Thought Gaetz was a bad attorney general pick? Get a load of Pam Bondi

Pam Bondi, former Florida attorney general, speaks to reporters outside an election integrity volunteer training, June 18, 2024, in Newtown, Pa.

Donald Trump has chosen to nominate former Florida Attorney General and Fox News guest host Pam Bondi to serve as his attorney general. Trump made the decision after his first choice, sex trafficking investigation subject Matt Gaetz, decided to drop out.

Bondi fits right in with Trump ideologically. During her time serving in Florida, Bondi focused on attacking the Affordable Care Act, which Trump has long pushed to repeal.

In 2012, she worked with other Republican attorneys general on a lawsuit meant to undo the law, which has extended health care coverage to millions of Americans. Bondi clearly relished her role as the public face of the suit and a 2012 Tampa Bay Times story quoted Bondi asking her team to take photos of her in front of the Supreme Court following a news conference there.

The case failed and the law has remained in place—with coverage expanded by the Biden/Harris administration.

Bondi was also part of a 2018 lawsuit that sought to strike down provisions in the law that require insurance companies to cover people with preexisting conditions. That effort also ultimately failed.

Like so many others in the Trump orbit, Bondi is a frequent part of the rotation of guests and guest hosts on Fox News.

In her appearances on the network the lawyer distinguished herself by referring to Kenosha shooter Kyle Rittenhouse as merely a “little boy out there trying to protect his community,” and by calling for schools to follow the post-9/11 airport security model in response to school shootings, as opposed to gun regulation.

Trump enlisted Bondi to argue his case on the Senate floor when he was impeached for using the presidency to solicit political favors from Ukraine, and she was one of the public faces of Trump’s efforts to promote election lies following his loss to President Joe Biden in the 2020 election.

“We’ve won Pennsylvania,” Bondi claimed at the time—and in a Fox News appearance came up with a story about “fake ballots” purportedly being counted in the state. Trump lost Pennsylvania to Biden by over 80,000 votes.

Trump has frequently said that loyalty is extremely important to him, and Bondi has been an advocate for him for years.

Those ties have also led to the appearance of corruption. In 2016, Trump was forced to pay a penalty to the IRS after it was determined that he had broken tax laws by giving a political contribution to a Bondi-connected nonprofit.

Following that 2013 donation of $25,000 from Trump, Bondi decided not to investigate fraud claims against Trump University in her role as Florida attorney general. Years later, Trump paid out $25 million in settlements to students who said the organization had duped them with promises to impart the “secrets of success” in real estate.

Unlike Gaetz, Bondi may not have any ongoing sex trafficking investigations (that are publicly known at least) but she has proven herself a Trump diehard, which is his top qualification for the most important positions.