New Assistant AG Will Report to Trump and Vance

I remember not long ago wondering if I was pushing the envelope a bit by writing that the Justice Department was being run out of the Trump White House. Since those strange times, evidence has continued to mount that this is exactly how things play out, but the White House and Justice Department have preferred to maintain the fiction that they were separate entities. Until today.

Here’s what Vice President JD Vance announced at a midday press conference at the White House (emphasis mine):

Vance said the new deputy attorney general will help coordinate an administration-wide effort to investigate and bring charges against potential fraudulent activity in federally supported programs. The deputy attorney general will not work within the Justice Department, the vice president said. Instead, the position will be run from the White House and overseen by Presidents Trump and Vance, he said.

The traditional Chinese wall between the White House and the Justice Department appears as intact as the East Wing.