The defining feature of Justice Department official Emil Bove’s trip to the Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday was his reluctance to detail anything at all.
Bove, who is seeking Senate confirmation for a spot on the federal appellate court, rebuffed questions about his actions at the top of the DOJ, leaning heavily on the notion that the American public can’t hear about internal deliberations at the country’s primary law enforcement agency.
Republican senators let Bove, who’s spent just five months as No. 3 at the Justice Department, deflect as he seeks an influential position on the Third Circuit Court of Appeals. The court reviews federal cases in Delaware, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Just a day before the confirmation hearing, a fired prosecutor alleged Bove had instructed government officials to ignore the nation’s court orders with a “Fuck you.”
Democrats grilled Bove over his role as President Donald Trump’s enforcer at the Justice Department, where he took the charge in dropping the criminal case against New York Mayor Eric Adams to ensure he could support the ongoing immigration crackdown and instigating mass firings of prosecutors who previously either investigated the president or the Jan. 6 rioters who supported him.
Bove wouldn’t go into his role in the internal department decision-making that resulted in firing DOJ employees, even after Trump had made explicit calls for revenge against federal workers who’d angered him politically.
“It’s politics over law, and it should be law over politics,” Sen. Amy Klobuchar told him.
He wouldn’t address his role in — or his personal views of — Trump’s mass pardoning of men and women who took part in attacking the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, even those convicted of seditious conspiracy against the United States.
And Bove wouldn’t say whether he spoke to White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller before deciding to drop the case against Adams, which brought a warning from a prosecutor who resigned after writing that the rule of law was at risk.
“You have no basis to avoid that question,” Sen. Richard Blumenthal said.
“This committee and Congress have never accepted that kind of assertion as a basis to evade questioning in this kind of confirmation hearing,” Blumenthal told fellow senators. “But I’d like to point out also that this witness has no right to invoke that privilege. It’s a privilege for the government of the United States to invoke … the witness is invoking it selectively. When he wants to answer the question, no privilege. When he wants to avoid answering the question, he says he’s not at liberty to answer it.”
Bove also refused to detail his involvement in an effort, led by former D.C. interim U.S. Attorney Ed Martin, to freeze the Environmental Protection Agency’s Biden-era Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund grants and shop prosecutions to another district in Florida after a Washington magistrate judge rejected a seizure warrant application.
“I think it’s a really bad position for this committee to put itself in with respect to nominees or other oversight matters, particularly when we see the Department of Justice that is stuffed with lawyers who could easily cook up an attorney-client privilege defense or a deliberate process defense, and then we are now in a no-fly zone with respect of our oversight responsibilities,” Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse said.
Republican Sens. John Kennedy, Ashley Moody, Eric Schmitt and others instead lauded the principal associate deputy attorney general’s resume — which included a stint at the elite Southern District of New York.
“Your record is exceptional: prosecuting terrorists and spies and cybercriminals and major traffickers,” Sen. Ted Cruz told him.
That reputation was earned and deserved, a former high-ranking official at the Drug Enforcement Administration told NOTUS, speaking on condition of anonymity. However, three former colleagues and personal acquaintances in recent weeks have also told NOTUS that Bove has, in their view, made a Faustian bargain by attaching himself to Trump in a focused mission to achieve what has become a rapid professional ascent in the legal world.
During Bove’s brief period atop the DOJ while the Trump administration awaited confirmation of Attorney General Pam Bondi, he quickly authored several department-wide memos that hardened the law enforcement agency’s stance against undocumented immigration — and more closely aligned its priorities with Trump’s political messaging.
The hardest punches on Wednesday came from Sen. Cory Booker, who brought up revelations first brought up in a Politico exposé about how Bove nearly faced demotion while a federal prosecutor in Manhattan for his “bellicose” temperament in 2018.
Booker, referencing paperwork his office had acquired, said: “They describe you as ‘vindictive,’ ‘always looking for leverage and power,’ ‘a prosecutorial version of a drunk driver,’ ‘completely reckless and out of control,’ ‘needing adult supervision.’ One attorney said that, ‘Whatever due justice is supposed to mean, it doesn’t apply to Bove.’”
Bove, who was not given an opportunity to substantially respond during that exchange, later in the hearing countered those descriptions, while acknowledging some personal faults.
“I’m not perfect. I’m not here to tell you that. I do learn from mistakes. I do take constructive criticism seriously, I did with respect to that 2018 email. That’s why I got the job the next time it was open,” he told Sen. Katie Britt.
Regardless of Bove’s shot at reaching the Third Circuit, there could be severe consequences to the Justice Department from the whistleblower allegation that he instructed DOJ officials to ignore court orders to prevent them from interfering with the Trump administration’s mid-March operation to legally brand migrants “alien enemies” to justify whisking them to a Salvadoran prison. Federal judges in D.C., Maryland, and Massachusetts have sought answers about that operation, and some have floated the possibility of contempt hearings.
Sen. Adam Schiff, a former federal prosecutor who has frequently used his role on the Judiciary Committee to advance issues that could later cause legal exposure for Trump officials, confronted Bove about the allegation.
“Did you say anything of that kind in the meeting?” Schiff asked.
“Senator,” Bove began, “I have no recollection of saying anything of that kind—”
“Wouldn’t you recall, Mr. Bove, if you said or suggested during a meeting with Justice Department lawyers that maybe they should consider telling the court, ‘Fuck you?’ It seems to me that would be something you would remember, unless it’s the kind of thing you say frequently,” Schiff retorted.
After more jockeying, Bove settled back into his defensive stance.
“I participated in this matter, and I’m not going to get into the contents of legal advice.”
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Jose Pagliery is a reporter at NOTUS.