Merrick Garland is Now Attacking Trump in Official Speeches

he gave voice to the principles that have guided not only prosecutors but all of our employees who understand deeply what is at stake when it comes to the fair and impartial application of our laws yeah like Jay brat Molly Gaston and Jack Smith the attorney for the government may not be influenced by a person's race religion gender ethnicity national origin sexual orientation or or political Association over the course of four decades during which I served in different jobs both career and noner not a Supreme Court Judge though Merrick Garland now comes to the podium to lecture Americans about our opinions on the Department of Justice if we think that the doj is filled with partisan political hacks who are using the system against their political opponents oh that might be a conspiracy theory that might be dangerous that might be undermining the institution which is the point because they've undermined themselves we love Justice here it's one of our values and we worked hard to get it and be a part of the justice system until we realized how disgusting it was now we call it out at every turn practicing here in the court of public opinion but the doj has been responsible for many many Corruptions and perversions of Justice you know the litany here they're well beyond just j6 and the raids on Trump's residence or the multiple criminal prosecutions that they're orchestrating they have corrupted the FBI to suppress news stories they're raiding people's homes they're arresting enemies of them and their party while they're protecting their own people who are burning down police precincts in Minneapolis and and so Garland came out today and he is making a rare appearance where he's going to try to be above The Fray but we know this is a political speech against Trump us attorney Dawn Eis served for nearly 20 years as a career assistant us attorney in the eastern district of Michigan today she leads that office I grateful to her for everything that she does and I am grateful to all the US attorneys who are here with us today for your leadership and for generously agreeing to invite the entire doj Workforce to this close cling session of the 85th annual us attorneys conference since 1939 us attorneys have traveled to Washington from across the country to meet with one another to discuss the most pressing issues facing their communities each year the Attorney General addresses the conference in recent years Attorneys General have delivered their remarks only to the US attorneys in a small windowless room upstairs in this building yeah now you want to bring it out in front of America everyone from here in this Great Hall first and foremost to thank you all of you the over 115,000 public servants who make up this department every day in communities across the country and around the world you do difficult and often dangerous work on behalf of the American people yeah rounding up J Grand you are the ones to whom victims and survivors turn to seek Justice on their behalf you are the ones to whom the American people turn for help when a community is targeted by hate crimes when a neighborhood is poisoned by toxic chemicals when workers and consumers are harmed by corporate monopolies when voters are unlawfully blocked from participating in our Democratic process when our country faces threats raging from violent crime and drug trafficking the terrorist organizations and authoritarian regimes you are the agents prosecutors correctional officers victims service specialists Prof so many others who step up when you are needed the most and in the wake of horrific tragedies you are the ones to whom communities look for protection and for Solace you also make up fake collusion hoes of the September 11th terrorist attacks on our country as we took time to remember all those who were taken from us on that day and in the year since we honored the doj employees who risk their lives in responding to the attacks they are heroes their service and sacrifice remind us that when the American people look to see what the justice department stands for they are looking to the example of the people who work here all of you I know that is an enormous responsibility so I want you to know that you have not only my gratitude but the Gratitude of every person whose life you have saved or changed through your work you do not hear it often enough thank you thank you for being selfless public servants and Patriots thank you for the countless hours the nights and weekends holidays and time away from family that you have spent because you believe in the mission of this department and because you want to serve the American people and thank you not only for the work you do but for the way you do your work with skill and integrity that is what I want to talk about today this Workforce is Ironclad commitment to the principles of fairness and impartiality that have long guided it and why that commitment is as important today as it has ever been 84 years ago then Attorney General Robert Jackson delivered a now famous address to the US attorneys right here in this Great Hall in that speech he sought to remind us attorneys of the enormous power they hold as Federal prosecutors and the responsibilities that come with that power he defined what he deemed quote a good prosecutor as a person who quote tempers Zeal with human kindness who seeks truth and not victims who serves the the law and not factional purposes and who approaches his task with humility close quote that speech which he titled the federal prosecutor outlin values that have echoed in the halls of this department he gave voice to the principles that have guided not only prosecutors but all of our employees who understand deeply what is at stake when it comes to the fair and impartial application of our laws yeah like Jay brat and Molly Gaston and Jack Smith public servants including me I first came to the justice department more than 40 years ago you are ignoring Congressional subpoenas you are ignoring rule of law because you're a partisan at a time when both the leadership and the career employees of this department were working to restore public confidence in the fair and impartial application of our laws in the wake of Watergate to do so department leaders like Attorneys General Ed Levy Griffin Bell and Benjamin cetti developed and formalized a set of norms to guide the Justice departments adherence to the rule of law relying on values foundational to our democracy in particular the promise of equal justice under law they put forward ass set policies to guide the Justice Department's work yeah tell that to the BLM protesters riers who burned down the the street versus the j6 totally regulations to protect the freedom of the press and policies to respect you're censoring the pr lawyers agents and staff and they included a project to set out for the first time in a single authoritative Source a set of principles to guide the exercise of prosecutorial discretion in my first job at the justice department working for attorney general civil edti I assisted on that project the result was a slim paper-bound volume entitled principles of federal prosecution published in 1980 modified now to prosecute Mega that's it just prosecute Trump thousand-word electronic document enshrined in the Justice manual the purpose of those principles as we wrote in the preface was quote to promote the reasoned exercise of prosecutorial Authority and contribute to the fair evenhanded administration of the federal criminal laws close quote much of that document is devoted to giving guidance to prosecutors about which factors they could should consider in a multitude of situations all right he's telling us about his old book report that's great chares they don't follow or care entering into plea agreements and making sentencing recommendations but the core of the principles is its directive about which factors an attorney for the government may not consider what in the words of that document quote the attorney for the government may not be influenced by a person's race religion gender ethnicity national origin sexual orientation or or political Association yeah political Association this is wild so this guy came out and he's going to give us a nice little self-aggrandizing speech here just tooting his own horn rubbing himself patting himself in the back here great job let me quote you from my own document that I wrote this is why I'm not politically prosecuting my enemies because I wrote a document 30 years ago and I'm following that document today you can trust me or beliefs by the attorney's own personal feelings concerning the person the person's Associates or the victim or by the possible effect of the decision on the attorney's own professional or personal circumstances this provision of the principles ends with an admonition quote Federal prosecutors and agents may never make a decision regarding an investigation or prosecution for the purpose of affecting any election or the purpose of giving an advantage or disadvantage to any candidate or political party in short we must treat like case alike oh gosh there is not one rule for friends and another for foes one rule for the powerful and another for the powerless one rule for the rich and another for the poor one rule for Democrats and another for Republicans or different rules depending on one's race or ethnicity that is what's happening right now to the contrary we have only one rule no you do not follow the facts and apply the law in a way that respects the Constitution and protects civil liberties I have spoken to you often about the importance of these Norms I know that to many outside of this department they may seem abstract or even inconsequential no they seem like anything but and they must not be taken for granted for us adhering to these policies principles and Norms in everything we do is how we fulfill the promise that is foundational to our democracy all people will be protected equally under the law all people will be held accountable equally under the law our Norms are a promise that we will fiercely protect the independence of this department from political in interference in our criminal investigations our Norms are a promise that we will not allow this department to be used as a political weapon too late our Norms are a promise allow this nation to become a country where law enforcement is treated as an apparatus of politics over the course of four decades during which I served in different jobs both career and non-career not a Supreme Court Judge though completely job I watched as those Norms became woven into the fabric of the justice department and were sustained by its dedicated career employees when I came back to doj in 2021 after a particularly difficult period for the Department I said that my mission as attorney general would be to reaffirm and strengthen those Norms as the principles upon which the Department of Justice operates so we took steps to better protect the Department's criminal and civil law enforcement decisions and its legal judgments from partisan or other inappropriate influences to name only a few of those steps reinstituted policies regulating contacts between department personnel and both the White House and Congress we strengthened and clarified the guidelines for sensitive FBI investigations we implemented remedial measures to ensure robust compliance with Section 702 of the foreign intelligence Sur we updated protections enforcement investigations in order to save the essential role that a free press plays in our democracy censored the hunter Biden story via the FBI prosecutorial discretion with respect charging pleas and sentencing we supplemented our state Secrets privilege policy to ensure that the United States invokes that privilege only when there is genuine risk to National Security and Department leadership restated and demonstrated through our actions again and again our respect for the work and integrity of the career employees who constitute the institutional backbone and historical memory of this department over the past three and a half years I have seen how the public servants of this department have continued to uphold and strengthen those Norms I have seen how you have to meet a range of extraordinary challenges and I have seen the incalculable toll this work has taken on so many of you especially those who risk your lives every day I am thinking of Heroes like Tommy weeks the deputy US Marshall who was killed while apprehending a fugitive earlier this spring and I'm thinking of Heroes like Tommy's family who have made the kind of sacrifice that no one should ever have to make in addition to seeing how you have operated in the face of dangers like violent crime and terrorism I have also seen how you have bravely carried on in the face of an unprecedented spike in threats targeting a range of public officials across the country over the past 3 and a half years there has been an escalation of attacks on the Justice Department's career lawyers agents and other Personnel that go far beyond scrutiny criticism and legitimate and necessary oversight of our work are you Prosecuting them these attacks have come in the form of conspiracy theories dangerous falsehoods efforts to bully and intimidate career public servants by repeatedly and publicly singling them out and threats of actual violence you have made clear that the justice department will not be intimidated by these attacks but it is dangerous and outrageous that you have to endure them it is dangerous to Target and intimidate individual employees of this department solely for doing their jobs and it is outrageous that you have to face these unfounded attacks because you are they're not unfounded that's the point rule of law they're legitimate you deserve better you deserve gratitude we deserve better the American people deserve better than a room full of sealed prosecutors who don't know the difference between real and legitimate and fake prosecutions you deserve to be honored the work you do every day makes a difference no and the way you do that work makes clear that the public servants of the Department of Justice do not Bend to politics and that they will not break Under Pressure the choices you make make in every investigation in every filing in every trial in everything you do to ensure the fair and impartial application of the law make this department and our democracy worthy of the public we serve and for that you deserve respect no we need a whole new doj you guys are a sh wholehearted you also have my promise that nothing will ever stop me from defending this department and defending the extraordinary people who work here I came back to doj as attorney general believing that our Norms are some of the most powerful tools we have to ensure our adherence to the rule of law Democratic Norms now served as attorney general for I continue to believe deeply that our Norms matter now more than ever to our department and to our democracy I also believe now more than ever that the most important resources the justice department has are the dedication and integrity of the people who work here as we wrote in the preface to the first principles of federal prosecution quote important though these principles are he's quation of our federal joral system the success of that system must rely ultimately on the character integrity sensitivity and competence of those men and women who are selected to represent the public interest of Federal Criminal jce J BR mol gon that the purposes of these principles will Jack Smith heot himself many of have heard me talk about why the work of the justice department is so important to me personally I've often shared that I wanted to give back to the country and to the system of laws that took my grandparents in and protected them oh gosh I had nowhere else to go someone get him some kleenex that protection is what distinguishes America from so many other countries the protection of law we don't rule of law our democracy relies on an independent law enforcement agency the Department of Justice to ensure those protections and critically our democracy depends on people who dedicate themselves and their careers to ensuring those protections people like all of you protecting the rule of law is the obligation of every generation of public servants at the United States Department of Justice in this time and place that responsibility is yours and it is mine I know we are up to it I am grateful to each of you for your commitment to this department to the Norms that sustain it and to the people we all serve thank you oh gosh so this was a disgusting Love Fest between these government prosecutors and Merrick Garland at the doj but normally apparently they do that behind closed doors but he had to come out and make a political statement and all these prosecutors just really thrilled to see him wow he's amazing yes 234 years of historical precedent shattered he raided our political opponents here let's take some pictures he's going to stand there a little awkwardly maybe somebody else is going to come talk shake some hands all right so hopefully he goes wipes his eyes from his very emotional speech