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Trump’s former personal attorney has a vast slate of conflicts of interest. Will lawmakers do their job in his confirmation hearings?
Todd Blanche is the most conflicted nominee for attorney general the US Congress has yet to encounter. As the former private attorney for Donald Trump, Blanche has been an unflappable ally for the president since 2023, when he left his private firm, Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft, to represent Trump in the hush-money prosecution brought against him by the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg. He went on to represent Trump in two other criminal prosecutions – the Mar-a-Lago classified documents prosecution, and the January 6 prosecution, both brought against Trump by the special counsel Jack Smith.
As both deputy attorney general and as acting head of the justice department since April, when attorney general Pam Bondi was fired by Donald Trump, Blanche has unabashedly continued his advocacy work for his former client through other means. He has signed off on a settlement between the IRS and Donald Trump regarding the latter’s taxes, that would ban the IRS from pursuing litigation against Trump, his family or his businesses forever. That settlement has now been ruled by a federal judge to be self-dealing; she referred the case to the Florida Bar Association. The New York Bar has issued a letter saying that Blanche is unfit for office.
Claire Finkelstein is the Algernon Biddle professor of law and professor of philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania and the faculty director of its Center for Ethics and the Rule of Law
