Calling for Pam Bondi's Disbarment - fordham political review

Photo via CNN

Attorney General Pam Bondi’s appearance before the House Judiciary Committee on February 11th, 2026, was nothing short of a disaster, further solidifying the need for competent chief law enforcement, not another puppet to shield Donald Trump. Her behavior at the hearing, in addition to her general mishandling of the Epstein files, should not just end her public service career; it should spark broader conversations about her disbarment for misleading Congress and the weaponization of the Department of Justice (DOJ).

House Democrats, who have been voting for transparency of the Epstein files since mid-November, started their opening statements by accusing Bondi of running a “massive Epstein cover-up” within the DOJ. Congress has subpoenaed approximately 6 million documents and videos/images, while the DOJ has failed to produce over half of these items. When Democrats pressed her on her broken promises, she dodged and dismissed the genuine concerns while reacting to claims that threatened her validity with fury rather than legal clarification.

When Rep. Jared Moskowitz (D-FL) highlighted that “Trump’s name appears more times in the Epstein files than God’s name appears in the book about God” (in reference to the Bible), Bondi didn’t respond with concern, but instead chose to defensively argue that there was “no evidence that Donald Trump committed a crime” and brushed off these numerous mentions (which her *own *department had briefed in the produced records) as meaningless. Further, when Rep. Ted Lieu (D-CA) directly accused Bondi of “lying under oath” for her sweeping exoneration of Trump in the record, she responded furiously, calling it “being accused of a crime,” and immediately deflected the conversation to immigration sanctuary policies in the congressman’s home state.

The most telling moment was when Republican lawmaker, Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY), articulated that the department had a “massive failure” in compliance and, more specifically, caught the co-conspiring Ohio billionaire Les Wexner’s name in the files, which was redacted initially (after which the DOJ scrambled to unredact it within the next 40 minutes). Bondi characterized this event as an oversight hiccup, while Massie called it out for what it was—being caught red-handed. Many Democrats, such as Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-TX), applauded Massie for being “the only person on the Republican side that has a backbone and knows how to stand up to corruption.”

What was truly the most disturbing part of this hearing was the fact that multiple Epstein survivors sat right behind Bondi as she continued to complicitly protect their sexual abusers. She previously stated that “any accusation of criminal wrongdoing will be taken seriously and investigated.” Yet, when Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA) asked the present Epstein survivors to raise their hand if they still haven’t been invited to meet with Pam Bondi or the DOJ, every survivor raised their hand. When Rep. Jayapal further questioned whether Bondi would “turn to them now and apologize” on behalf of the DOJ, she simply shook her head no and looked down, a look of pure cowardice. She added that she was not “going to get into the gutter with [Jayapal] doing theatrics.” The visual below, Bondi refusing to make any eye contact with the survivors, truly indicates where her loyalties lie as an Attorney General and, more disappointingly, as a woman herself.

Photo via Roberto Schmidt/AFP/Getty Images

This case isn’t just a one-time instance of Bondi’s incapability; it shapes a broader pattern of her putting Trump’s interests above the people of this country. She showed us her loyalty since the beginning through her urgency in investigating possible Democrat ties to the Epstein files (as instructed by Trump), compared to her lackluster pace in identifying the connections between those files and Trump’s close circle that the public demands. We saw her loyalties through attacking the questioners in this chamber each time the facts got too uncomfortable, referring to the people in the chamber as infected by “Trump Derangement Syndrome” and accusing Democrats of using these files to distract from Trump’s successes. And most importantly, we can see her loyalties now as she downplays the consistent presence of Trump in the Epstein files and allows him and his allies to hide behind redactions with no accountability, day in and day out.

Pam Bondi is a continuing threat to the practice of law in this country. Someone who treats congressional subpoenas as optional, allegedly lies under oath and treats the young survivors of Jeffrey Epstein’s sex-trafficking as background props, is wholeheartedly unfit for the position of Madam Attorney General—let alone any position of power. For the sake of credibility within the Department of Justice and the fundamental principle that no one is above the law, Pam Bondi must face disbarment proceedings to be removed from her position as Attorney General. As Rep Lieu gracefully concluded, “Shame on you.”

This article was edited by Elaina Gibson.