Trump’s new AG pick didn’t pursue lawsuit against Trump University – after he donated $25k to her campaign
The incoming Trump administration didn’t waste time on Thursday after Matt Gaetz announced he was dropping his bid to become attorney general, announcing former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi would seek the top position at the Justice Department instead.
Bondi, who served as Florida’s attorney general from 2011 to 2019, is both an experienced public official and a long-time Trump ally. Here’s what you need to know:
Ethical questions around campaign cash in Florida
Trump and Bondi have ties that date back over a decade, to when Bondi was serving as Florida’s first female attorney general.
In 2013, as Bondi’s office was receiving complaints from people alleging they’d been scammed by the future president’s Trump University seminars, her political committee received a $25,000 donation from the Donald J. Trump Foundation. While New York pursued lawsuits related to the seminars, Florida did not. Both Trump and Bondi have denied the donation was improper or related to the charging decision.
That wasn’t the only campaign-related scandal in Bondi’s time in Florida.
That same year, she persuaded then-Govenor Rick Scott to reschedule the execution of convicted murderer Marshall Lee Fore to accomodate a fundraiser.
“I should not have requested the execution be moved. It had been [delayed] twice,” she said at the time, The Tampa Tribune reported. “I’m sorry. And it will not happen again.”
A record of high-profile cases
Unlike some of the Trump administration’s other nominees, who lack direct government experience related to their cabinet positions, Bondi has a substantial record in public office, and has shown a willingness to take on high-profile cases.
She helped appoint the special prosecutor who investigated the 2012 shooting of Trayvon Martin, an unarmed Black teen, by a neighborhood watch volunteer.
She also initiated a lawsuit in 2018 against the makers of opioid medications, litigation that eventually culminated in a $3bn settlement with the state of Florida after leaving office. Bondi’s office also sued BP after the Deepwater Horizon oil spill and helped net Florida a more than $2bn payout.
A diehard Trump defender and political ally
Since leaving office, Bondi has been a resolute ally of Trump through his administration, as well as multiple impeachments and criminal investigations.
