawmakers unearth documents and testimony about his decision-making, the No. 2 official at the Justice Department. It is becoming more likely that this will happen. Whether Mr. Garland is really in power is also questionable, especially if Mr. Trump is chosen as the Republican candidate as most expected, and if he fends off criticism from rival administrations in the run-up to the 2024 presidential election. It could become a central focus of this year's presidential campaign. election.
