Grassley Questions Blanche at Attorney General Nomination Hearing

WASHINGTON – Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) questioned Department of Justice (DOJ) Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche while chairing Blanche’s nomination hearing to be U.S. Attorney General. Blanche committed to prioritizing antitrust enforcement to ensure family farmers and consumers get a fair price. He told Grassley he’s working to provide transparency and accountability in light of the revelations Grassley has uncovered through his Arctic Frost investigation . Blanche also detailed how the DOJ has worked to comply with the Epstein Transparency Act , including reviewing over six million pages of documents and providing unredacted versions to members of Congress. Blanche confirmed the DOJ is investigating the leads provided by Jeffrey Epstein’s victims and encouraged victims to meet with the DOJ and Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). Video and a transcript of Grassley and Blanche’s exchange follow. VIDEO Uncovering Arctic Frost and Special Counsel Jack Smith’s lawfare : GRASSLEY : “Jack Smith and his team possessed and reviewed congressional information and other sensitive material when they shouldn’t have and they were advised not to. Describe the steps you’ve taken to impose accountability so that this egregious and partisan misconduct never happens again.” BLANCHE : “The biggest thing we can do, Chairman, is [to] be transparent about what happened, and that requires us doing a check on ourselves and on the work that happened before us and being transparent with this body and providing records to you. “I think when the American people understand and learn what happened, and the egregious abuses that happened, it will be a check on making sure it never happens again. We strive every day to not only move forward as a department doing the right thing, but to make sure that anything that happened in the past, whether it's releasing emails or admitting to things that the department did that we shouldn't have done, [we’re being] transparent with the American people about that.” GRASSLEY: I made messages public between Jack Smith’s office that appear to relate to the Trump classified document case. Those messages showed government personnel left open a classified facility and potentially mishandled classified information, causing a security violation. While defense counsel to Trump, did the government apprise you of these issues? And secondly, did the Biden Justice Department do any investigation into the misconduct? BLANCHE : “We were never advised at that time when I was defense counsel to President Trump, and I'm not aware of any investigation that was started by that alleged conduct.” Antitrust enforcement : GRASSLEY : “I've long been concerned about concentration and anti-competitive conduct in healthcare, technology, but particularly in agriculture. Family farmers deserve fair prices. I held a hearing on anti-competitive activities in this committee last October on the subject of agriculture. As I recall, as a result of that hearing, the president issued an executive order, and an investigation was started in your department. I sense some pause in that right now. “If confirmed, do you have a commitment that the Justice Department will make antitrust enforcement a priority?” BLANCHE : “Chairman, absolutely, you're right. President Trump issued an executive order. I have worked closely with Secretary Rollins on this very issue. We recently held a press conference announcing some of the work that we're doing to not only deal with the anti-competitive behavior that we've seen, but also to help ease prices in the cattle market around the country. So yes, Chairman, I commit to that.” Complying with the Epstein Transparency Act : GRASSLEY : “This committee has also received outreach concerning the department’s handling of the investigation and release of the Epstein files, and your role in it. Some allegations include problematic redactions, insufficient efforts to follow investigative leads, a refusal to meet with victims and questions surrounding the transfer of [Ghislaine] Maxwell to a lower security prison. “I want you to take the opportunity to respond to these allegations. What would you like this committee to know regarding these files?” BLANCHE : “When President Trump signed the Epstein Transparency Act , the Department of Justice undertook a Herculean task to review millions and millions of potentially responsive files. We were required under the statute to do this expeditiously and very quickly. The Department of Justice did so. “We reviewed over six million pages… The reviewers were qualified, experienced attorneys within the department and the FBI. They took pains to apply appropriate redactions. “There were mistakes that were made, and so approximately 1% of the redactions had to be fixed after we released the Epstein files, Chairman. We had dozens of lawyers on call, 24/7. Whenever we learned that any victim's name had been improperly not redacted, we immediately took the document down and fixed it as soon as we could. That doesn't excuse the mistakes, of which I take responsibility, but it does mean that we tried to fix them. “The other thing that we did, Chairman, is we made unredacted versions of the entire database available to everybody in this body, and we did that because of transparency. Remember, for four years there wasn't a peep about Jeffrey Epstein. The Biden administration did nothing to be transparent about the Epstein case.… “We have spoken with over 30 representatives of dozens and dozens of victims since this process started. Any victim, if they're here today, I would encourage them, or their lawyers, to meet with the FBI. We will 100% investigate. There are no closed investigations. If we learn today, if we learn next week, if we learn next month that there's an individual that we can investigate, indict and prosecute out of the Epstein files, you better believe we will.” Regulations governing mail-order abortion drugs : GRASSLEY : “Our committee has received a lot of outreach about the department’s litigation position in Louisiana v. FDA . The plaintiffs in this case challenged the relaxed regulations governing mail-order abortion drugs. Can you tell the committee about this case and explain what the Department’s doing?” BLANCHE : “President Trump is the most pro-life president in history, and the work that this Department’s doing in that space is something that hasn’t been done for 10 years… [I]t would be wrong for me to talk about any litigation strategy beyond what’s in our briefs. But suffice to say, Chairman, that, as we talk about in our briefs, we are not in any way defending what Biden and his administration did.” Special Counsel Robert Mueller and the Russia Hoax : GRASSLEY: “On March the 15th this year, I made public a signed and sworn statement from an FBI official. That statement says two important things: Special Counsel Mueller's team lacked a legal basis to pursue a FISA renewal on Walid Phares and investigate Tom Barrack, but did so anyway. What steps have you taken to investigate these very troubling criminal allegations? And if you haven't taken any action, why not?” BLANCHE : “We are investigating that, Chairman, and it would be inappropriate in this setting to get into the details of that investigation. But the sworn affidavit that we reviewed that you provided does raise serious allegations.” -30-