Senate

GOP sees conflict of interest in Trump indictment

by Alexander Bolton - 06/09/23 6:00 AM ET

Republican senators, including members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, are warning the indictment brought by the Department of Justice against former President Donald Trump raises serious conflict-of-interest issues for Attorney General Merrick Garland.

The senators, who mostly spoke to The Hill in the hours before Trump himself broke the news of his indictment, cited Trump’s status as the leading Republican candidate for president and the fact that federal investigators have also seized classified documents President Biden kept in his personal possession after leaving the Obama administration.

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, warned Thursday evening the prosecution of Trump “will do enormous damage to the rule of law.”

“Indicting Donald Trump is the culmination of what Merrick Garland has been pushing for since he became Attorney General. The weaponization of our Department of Justice against enemies of the Biden admin. will do enormous damage to the rule or law & have a lasting impact,” he tweeted after Trump himself announced he would be indicted.

More Trump indictment coverage from The Hill

Some GOP senators predict an indictment of Trump by the Justice Department (DOJ) will galvanize Republican voters behind Trump and solidify his lead over the rest of the Republican presidential field.

Trump saw his poll numbers climb after Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg announced a 34-count felony indictment against the president in early April.

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said the decision to bring criminal charges against the leading Republican candidate for president, who could face Biden in the 2024 election, takes the DOJ “into totally uncharted territory.”

“I just can’t believe that they would even consider doing this,” he said, noting that Trump eventually returned the sensitive documents to the National Archives.

Hawley spoke to The Hill about the anticipated indictment Thursday afternoon, a few hours before Trump announced that federal prosecutors had charged him as a result of their investigation of his handling of classified documents.

“He has the ability to declassify them,” he added. “Are you telling me you’re going to indict a former president because he took records, which he subsequently returned, which he had the ability to take?”

“What is that going to look like if DOJ indicts this guy on the eve of a presidential election but the current president [is charged with] nothing?” he said.

“I think the precedents that these guys are setting here are going to be hugely destructive. We do not want DOJ intervening in presidential elections indicting candidates …. We’re talking about a document dispute,” he added.

Hawley reiterated his concerns in an interview with Fox News on Thursday evening.

“If the president in power can just jail his political opponents, which is what Joe Biden is trying to do tonight, we don’t have a republic anymore, we don’t have a rule of law, we don’t have the Constitution,” he said. “Joe Biden and his cronies are trying to take out their chief political opponent.”

Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) told The Hill on Thursday afternoon it’s “certainly not a good look” for the DOJ.

“I don’t trust any action Merrick Garland makes,” he said. “This is where you start looking like a banana republic.”

Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.), a top Trump ally in the Senate, on Thursday agreed with colleagues who say the Biden DOJ faces a conflict of interest.

“Sure it is. When you’ve got the former vice president, former senator and sitting president had, supposedly, the same type of documents … but you’re going after a guy who’s running for office, this is irrational,” he said, referring to Biden’s access to classified documents as the former chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and vice president during the Obama administration.

“People recognize this. Stop all this partisan politics stuff and get on with another election,” he said.

The FBI and National Archives have recovered classified documents from Biden’s home in Wilmington, Del., and the Penn Biden Center in Washington.

The president kept the documents after his prior stints in government service and the FBI began an investigation in November into whether he or his aides mishandled classified information.

That investigation of Biden is ongoing.

Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (W.Va.), a member of the Senate GOP leadership, said, “I would hope that the Department of Justice would be nonpartisan. I don’t have full faith in them at this point.”

She warned that the DOJ faces a backlash from Republican voters.

“I think they’re going to be upset, it’s a targeted thing,” she said of Trump’s loyal following among the GOP base.

Hawley predicted an indictment will only bolster Trump’s support among GOP primary voters, who rallied behind him after the Manhattan district attorney brought charges.

“It probably galvanizes them,” he said. “I think it’s probably good for Trump. Probably like the Bragg indictment. I imagine it would spark huge outrage.”

Democrats are defending Garland from Republican criticism.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) emphasized that Garland appointed special counsel Jack Smith in November to investigate Trump as a way to defuse the criticism that any charges brought against the president would be politically motivated.

“The Department of Justice has done everything they could do to depoliticize this political issue,” he argued. “To say that we’re going to walk away from it because of possible political connections would be to concede there are people in this country above the law, that’s wrong.”

Garland appointed special counsel Robert Hur in January to investigate Biden’s handling of the classified documents found at his home and private office.

Senate Republicans are divided over how strongly to push back on the DOJ.

Republicans who don’t want to see their party nominated Trump for president next year are holding their fire.

Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), an adviser to the Senate GOP leadership, said he wants to “wait and see what happens.”

Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.), who is backing Sen. Tim Scott’s (R-S.C.) presidential bid, said he doesn’t necessarily see a conflict of interest if DOJ prosecutors indict Trump.

“I’m not sure I could point out where that would be at this point,” he said. “He may be a candidate but he is not an elected nominee at this stage in the game. And so at this point I don’t see the conflict on it.”

Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said he wanted to wait to see what the DOJ would do but warned that bringing charges against Trump but not Biden would raise questions.

“If you look at the fact patterns between President Trump and President Biden, but for some of the allegations [against Trump] of obstruction, they’re identical so I’m kind of curious how that weighs into the administration’s decision to move forward with an indictment on the sitting president,” he said.

He the “electorate is generally going to view [Trump] as innocent until proven guilty.”

“Then, depending upon what actually comes out in the indictment, there’s going to be — depending upon the counts in the indictment, if any of them are politically motivated, if they are — then you would expect them to probably harden the resolve of his base,” he said.

Tillis said “there’s no question” the indictment against Trump in Manhattan boosted his poll numbers.