WASHINGTON (AP) — On his first day as attorney general, Merrick Garland pledged to return to what he called the Justice Department’s “rules” and said he would work to eliminate the perception of political interference. But in the two years since he took office, the former federal judge has found himself in the middle of a political storm of historic proportions.
The case against Donald Trump, the first former president to face federal criminal charges, brought a throng of protesters to a Miami courthouse last week, as well as a flood of messages from Trump on social media and an onslaught of criticism of the Republicans
The decision to charge Trump, who is running for president again, is perhaps the most consequential in the history of the Justice Department. The final call came from Garland, whose demeanor leans toward the suave.
Even the day prosecutors briefed Trump on the charges was outwardly quiet in the halls of the Justice Department’s stately headquarters. That stillness was maintained late into the night amid the furor unleashed when the former president broke the news on his social media platform.
It wasn’t the first time Garland kept a poker face while under a high-profile spotlight. She had stayed mum when her 2016 Supreme Court nomination by President Barack Obama languished long enough to break a century-old record before it expired.
Garland spent two decades as a judge, and that experience seemed to come through in her folded hands and stoic expression as she made her public comments Wednesday about the charges against Trump. The attorney general stressed that he had followed the rules and regulations for special counsels and punctuated every word as he defended investigator Jack Smith as a “veteran career prosecutor.”
“We live in a democracy. These types of matters are resolved through the court system,” Garland said as he took about three minutes to field questions from two of the assembled reporters at the start of a meeting with U.S. attorneys on violent crimes.
That repeated mantra of commitment to the rule of law has not mollified Republicans who are standing by the accused former president and reframing the charges as unjust political persecution.
Those close to Garland say she has long been a careful, thoughtful presence and does what is needed, with few outward displays of empathy. Still, this time probably won’t be easy, said friend Robert Post, a Yale Law School professor who first met Garland when they served together as clerks in the late 1970s.
“I’m sure he’s saddened by the spectacle of a former president being indicted for the kinds of crimes we see Trump indicted for,” Post said. “He’s the least partisan person I know. He cares most about the law.”
Smith’s appointment as special counsel after Trump announced his 2024 presidential campaign was another effort to uphold Justice Department rules and the agency’s principle that it follows facts and the law, not politics. said Anthony Coley, who previously served as Garland’s chief spokesman at the department. .
“For the Attorney General, the rule of law is not just a lawyer’s turn of phrase. For him, the rule of law is a fundamental element of our democracy”, he said.
It was Smith, a former war crimes prosecutor, who stood alone behind a podium the day after Trump’s charges were made public to declare: “We have a set of laws in this country and they apply to everyone.”
This appearance also brought visual cues about the split between Garland and Smith.
Smith did not speak from the neoclassical headquarters where Garland works, but held his press conference in the elegant building across town where he has been working. The special counsel attended the hearing where Trump pleaded not guilty to illegally amassing classified documents. Smith sat in the front row behind his team of prosecutors.
He has the power to decide whether any charges should be filed, though Garland retains ultimate oversight of his work.
Trump announced on June 8 that he had been indicted, and according to the White House, Biden learned of the 37 crimes against the former president through news coverage. The next day, Biden was asked if he had spoken to Garland about the case. “I haven’t talked to him at all,” Biden told reporters. “I won’t talk to him.”
Garland was confirmed by the Senate in March 2021 in a bipartisan vote, with Democrats and Republicans saying he had the right record and temperament for now. He served as a federal appeals court judge for more than two decades after a stint at the Justice Department where he earned a reputation for meticulous preparation in the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing prosecution which killed 168 people.
Garland’s handling of the release of another special counsel investigation was similarly low-key. The FBI investigation into the origins of Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign, conducted by special counsel John Durham, originally began under Trump. When completed under Garland, the report was released with few redactions.
Trump’s last attorney general, Bill Barr, took a very different approach with the release of special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian election interference and the Trump campaign. Barr released his own memo on the report and later held a very pro-Trump press conference before releasing the report. The episode came during tumultuous years when Trump insisted that his attorney general and the entire Justice Department be personally loyal to him, undermining his reputation for political independence.
Garland will still have to deal with the more special findings of the lawyers. Smith is investigating Trump’s role in the January 6, 2021 Capitol riot and efforts to undo the 2020 election he lost to Biden.
Garland appointed a special counsel to investigate the presence of classified documents found in Biden’s Delaware home and former Washington office that date to his time as vice president.
In announcing the move, Garland used a phrase identical to Smith’s quote, words he used again in his brief comments after the impeachment: “independence and responsibility.”
