Last week, the Trump administration broke irony when it raided the home and office of John Bolton, former national security advisor and current critic of Donald Trump, for — wait for it — suspected wrongful possession of classified documents. The law enforcement action was largely panned as retribution for Bolton’s 2020 book “The Room Where It Happened,” which is sharply critical of Trump’s lack of knowledge on all things foreign policy-related.
Now former White House attorney — and current critic of Trump — Ty Cobb is talking about the “justifiable paranoia” of those that dare to call out the president. Appearing on NPR, Cobb told host Steve Inskeep that when he first learned of the Bolton raid he “went down and locked my door.” The deadpan quip is played for a laugh, but there’s a dark truth there.
“I think anybody that’s critical of the president has justifiable paranoia at this stage of the game,” Cobb noted. And it’s a sentiment echoed by others — Norm Eisen and Andrew Warren wrote for MSNBC: “The early-morning knock on Bolton’s door should be a wake-up call to every American. This escalation in the Trump administration’s use of law enforcement to target political opposition marks a dangerous new front for American authoritarianism.”
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Cobb softened his stance a bit, saying not to “overreact” to the raid, and noting that he doesn’t believe that Bolton will ultimately be indicated.
But despite Cobb’s optimism on Bolton’s legal fate, it feels undeniable that retribution was part of the motivation and that’s unusual — and deeply disturbing. “There’s certainly an abandonment of traditional norms at the Justice Department in going back and doing this,” he said.
Cobb continued:
This is no longer a Justice Department, you know, with independent thinkers, you know, acting ethically. This – these people are so totally devoted to Trump and his campaign of vengeance. And, you know, they made that clear when they welcomed him into the Great Hall and Pam Bondi, you know, declared the fealty of the department to the president as opposed to the Constitution, which is actually what their oath is for.
It is definitely a new — and troubling — frontier.
Kathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, host of The Jabot podcast, and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email her with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter @Kathryn1 or Mastodon @[email protected].