Pam Bondi's House hearing was so bad, Fox News cut away | Opinion

 

Pam Bondi's House hearing was so bad, Fox News cut away | Opinion

 

Bill Goodykoontz   Arizona Republic

 

What's the point?

 

U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi appeared before the House Judiciary Committee in an oversight hearing on Wednesday, Feb. 11. For all the good it did.

 

It was a circus, with Bondi willingly ― eagerly, even ― playing the part of a disruptive clown. As committee hearings go, it was bewildering, an exercise in frustration. As TV goes, it was also frustrating and at times offensive, and a massive waste of time. If we wanted to listen to a litany of insults and arrogant boasts, we could just follow a schoolyard bully around at recess.

 

"This is farcical and it's embarrassing," Phil Mattingly said on CNN. "And it's also extraordinarily juvenile in its approach."

 

See schoolyard bully, above.

 

 

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Pam Bondi testifies amid questions over DOJ Epstein files release

Pam Bondi faces Congress amid concerns over Trump administration's handling of release of files related to disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein.

Bondi attacked Raskin as a 'washed-up loser lawyer'

When asked questions about the Department of Justice's handling of the Epstein files, Bondi didn't just decline to answer. Instead, she went on the attack, toggling between irrelevant distractions, unrelated praise of Donald Trump and personal attacks.

 

How personal? Well, for instance, when Rep. Jamie Raskin told Bondi that she was not following the rules of hearings, she didn't exactly take it in stride, you might say.

 

"You don't tell me anything, washed-up loser lawyer," Bondi said to Raskin. "Not even a lawyer."

 

 

U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi testifies before the House Judiciary Committee on Feb. 11, 2026 in Washington, DC. 

Win McNamee, Getty Images

When Rep. Thomas Massie, the lone Republican to criticize Trump, Bondi and the DOJ, criticized the handling of the Epstein files, Bondi responded with, "This guy has Trump Derangement Syndrome. You're a failed politician."

 

Later, she sneered at Massie, "Hypocrite."

 

Not to belabor the point, but again, this was a congressional hearing, not a middle-school playground. At this point, the playground was preferable. And more mature.

 

We've seen Bondi's tactics before

It's not like we haven't seen this act before. It's part and parcel of the Trump playbook, adapted from his mentor Roy Cohn, long in use: Attack, attack, attack; admit nothing, deny everything; claim victory and never admit defeat. Bondi brought prepared insults and data on crimes in the districts of individual members, anything to avoid answering the question at hand if the question involved Epstein.

 

Bondi has employed this tactic herself in a Senate hearing. Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the secretary of Health and Human Services, tried his own bizarre version of it in a Justice Committee hearing.

 

At the time I called the RFK Jr. hearing the wildest I'd ever seen. I stand corrected.

 

Don't misunderstand, these kinds of hearings are often a forum for political grandstanding. Representatives use them to burnish their MAGA or liberal bona fides, while the person testifying works overtime to put up a good front for whatever administration they are serving.

 

But this is different.

 

"This has gotten to the point where whatever factual information that used to come out of congressional hearings has now basically gone away," Peter Baker, a New York Times reporter, said on MS NOW. "This has gone so far down the road for reality show television, rather than any kind of exploration of policy or practice, that it’s all just about who can find a viral moment that they’ll put on their web accounts and their social media accounts and say, see, we’re right about this or that."

 

That's correct. Somewhere someone is writing an entry in a MAGA friendly newsletter about how Pam Bondi owned the libs or whatever, and somewhere someone is going to open that newsletter and agree with every word. Such is the divide among Americans over everything.

 

If you wanted to learn anything from this hearing, you would have been sorely disappointed. Well, if you wanted to learn that Bondi would say or do almost anything to keep the words "Trump" and "Epstein" as far apart as is humanly possible, I suppose it worked out OK.

 

"This is not a game, secretary," Rep. Becca Balint said at one point.

 

"I'm Attorney General," Bondi responded.

 

"My apologies," Balint said. "I couldn't tell."

 

 

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Fox News didn't cover the hearing from start to finish

CNN and MS NOW covered almost the entire hearing. Fox News cut away relatively quickly, opting for occasional updates. Read into that what you will.

 

Some Democratic members asked survivors of Jeffrey Epstein's abuse who were in the room to stand, and asked if the Department of Justice had contacted them. No. Had they reached out to the DOJ? Yes. And had they heard back? No. Bondi didn't look behind her to acknowledge them.

 

A political stunt? Maybe. But a powerful one. At least it was relevant, as opposed to Bondi demanding to know if any of the Democrats on the committee had apologized for voting to impeach Trump, or ― talk about bizarre ― responding to an Epstein question by saying, "The Dow is over 50,000 right now. The S&P is at almost 7,000. The Nasdaq is smashing records. Americans’ 401(k)s and retirement savings are booming. That’s what we should be talking about. We should be talking about making Americans safe.”

 

Bondi was 'speaking to an audience of one'

Bondi can send out emails to Republican supporters that say things like this. Congress doesn't need to waste several hours listening to her deflect and attack. Again, other than trying to get her on the record about anything, what is the point?

 

You know what the point is. The point is to impress Trump with her loyalty, no matter what. It's not just job one. It's the only job.

 

Or, as Dana Bash put it on CNN, over the course of the hearing, "It has been very clear that the Attorney General was speaking to an audience of one."

 

On that front, if on no other, mission accomplished. What a sad state of affairs. And it's playing out on TV every day. On this particular day, it was just a little more pronounced than most