Below is my column in The Hill on Attorney General Merrick Garland at the midpoint of his tenure at the Justice Department. For an Attorney General who said that he wanted to restore the trust of the public in his department, Garland has manifestly failed to achieve his goal. It appears that the Justice Department and FBI are now trusted less than under his predecessor, Bill Barr. A new poll shows that 55 percent of the public view the Trump indictment as “politically motivated” and 56% believe that it constitutes election interference. A similar majority wanted Trump pardoned if convicted.
Here is the column:
Merrick Garland began his tenure as attorney general with the stated intention of restoring faith in the Justice Department and the rule of law. By that standard, Garland has been a failure.
In fact, if anything, the crisis of faith surrounding his department has only deepened on his watch, and he bears some of the blame.
Polls show that half the country distrusts the FBI. A recent poll by Harvard CAPS-Harris found that 70 percent are either very or somewhat concerned about election interference by the FBI and other intelligence agencies. An additional 71 percent agreed that changes post-2016 had not done enough to prevent further interference and that “wide-ranging” reform was still required. Another poll showed 64 percent view the FBI as “politically compromised.”
During the term of his predecessor, Bill Barr, 50 percent of the public viewed the department favorably, and 70 percent had a favorable view of the FBI. The public trust of the department appears to have declined under Garland. At the very least, it has not dramatically improved.
There is variation in these polls, but they show a deep-seated distrust of the Justice Department that continues to taint all of the department’s work.
For example, the recent indictment of former President Donald Trump contains extremely damaging elements, including an audiotape that directly contradicts Trump’s assertions that he declassified all of the documents in his possession. Yet even the Justice Department’s release of an unusually detailed indictment, with pictures designed to sway public opinion, appears to have had little effect. While 48 percent of the public believes that the charges are justified, 47 percent believe the charges are “politically motivated.”
The response to this indictment shows the gravitational pull of public perceptions of the Justice Department. That perception of bias is well earned. Various officials were removed from the Department by career officials for their express bias and misconduct during the Russia-collusion investigation. That investigation was recently found by Special Counsel John Durham to have been launched with the backing of the Clinton campaign and without the minimal evidence ordinarily required by the department.
The Justice Department and the media kept the investigation going for years despite the lack of credible evidence.
When Biden gave the nod to Garland, I thought it was a brilliant move. Garland had been an affable, principled and moderate judge. Many of us criticized the Senate’s refusal to give him a vote after his nomination to the Supreme Court. I now believe that he would have made a great justice for all the reasons he has proven to be a poor attorney general.
He is affable but not influential or effective in changing the department. He is the very symbol for maintaining a status quo that the public rejects.
Garland leads the department with the same judicial temperament and persona. Predecessors such as Barr came to the department as former prosecutors with a clarity of purpose and mission. That would put Barr in conflict with Trump, but he was a hands-on manager who penetrated every level of the department. While some opposed Barr’s priorities, no one doubted who was in control of that department.
Garland’s reputation is more like that of a supervising judge who defers to the views and decisions of his agency. The result has been disastrous for the department. Even FBI Director Christopher Wray admitted that the past scandals demanded fundamental changes in the department’s operations.
Yet Garland allowed the culture to remain unchanged. He remained largely reactive to new scandals like the task force quickly assembled at the request of the teacher’s union and school board officials to investigate parents challenging school boards.
Garland remained largely silent as the FBI cracked down on conservative groups across the country in the wake of the Jan. 6 riot. He said nothing as his subordinate prosecutor Michael Sherwin bragged on in a television interview how they sought to unleash “shock and awe” on those who supported the election challenge to ensure that certain “people were afraid to come back to D.C.”
While most of us supported the tough punishment of rioters, the Justice Department was criticized for its draconian treatment of people charged with relatively minor offenses such as trespass and unlawful entry into the Capitol.
The controversies continue to pile up, from the seizure of the phone of a member of Congress to alleged disparate treatment in investigations of pro-life over pro-choice groups. Some of these and other controversies are legitimately debatable; others are not.
Garland could have taken steps to assure the public that there is not a two-tiered system of justice but repeatedly refused to do so. For example, Garland has continued to refuse to appoint a special counsel in the investigation of Hunter Biden. By doing so, Garland has removed the president’s greatest threat in the form of a report that would detail the scope of the Biden family’s alleged influence peddling and foreign contacts.
Garland is now looking at a new inflammatory situation after Special Counsel Jack Smith has leveled 37 charges against Trump while Robert Hur, “the other special counsel” investigating Biden, has largely disappeared from sight.
There is also the notable absence of any decision by Smith on another part of his mandate: crimes associated with Jan. 6th. Some of us have argued that Trump’s controversial speech was constitutionally protected. While Smith was swift to charge on the documents matter, he has not resolved the other part of his mandate even though the Jan. 6th matter has widely investigated by the Justice Department and Congress. The concern is that the Justice Department does not want to undermine the widespread claims in the media and Congress that Trump committed crimes in supporting an “insurrection.”
Garland has also supported the appointment of controversial officials such as Kirsten Clarke and Rachael Rollins, deepening the distrust of conservatives.
Time and again, Garland could have made decisions to seek to assure the public with more moderate and transparent decisions. He has repeatedly failed to do so.
Garland is not solely at fault. Biden took office promising to be a unifier and a moderate. He immediately adopted far left policies and fueled divisions by denouncing millions of “MAGA Republicans” and his political opponents as “semi-fascist” extremists.
Garland repeatedly pledged that political considerations would hold no sway with him as attorney general. He has certainly refrained from Biden’s style of divisive rhetoric. However, he has done little prospectively to assure the public that the department is pursuing cases without political bias. He continues to repeat the mantra of “trust us, we’re the government,” long after that trust has been lost with many citizens.
The failure of Merrick Garland is becoming more and more evident by the day. The public continues to distrust the Department, and his assurances of fair dealing have been overwhelmingly rejected by Republicans and independents.
It is hard to dislike Merrick Garland as a man. But as an attorney general, there is little to like about his last two years.
Jonathan Turley is the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University. You can follow him on Twitter @JonathanTurley.
I wonder if the public’s perception of the DoJ has anything to do with the Republicans loudly spouting lies and misinformation about the DoJ because the DoJ won’t let them get away with crimes?
No. It is the perception of double standards.
Politics, a Prosecutor’s Discretion and Equal Treatment Under the Law
https://themessenger.com/opinion/politics-a-prosecutors-discretion-and-equal-treatment-under-the-law
@Sammy
Please provide specific references for your claim “spouting lies and misinformation about the DoJ”, so we can judge the veracity for ourselves.
The Rs are falsely claiming that the PRA allows Trump to do what he did. The PRA says the exact opposite. They say that this is selective prosecution but ignore the many other people charged and convicted of mishandling classified material. They they to equate what Trump did to Biden, but he promptly cooperated and returned the documents. Trump worked hard to keep the documents and lied about it.
Everything I wrote is easily verified.
@Sammy
You refuse to provide specifics. Not surprising.
And of those “many other people charged and convicted of mishandling classified material”, how many were a president?
And Biden “promptly cooperated and returned the documents”? Biden appears to have stolen some of those documents from a SCIF while he was a senator well over 15 years ago.That theft was the crime. And now he ‘cooperates’ by letting the FBI search his home over a decade later and that cooperation completely mitigates the original crime? Great reasoning! Do they even need jails where you live, Sammy? If thieves just “cooperated and returned” stolen items once they were caught, why even have jails or other penalties?
Sammy, keep in mind Biden’s (the same guy that is now suspected of influence pedaling) illegal removal of documents from a SCIF well over a decade ago and maintaining them in an unsecured place for what purpose we do not know. Now go read the last 20 or so words of the paragraph that begins: “Whoever having unauthorized possession of, access to, or control over any document,..” of 18 U.S. Code § 793 (e). That code is the Espionage Act. And it says nothing about cooperating AFTER you are caught.
That’s sound so Stupid A True Democrat
Sammy, one of us is from mars and the other from Venus. Take your pick.
“Garland repeatedly pledged that political considerations would hold no sway with him as attorney general.” Yet, it appears Garland has not kept his pledge. Such a circumstance prompts the other possibilities that Mr.Turley does not consider: Merrick Garland is either complicit with Biden activities or incompetent.
“I now believe that he would have made a great justice for all the reasons he has proven to be a poor attorney general. He is affable but not influential or effective in changing the department. He is the very symbol for maintaining a status quo that the public rejects.”
Mixed messages much, Doc?
Talk about sour grapes! I don’t trust anybody who changes their name( i.e. like Lenin did from Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov ) and in this commies case, from Garfinkle to Garland.
According to Wikipedia, the family name was changed several generations before he was born.
Can anyone explain why Garland was thought by some to have been a great judge on the D.C. Circuit? Did he write any landmark opinions, for example?
Good question, Daniel. From a 2016 USA Today article on his nomination to the Court: “Most of the cases are obscure, reflecting the largely administrative docket of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, where Garland has served since 1997, most recently as chief judge…few of the 2,640 decisions in which he was involved received much attention.”
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2016/05/10/supreme-court-merrick-garland-top-10-cases/84186750/
” I now believe that he would have made a great justice for all the reasons he has proven to be a poor attorney general.”
This statement by the Professor is shocking. A judge should have a deep-rooted respect for the rule of law, yet Garland has shown none. Without that underlying wisdom, the man is not qualified to be a judge, much less a Supreme Court Judge.
Professor Turley should have deleted his statement above and kept the following. “Garland could have taken steps to assure the public that there is not a two-tiered system of justice but repeatedly refused to do so.”
👍
The know-nothing Bug got squished after his comment: “There isn’t a two tiered system.”
It is blatantly obvious to all but the terminally stupid that, at present, there is a two-tiered system. We don’t expect you to know that or much of anything else. Keep puffing away at those deflated basket-balls.
Just thank your lucky stars that McConnell was able to keep this partisan hack off of the Supreme Court.
Garland is a bitter vindictive little man who uses his milquetoast demeanor to cloak his rotten core.
America owes Moscow Mitch a debt of gratitude for preventing this scum from being elevated to the Supreme Court
Whether Garland is a failure is a matter of opinion. JT thinks is. I don’t.
JT lies that “[Crossfire Hurricane] was recently found by Special Counsel John Durham to have been launched with the backing of the Clinton campaign and without the minimal evidence ordinarily required by the department.” Durham was quite explicit that CH was started because after the DNC Wikileaks release, Australian diplomats contacted the US to report that George Papadopoulous “also suggested the Trump team had received some kind of suggestion from Russia that it could assist this process [winning the election] with the anonymous release of information during the campaign that would be damaging to Mrs. Clinton.” He also said that it would have been a “sensible step” to open it as a preliminary investigation rather than a full investigation — but absolutely NOT that it was “without the minimal evidence ordinarily required by the department.”
“The Justice Department and the media kept the investigation going for years despite the lack of credible evidence” is also a lie. The Mueller investigation found plenty of credible evidence. The bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee report did as well.
I think Turley’s column is a failure. I think he’s a failure as a model to his students of being accurate in his writing. Again, a matter of opinion.
If there was so much credible evidence as you suggest without any citations or proof, why did they not convict. No need to answer it is a rhetorical question.
Convict who? Trump? They didn’t indict because of the OLC memo. They also successfully obstructed the investigation, then he pardoned several of his co-conspirators.
The only people chasing Trump are the democrats and the deep state establishment. One and the same.
“Whether Garland is a failure is a matter of opinion.”
Is that statement a fact or an opinion? If an opinion, then by your own sophistical premise, it can be dismissed out of hand. If a fact, then you’ve cooked your own goose. At best, such a tool of deceit is meaningless. At worst, self-contradictory.
Nice to know that you believe all opinions, yours included, “can be dismissed out of hand.”
Trump team had received some kind of suggestion from Russia that it could assist this process [winning the election]
The DNC emails are true….but the conclusion was never supported. Trump NEVER implicated. some kind of suggestion from Russia that it could….assist this process [winning election].
Your chosen quote is an admission of ZERO evidence.
Just unfounded conclusions. There are multiple statements from the FBI , DoJ and CIA that NO evidence tied Trump OR ANY OTHER AMERICAN, to Russia.
Stupid strike through
CH wasn’t opened to investigate Trump. It was opened to investigate Russian election interference. And the quote is evidence of Turley lying to his readers about the evidence upon which CH was opened.
That does not matter. The fact that Russia was trying to influence the election is grounds enough to open an investigation. That is a serious matter that can not be ignored. And there was plenty of evidence gathered that substantiated the suspicion. There was no evidence that Trump himself knew about this, but he was in no way exonerated.
Anonymous – can you tell us what the “plenty of credible evidence” is? Names and dates please.
Read the Mueller Report and the bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee Report for yourself. They both have names and dates, though some things remain redacted. There isn’t room here to summarize all of the evidence in them, nor is it my job to digest them for you.
Mueller report. Mueller was head of the FBI when they were chasing the Italian mafia in eastern New England. Two innocent men spent many years in jail and the FBI knew they were innocent but did nothing to get them released. One of those men died in jail. Mueller is no saint. Hardly from it.
Anon. – Try three.
NO everything is not a matter of opinion. It is not just an opinion that Hilter was a fascist.
By the criteria we judge AG’s by, and by the Criteria Garland set for himself – he is a failure.
Way more important than getting down in the weeds about Trump’s innocence or guilt in any of these cases is the fact that we have a DOJ that is selectively and aggressively prosecuting an entire class of Americans—Trump and people who support Trump—in violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the United State Constitution. Complicit with the DOJ in its efforts are other federal agencies such as the CIA and the Department of Defense.
Until sanity is returned to the federal government through the election process, the courts should follow the Constitution and dismiss any and all of these politically motivated cases.
Thank God Trump appointed over 430 federal judges and three Supreme Court justices who believe in following the Constitution. And thank God there is an election in 2024.
Trump will lose in 2024, like he lost in 2020. He’s been indicted because he’s committed crimes. He’s likely going to face more indictments — in GA and for Jan 6. He’s already been found liable for sexual assault and defamation. He has a civil trial for tax fraud in October. He has another defamation trial in January. This is the disgusting person you support.
Seven year witch hunt going on eight. Good luck.
For a witch hunt they have found a surprisingly large number of witches.
I wonder how many witches the Biden klan is hiding?
In 2016, the left put a target on the back of their number one political rival and spent the next seven years and tens of millions of dollars searching high and low for things to charge him with. Then, they indicted him, just months before the beginning of 2024 primary season, Then, they conspired to ruin the careers of any top attorneys who would defend him.
Of course, that’s probably a good strategy considering who the Democratic candidate is and who the alternative Democratic candidates are.
Yep, that’s probably a good strategy considering the Democrats’ wide-open illegal immigration, sky-high prices, attack on fossil fuels, vaccine mandates, naked men in girls’ locker rooms, race discrimination in college admissions, and the war in Ukraine,
Yet Trump is leading Biden by 6 points in a very recent poll. https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/4054317-trump-beats-biden-by-6-points-in-2024-matchup-poll/ And the legal and health situation of Biden will only worsen friom today’s situation.
Trump’s legal and health situation will also be getting worse. Between the two of them, Trump’s situation is worse than Biden’s.
Anonymous, pray tell, what are you smoking?
”It is hard to dislike Merrick Garland as a man.”
I judge a man by his actions. Oratory carries some sway, but only when t the oratory is backed up by actions.
Its easy to say you support the less fortunate, But without action, words have no meaning.
It is easy to dislike Merrick Garland as a man.
His dishonesty and negligence as the chief law enforcement officer in the nation is a disgrace.
The harassment of Supreme Court justices at their homes, the questionable partisan prosecutions of civil torts as criminal acts, the ignoring of real criminal acts by fellow partisans show a man without character or temperament for public office.
“Who knows what evil lurks in the heart of man (or Merrick Garland?)” “The Shadow (and Merrick Garland) knows!”
But I’ll speculate two reasons for the large gap between the respectable, somewhat likeable, mild-mannered Clark Kent-like Garland that America once knew and that lowly worm wokester who’s running but clearly not in charge of the Department of Justice: 1) That old Clark Kent-like guy really had little responsibilty and no one to manage. He was merely a judge. His duty was merely to decide which of two sides was correct on the law. His decision was then almost automatically implemented by others eslewhere on whom Garland did not depend. That duty which he was legally obliged to do as a judge Garland could do by himself. He was legally walled off from outside interference, and he depended on no one to do his duty as he saw fit. Easy duty, easily done. Nice guy. Walter Mitty with a black robe!
2) That new Garland, the Attorney General Garland, the Garland that Republicans loath and all Americans should distrust, has the 2d hardest job and the most powerful job in the US Government. He is totally subject to outside pressure and influence (as in White House and Senate Democrats.) And the new Garland must manage his DOJ bureaucracy if he is to do his duty. DOJ is a huge bureaucracy, made up of and run by thousands of highly skilled DOJ careerists who have their own political agendas. The new Garland must do what these others (outside and inside DOJ) tell him to do, unless he has the will to resist them and the energy to force them to do the right thing. Garland lacks the will to resist and the will to comand because resisting and comanding powerful forces takes physical and mental strength, vigorous energy, unyielding persistence and obdurate tenacity. Those are the characteristics of young men and women. Garland is old and obviously feeble. He lacks the physical and mental capacity to do his duty, EVEN IF HE WISHED TO DO IT.
Actually, Merrick Garland’s performance as a Biden team player has been truly amazing. Find every way possible to weaponize the FBI to get your political opponents. Upon his departure from office, President Biden will nominate him for the Congressional Medal of Freedom for “saving democracy”. Sound about right ???
Turley is far too generous to Garland. He has proven himself to be nothing more than a political hatchet man. We will never know what kind of Supreme Court Justice he would have been, but I am thankful for that. He is no better, and maybe worse, than Eric Holder, which is about as bad as you can get.
Meh, Eric Holder is a racist, and as we have been informed by his side of the aisle is the worst thing a person can be. Garland is just a typical schmuck simply singing for his supper served by his handlers.
Holder is fueled by internal hatred of people unlike him whereas, Garland is paid to hate them.
I don’t know that I buy the theory that Garland is a passive judicial figure. Coming from your background, I am at least willing to consider the possibility but, if true, he bears complete responsibility for allowing activists under his authority to make a mockery of the DOJ. I can’t give him a pass for that.
Just curious, does anonymous have a split personality.
I understand the logic of what you’re saying about Garland’s weakness as AG being his strength as SCJ, but it’s a generous stretch – one I wouldn’t want to test. Those same weaknesses could/would arise when being pressured by the other Justices. He may not want to rewrite the Constitution or pack the court, but he may not stand against it, either. As for Garland’s affability…our government is overflowing with inept, corrupt, unreliable, affable persons.
DLNoe: Agree, agree, agree, and agree.
To flesh this out, picture him as an innocuous member of a jury in a local court trial.
Merrick Garland is either a bitter partisan raging against conservatives or the Bidens/CCP have dirt on him and he’s compromised.
Turley’s criticism of Garland, in a sense, is self-criticism because both men are trained in the law and the usual method for training in the law forces one to defend a position regardless of merit. The rest of us who are not trained in the law can adhere to principles. Yes, the world needs lawyers but they should be given roles that respect and acknowledge their strengths and weaknesses. Turley begins to define these, on the one hand, saying that Garland would have made a great Justice because he listens to the arguments of others but, on the other hand, he is a bad manager because he is led by his subordinates and unable to manage the Department. These are valid observations but they actually apply to all, or most, lawyers because of their training and one might speculate they chose the profession because of innate ambivalences. There may be exceptions here and there but such exceptions are rare and the rule is that lawyers are simply always and everywhere poor managers.
“Turley’s criticism of Garland, in a sense, is self-criticism . . .”
That is grossly unfair.
One of the character traits that makes Turley a scholar, as opposed to a hired gun, is his *principled* defense of the Constitution and the law. He is not swayed by political expediency, or by the ends justifies the means.
-or by pecuniary interest.
— or by power, fame, or any other bauble.
LOL. His columns are an endless parade of argument by political expediency.
(Then why are you here every day?)
Lin, good question
“His columns are an endless parade of . . .”
Says the sophistical hack who can parse “re-education camp” into “summer camp.”
Just because one is trained in the law does not mean that principles or morality are cast aside. It is true that a lawyer representing a client is expected to advocate on behalf of the client, but Garland’s client is not supposed to be Joe Biden. He is supposed to represent the best interests of the country and he is sworn to uphold the Constitution. Instead, he has whored himself out to Joe Biden and the democrat party.
Maybe he is not suited to lead the DOJ.
I have seen officers and staff NCOs who were good at their job but not the kind of people that should take charge or be in command.
Or he got the job then was told to sit down, shut up and we will run the DOJ. That would follow with the rest of the Biden admin.
regardless of politics…people should be terrified of the fascism being pushed from DC
Read H.G Wells book “Outline of History” which surveys all of world history. Has numerous examples of what happens when the Machiavellians gain power with in a centralized government. He talks about the massive success of the USA with its decentralized government of it early history! Now if you are a child of a political leader in the DC…you are an Aristocrat with wealth and power.
We should cut 50% of Fed government, then move 75% of what is left from DC to the heartland, and enforce a 12 year limit on all federal offices….president, judges, congress, other appointments like Fauci. Also a HARD limit on age of 75 years.
*Like* “…enforce a 12 year limit on all federal offices…” How about we not allow *anyone* to make a ‘career’ of grifting taxpayers, including the lowest paid, paper-pushers? Government should never be it’s own largest employer.
garland is a despicable creature of politics. My hope is that in 50 years, history celebrates he was not appointed to the Supreme Court.
Given history “professors”, I won’t hold my breath.
@Jonathan Turley: RE:”It is hard to dislike Merrick Garland as a man.” Hard to separate the man from his message. There’s plenty to dislike. The SCOTUS’ loss is the nation’s gain and an affirmation of Obama’s lack of judgement second only to his VP. . . To impeach Garland and remove him from office would be the nation’s win.