President Donald Trump on Friday announced a ‘proud new chapter’ of the Justice Department that would end the ‘weaponization’ of government in rambling speech that revisited his old wounds and allowed him to gloat.
‘We are turning the page on four long years of corruption, weaponization and surrender to violent criminals and we are restoring fair, equal and impartial justice under the law,’ Trump said, standing before the seal of the Department of Justice.
But the main point of his speech was to declare victory over his political rivals and the federal officials who tried to prosecute him. It was yet another setting for him to repeat his complaints about the cases against him and to mock his vanquished rival, Joe Biden.
Trump described the federal cases against him as ‘bulls***,’ admitting he was breaking a promise to wife Melania Trump in using the word.
‘I will not use a bad word. I promised my wife I would never use a bad word,’ he said before going on to use an expletive: ‘The case against me was bulls***.’
From the campaign onwards, Trump has demonstrated his interest in having control over the department and which investigations it pursues.
The visit is the first by Trump and the first by any president in a decade. The last president to visit the department was Barack Obama, who attended then Attorney General Eric Holder’s departure ceremony.
President Donald Trump speaks at the Department of Justice
Trump spoke in the department’s great hall, the same stage which Merrick Garland, Joe Biden’s attorney general, announced investigations into Trump.
The president praised the officials he appointed to top positions at Justice and blasted those who led it in the last administration as ‘bad people. Really bad people.’
‘In recent years, a corrupt group of hacks and radicals within the ranks of the American government obliterated the trust and goodwill built up over generations.’
‘But in the end the thugs failed and the truth won. Freedom, justice and democracy won and above all the American people won,’ he added.
The president used his speech to rail against his usual list of perceived wrongs against him: spying on his campaign, persecuting his family, raiding Mar-a-Lago, and doing ‘everything within their power to prevent me from becoming the president of the United States.’
He even used biblical terms, complaining that the law was used to punish the ‘innocent’ and ‘reward the wicked.’
Much of his vitriol was directed to Biden and Garland. He said of them: ‘There can be no heinous betrayal of American values than to use the law to terrorize the innocent and reward the wicked. That is what they were doing at a level that has never been seen before.’
He complained he had to take ‘tremendous abuse’ in the trials against him and then pointed to his election victory: ‘How did I do? I think I’m president.’
Trump rambled repeatedly during his remarks – at one point goin going on a long rant about basketball coach Bobby Knight. His speech resembled those he gave at campaign rallies during the 2024 election.
Declaring himself the ‘the chief law enforcement officer in our country,’ Trump vowed: ‘I stand before you today to declare the days are over and they are never going to come back.’
He even hinted there should be retribution.
‘The people who did this to us should go to jail,’ he said without naming names or indicating who he meant.
‘I was attacked by a political opponent. And probably it helped that I was attacked more than anybody in the history of our country,’ he said.
He also complained that some reporting by the news media is ‘illegal.’
‘These networks and these newspapers are really no different than the highly paid political operative. And it has to stop. It has to be illegal. It is influencing judges and it is really changing law and that just cannot be illegal. I don’t believe it is legal,’ he said.
President Donald Trump admitted he was breaking a promise to Melania Trump when he swore during his speech at the Justice Department – above the couple on inauguration day
Attorney General Pam Bondi speaks at the Department of Justice before boxes of evidence
President Donald Trump used his speech at the Justice Department as a victory lap
He also bragged about actions he took as president.
‘We also terminated the clearances of the Biden crime family and Joe Biden himself,’ he said.
He went on to mock Biden, referring to a report from the special counsel that referred to Biden as ‘a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory.’
‘He was essentially found guilty but they said he was incompetent and therefore let’s not find him guilty,’ he said.
‘I would have rather been found guilty than what they found with him,’ Trump said as the audience laughed. ‘They said he didn’t know what the hell he was doing and therefore he is let go. I said, I would rather be convicted, Pam, than that. I said please convict me, don’t say that.’
He ended his speech by saying he was invited to come give it.
‘We will restore the prestige of this great department and we will bring back faith in our justice system for the citizens of every race, religion, color, and created,’ he said.
‘I want to tell you that this has been a great honor. I was asked to do it and I said is it appropriate that I do it? And I realized it is not only appropriate I think it is really important as I may never do it again it. I may never have another chance to do it again because this is something that I am leaving to the greatest people.’
There were a few hundred people in the audience for his remarks – all of them ardent Trump supporters.
It’s also unusual in that Trump was the focal point of two federal investigations – one relating to his actions in regards to the 2020 presidential election and one tied to the search of his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida, for classified documents.
He often railed against the ‘weaponization’ of the government against him, referring to the federal investigations into him.
Trump has felt empowered by a Supreme Court ruling that gives presidents immunity for any act conducted while they are in office.
He has filled the Justice Department top ranks with loyalists and his own personal defense attorneys.
These include Pami Bondi, who defended him at his impeachment trial in his first term, and two of his lawyers in the porn star hush money trial that saw Trump convicted by a New York judge last year.
In one of her first directives following her confirmation, Bondi ordered DoJ officials to ‘zealously defend’ the interests of the presidency.
She escorted Trump into the department when he arrived to give his remarks. She showed him his official portrait on the wall.
‘That’s a nice picture,’ Trump said.
The president also installed longtime loyalist Kash Patel as the director of the FBI.
Many DoJ staff who worked on the Trump investigation or those on the January 6th Capitol riot prosecutions were fired or resigned.
Trump, in his first term, had difficult relationships with his hand-picked attorneys general – Jeff Sessions was fired immediately after the 2018 midterm election, and Bill Barr resigned weeks after publicly disputing Trump’s false claims of fraud in the 2020 election.
Attorney General Pam Bondi escorted President Donald Trump into the Justice Department and showed him his official portrait on the wall
There was an anti-Trump protest on the National Mall at the same time as Trump’s speech
FBI Director Kash Patel at Trump’s speech
But, on Friday, he dominated the department.
The president and the other speakers delivered their remarks beside a pile of boxes and packages labeled as ‘DEA Evidence.’ The podium was flanked by signs with the message: ‘Fighting Fentanyl in America.’
The packages represented 180 kgs of fentanyl, which Bondi noted could kill 90 million people – the population of Texas, California and Florida – in its pure form.
More than 200 local sheriffs, law enforcement officials, staff from Capitol Hill offices, families impacted by the fentanyl epidemic and others wearing red ‘Make America Great Again’ caps gathered to hear from Trump.
Two angel moms – families of victims killed by illegal immigrants – were also present.
Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley and Senator Bill Cassidy were spotted in the crowd.
The crowd was asked to sit in the hall for hours before Trumps’ arrival, but they were provided a table of deli sandwiches, pretzels, chips and popcorn to help pass the time.
Some of Trump’s favorite rally music also filled the space with hits from Elvis, the Beach Boys, the musicals Grease and Phantom of the Opera and the Luciano Pavarotti and James Brown version of It’s A Man’s World blaring as guests waited for the president.
