Blanche says at Senate confirmation hearing that he is ‘restoring trust’ in the Justice Department

WASHINGTON (AP) — Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche says at his confirmation hearing Wednesday that he and his team are “restoring trust” in the Justice Department, moving to address complaints from Democrats that he has weaponized the law enforcement institution by pursuing criminal investigations into President Donald Trump’s perceived adversaries.

Blanche is confronting questions about his brief tenure atop the Justice Department during a Senate hearing that will test Trump’s grip on Republican lawmakers whose support the nominee will need for the job. His prepared remarks were released before the hearing.

Blanche, Trump’s former personal attorney, has run the department on an interim basis since April.

Those actions will receive fresh scrutiny at the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing as Blanche testifies for the opportunity to serve out the duration of Trump’s term. The stakes are high given the upheaval inside the department, where mass firings and resignations have hollowed out the workforce.

In his prepared remarks, Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, the committee’s top Democrat, noted that the attorney general is the chief law enforcement officer of the country. “You take an oath to the Constitution, not to the President,” he plans to say. “But you have treated DOJ like President Trump’s personal law firm.” He said the Trump administration’s Justice Department has violated dozens of court orders.

Blanche, for his part, will insist that he has presided over a course correction at the department following years of investigations into Trump during the Biden administration.

“In recent years, Americans watched the Justice Department turned against many of you and a former president, and it damaged the public’s faith in justice,” Blanche will say. “We are fixing that.”

Blanche will need the support of each Republican on the panel

Blanche, who is expected to be uniformly voted down by Democrats on the committee, must win the support of all Republicans on the panel for his nomination to advance.

A particular focus is on Republican Sen. John Cornyn of Texas, who in May lost his primary and has said he won’t decide on Blanche’s nomination until after the hearing, and Sen. Thom Tillis, a North Carolina Republican who has opted not to seek reelection. Tillis has been an outspoken critic of a $1.776 billion fund that the Trump administration created to compensate people unjustly persecuted by the criminal justice system and then withdrew.

With the death of South Carolina Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham, who was a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, there are 11 Republicans and 10 Democrats on the panel. If even one Republican on the committee votes against Blanche, it could scuttle his nomination.

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche listens as President Donald Trump speaks in the Oval Office of the White House, Friday, June 26, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)