- 5/13/2025
US Attorney Ed Martin held a press briefing on Tuesday.
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00:00Welcome, everyone. Thank you for being here. Before I begin my remarks, let me recognize the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Arkansas, John Ross, who is in town for some business and stopped by to make sure that we're collaborating closely. He and I talked early in our tenure and about some ways to work together. So welcome and thank you for everything you do in Arkansas. As a Missourian, we love Arkansas almost as much as Missouri. So glad you're here.
00:27Thank you all for coming. I appreciate you coming, especially Washington traffic in the rain. I can slow you down. You know, when President Donald J. Trump asked me to be his U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia on day one, I immediately accepted because I knew it was what we call a tip of the spear assignment, a tip of the spear assignment.
00:50And I knew if I did the job the way President Trump wanted me to, that it would get plenty of attention. And so it has. And I'm proud of what we've done to make D.C. safe again and what we've done in this office.
01:03The president has given me a new assignment as the director of the weaponization working group, a group that has been working already for some two months and of which I'm a part of.
01:14It's a very impressive group. The docket is broad all across the country and in fact, across the world where government was used against the citizens, weaponized against the people.
01:25We have a job to do and we're going to do it. I've also been named the Department of Justice or the pardon attorney for the nation.
01:34And I spoke just a few moments ago with Alice Johnson, one of the trusted advisors to President Trump on issues of pardons and others.
01:43She's an extraordinary woman. And we're looking forward to working together in that important job.
01:48I have loved my job as D.C.'s U.S. attorney and I really have come to treasure the colleagues and the work.
01:58But I'm really going to love how Judge Jeanine Pirro takes up this mission with her passion and intelligence and her real world experience as a prosecutor and a judge.
02:09She and I have been in contact since she was appointed. She will be getting sworn in very soon.
02:15And she's totally energetic and focused. She's really amazing. And I'm pleased to be working with her.
02:22My motivation to speak today to you all is twofold.
02:26First, I wish to highlight our recent success in fighting illegal immigration.
02:31Second, I wish to express my concern that far too many bad guys are being let go, released by our courts, not detained.
02:41And specifically, I'm thinking right now, and you can see the images of two bad guys, two fentanyl dealers, who were found in possession of illegal machine guns.
02:51If you look at the drugs, the pictures of the drugs and the numbers related to the drugs up here, it's enough drugs, obviously fentanyl, to kill, you know, an apartment building.
03:01And also these guns that they seized are enough to slaughter, you know, people living in an apartment building.
03:08And yet they were released, these two that I'm thinking of.
03:11So this is a problem, and we have to address it.
03:14So let me comment and commend the recent illegal immigration initiative.
03:20In about a month ago, we had Tom Holman visit, and Emil Vove from the Department of Justice.
03:26Both of them talked about our priorities, and specifically about illegal immigration.
03:31We took seriously, we take seriously the charge to focus on illegal immigration, and our initiative has been extraordinarily successful, both in collaboration and in the concrete successes that we have done.
03:45First, I salute the brave men and women of law enforcement who are out there making D.C. safer by capturing these illegal aliens.
03:53It is dangerous work, work that they have to do in parts of our district that sometimes they are less familiar with, and so they work together in extraordinary ways to get this done.
04:05In the last week alone, in this initiative, we had nearly 200, I think 189 by count, have been captured and are facing the consequences.
04:16I want to commend, by name, Jonathan Hornock, the head of our criminal division.
04:22Jonathan has been a prosecutor in Texas and in Arizona.
04:27He's used his experience as a thoughtful prosecutor to be a leader of our division, but also to work with our national and local law enforcement partners to execute this operation.
04:38I do want to warn people, warn the citizens of the district, that the D.C. local leadership, the council and others, has made D.C. a sanctuary city.
04:53We're all familiar with that, but the cost of that is something that is paid by the citizens.
04:58And I warn you, as we've looked more and more at the sanctuary city provisions, that it is crippling law enforcement in their effort, local law enforcement, to make sure to keep D.C. safer.
05:09That needs to change, and it needs to change right now for the citizens of D.C. more than anyone.
05:16My second point in gathering, it deals with a concern that we have about the deteriorating, what I call the deteriorating role of our justice system,
05:24specifically our courts, when it comes to putting bad guys away, getting them off the streets.
05:30Our gun initiative, which has been hugely successful, started in March, continued through April, going on in May,
05:36taking felons in possession of guns and taking them to federal district court was required in part because we couldn't have confidence that our superior court judges
05:45would detain these bad guys who are in possession of guns in violation of the law.
05:50Well, that is ongoing, and these two fentanyl dealers who were found in possession of these illegal machine guns,
05:58they were not detained by our courts.
06:00This is a heinous, heinous problem.
06:03We're operating in a system where the Public Defender Service and others think that it's okay to not only argue vociferously for a lack of detention,
06:12but to successfully get that detention from the courts.
06:15It's a problem that has to be addressed.
06:18First, soft, on-crime decision-making, in this case, is dangerous, needs to change.
06:24The President of the United States was gracious recently to remind people that our office in our initiative to make D.C. safe again
06:31has had a great success in these 100 days to lower crime by something close to 30 percent.
06:38But it was not easy.
06:40It takes attention, it takes focus, it takes resource, and it takes law enforcement working with prosecutors
06:46to make sure that we get the bad actors off the streets.
06:50And we need help with this in every aspect of the work.
06:54Congress gave the District of Columbia, as many of you know, home rule.
06:58But with that comes the responsibility to the city's residents, to the businesses, and to the workers,
07:04and the responsibility, frankly, to the rest of the country that our nation's capital will be safe.
07:10When the District's leadership exploited home rule to make D.C. a sanctuary city,
07:15they acted as if D.C. was just another city.
07:18And it's not.
07:19When our justice system thinks that justice is a revolving door,
07:23when bad actors like the ones with guns and fentanyl get back on the streets,
07:27we have a growing problem.
07:29As we approach the President of the United States' amazing America 250 celebration,
07:34more and more people all over the world and the country are going to join us in Washington, D.C.
07:39And there needs to be a robust discussion now about D.C.'s sanctuary city status
07:44and its justice system and its judges.
07:47And if that means that home rule is on the table to go away, well, then so be it.
07:52If that means that the system of appointing judges that gets us judges who continue to do this to our city,
07:57if that system has to change, of course, they're appointed by the President, confirmed by the Senate,
08:02then so be it.
08:04With that, I'm happy to take your questions, and I thank you for being here.
08:10Yeah.
08:11Michael Consolini from the Associated Press.
08:13Mr. Martin, why do you think your nomination failed?
08:15Well, we went through the process, and I think the Senate has their role in the process.
08:22And ultimately, the President decided we didn't want to keep going forward.
08:26We had the votes.
08:27I can do math.
08:27I know the votes.
08:28And so Senator Tillis had some objections that he expressed, and that blocked it.
08:33But ultimately, I think we, you know, the President of the United States said we have other battles to do,
08:38and so I'm excited about that.
08:39Mr. Martin, just to follow up on that question.
08:41Sure.
08:41I'm sorry.
08:42Keep the Alexander Washington Post.
08:44Sorry.
08:44I'm going to follow up on that question for him.
08:46Is there anything that you would do differently, Mr. Martin, during these past three or four months?
08:50Anything you would have done differently?
08:51Well, I think that probably the one thing I would do differently is turn faster towards the question of violent crime.
09:01You know, we started this initiative in March and April.
09:04I feel like we could have done that sooner.
09:06You know, I think we, I could do it now a little bit.
09:09I think the problem of juveniles, the Attorney General of D.C. is in this building.
09:13He has sort of purview over juveniles.
09:15It's a failure.
09:16I'm not saying he's a failure, although I get close, but it's a failure.
09:19Our juveniles are being exploited by the, across the country, the juvenile problem is one every city, all cities are facing.
09:26So I think it's something that we all have to be worried about for our community.
09:30But, but in general, I don't spend a lot of time worrying about regrets.
09:34I think, and looking back, I'd like to look forward and see what's coming next.
09:39Sir, go ahead.
09:40Yes.
09:40I have a press for CNN.
09:42Mr. Martin, one of the, obviously one of the things you're going to be focused on is on this task force on weaponization.
09:49Can you provide an update?
09:51I know it's been already stood up and it's been ongoing.
09:54Can you provide any updates on, on the work that has been ongoing?
09:58We know that, I think they, they provided, the FBI provided the names of 5,000 employees who are working on those investigations that were of issue.
10:08Are those people under investigation?
10:11Is there any progress towards any clarity on what happens to those people?
10:15And then I have a follow-up on the crime issue too.
10:17Well, I would say specifically on those, I don't have an update on those individuals or the idea you described.
10:23I would say this.
10:24The working group that's been meeting is an all-star team.
10:28That's across DOJ.
10:29It's people from different sections, civil rights from different parts of the place.
10:33It's an all-star team focused initially on what Attorney General Bondi gave us on the memo.
10:38If you look at the memo on the second page, there's a list.
10:42Why were Catholics targeted?
10:43Why were school board members, why were school board families targeted?
10:47What happened with J6?
10:48What was Jack Smith, the collaboration between federal employees, prosecutors, and Jack Smith?
10:53How did Jack Smith weaponize the grand jury system?
10:56Those, there's a set on there, whistleblowers.
10:58The Biden administration was particularly hostile to whistleblowers.
11:02So we've been looking at the specific charges that Attorney General Bondi gave us, and we've been going through them.
11:07We've also been getting more weaponization folks coming forward within the government as well as outside saying,
11:14can you look at this, can you look at that?
11:15It's a problem that seems to be growing as we, faster than we can capture it.
11:21What I can say is this, when it comes to the problem of weaponization, the first part of it must be transparency.
11:31We have to show our fellow Americans what went on, because when you hide it and then you prosecute, you look like you're targeting.
11:41That's what the Biden administration, they didn't tell you what they were doing, they just targeted people.
11:45And so they really lied, mostly, they mostly were lying about it.
11:48And so we have to be more transparent.
11:51So a lot of what we're doing is trying to get more of the facts out and finding.
11:55I was on the phone earlier today with Chairman Grassley's staff about some of the documents that they want to see put out
12:03and that are, right, currently a lot of them are redacted and they want to see them out so that people can know what's going on.
12:08And we're going to work on that.
12:09We're going to do that more and more.
12:10So first thing is more transparency and then, of course, accountability.
12:14And the weaponization group, I think the president's acknowledgement that so much was going on, you needed a captain.
12:21And I'm happy to take the helm of that and sort of get that thing really going for the country and for the people.
12:27In a follow-up card.
12:28Yeah, you mentioned, obviously, the issue of the revolving door of people who get arrested and then get released.
12:36From what we can tell, a lot of those people are not here in this country legally.
12:40They're people from Washington, D.C. or in the surrounding area, right?
12:44Is that, am I to understand that you think that this actually city issue is part of this revolving door problem?
12:50What's the relationship there?
12:52Well, no, I mean, the relationship is that lawlessness is unhelpful to being able to make people safe.
12:59If you're going to change, if you're going to decide that you don't want to enforce the law of illegals or you don't want to enforce the law of detaining people, lawlessness gives people, bad guys, an opportunity to do worse things.
13:09So I'm not sure.
13:10Look, right now we're living in a place where illegals that are detained, the courts will actually send them to the corrections.
13:16Listen carefully.
13:17Corrections will have to release them, won't give them to ICE.
13:21So we have to have ICE agents sitting outside of the jails waiting to get them, endangering themselves, endangering the illegals.
13:28That's because of lawlessness, right?
13:30If they abided by the law, the federal law, they would be not doing that.
13:33So similarly, the detention of people who commit these crimes, the barrier to being detained is to show that there is enough reason to detain them.
13:44That's the barrier.
13:45We have that in law.
13:46What we have currently is judges who think they are the advocates who can decide that.
13:51And so what we have to do is these bad guys don't get detained.
13:54Then we have to appeal it.
13:55We have to go up and appeal it.
13:56And the judges will, not every time, but almost every time, say, yeah, you know, we're not going to let this guy out with these guns and this stuff.
14:02So I think they're related.
14:05And we better have the conversation about it now if we're going to make the city safer.
14:09Yes, sir.
14:09Go ahead, please.
14:11Mr. Martin, Alan Etter from WTOP here in town.
14:14You have had some criticism of city leadership for dealing with crime in the city.
14:20Can you describe your interaction with the mayor or the police chief in terms of developing up, coming up with resolutions?
14:26Well, the first person I spoke to when I got the job was the chief of police.
14:30She's been very responsive.
14:32Then I also talked to the mayor, met with the mayor.
14:35First meeting I took was with the mayor.
14:37So early on I made the effort to go see them, and we work with them all the time.
14:40They were in touch a few minutes ago.
14:42What I did was I went out on ride-alongs in every part of the city, and I went and I said to the cops, detectives, sergeants, beat cops, what's going on here where you are?
14:53And so what we did was we changed our policies.
14:55We now allow the cops to paper in person, to be face-to-face with the prosecutor instead of doing it by e-mail only.
15:03It's been a tough process.
15:04It requires overtime, and the chief has been supportive of that.
15:09But we're trying to create a different relationship than just e-mail and cyber prosecuting and cops.
15:15And so we tried to empower the cops and listen to them.
15:19The cops will tell you that they were upset that for all these years if there's a misdemeanor assault on police, it doesn't get charged many times because it's a lot of effort for a misdemeanor.
15:29And we said we're going to charge every single time, no matter what.
15:32We're going to charge it.
15:33We're going to work it.
15:34It may take a lot of effort.
15:35We may be in front of a jury that nullifies us, but we don't care because cops need to know we have their back.
15:40That's because we listen to them.
15:42So, and then we listen to the community.
15:44The communities up in arms that we have cannabis, marijuana, pop-up shops and shops all over the place.
15:51What gathers around those places is not healthy.
15:54It's not helpful.
15:55And, again, the D.C. City Council has laws that appear to contradict federal law.
16:00I was down in Georgetown.
16:02These aren't, by the way, these aren't Republicans.
16:04These aren't conservatives.
16:05These are family members who are saying, hey, we don't want a pot store within 1,000 feet of a school, right?
16:12And not only one, by the way, it's four schools within 1,000 feet of a pot dispensary, a pot shop.
16:18So those are the policies you hear when you listen to the people.
16:23And I think the mayor generally has been supportive.
16:25She got rid of Black Lives Matter Plaza.
16:27That's something that I wanted and the president wanted.
16:30She changed some of the policies to make it a little bit better for homeless.
16:34I think the problem is percolated back up again.
16:37That's something she controls.
16:38So we have a give and take.
16:40She's got to be the mayor.
16:41But as much as we can listen to what's needed for the cops and for the community, we've been able to do.
16:50Ma'am, you know?
16:51Catherine Falters with ABC.
16:53I have, obviously, you said you want to talk more about your new role and forward-looking.
16:58So on the topic of pardons, I have two questions on it.
17:01But one, President Trump, I believe it was last month or the month before, said on his social media account that he believed that the last-minute pardons by President Biden were null and void.
17:12As pardon attorney, do you anticipate formally nullifying those pardons with the intention of investigating people who President Trump presumes to be his political enemies?
17:23Well, I will say there was a – you concluded the thing there.
17:28I certainly think that my job as pardon attorney will be to make clear how the pardons work.
17:34And I think that no one – no one, I think, with a standard of sort of reasonableness thinks that what Joe Biden did at the end of his term was particularly reasonable.
17:44Now, I happen to think the pardon power is plenary.
17:46If you use the auto pen for a pardon power, I don't think that that's necessarily a problem.
17:52But the question is, how did this happen?
17:54Just like, by the way, many people said, well, wait, there's, you know, 1,500 January 6th pardons.
18:00How did that happen?
18:01These are big moments.
18:02And so they have to be able to withstand scrutiny.
18:05And I do think that the Biden pardons need some scrutiny.
18:09And they need scrutiny because we want pardons to matter and to be accepted and to be something that's used correctly.
18:15So I do think we're going to take a hard look at how they went and what they did.
18:20And if they're, I don't know, null and void, I'm not sure how that operates.
18:23But I can tell you we've had – already I've had, in my current position or my position as U.S. attorney,
18:28we've had – been taking a look at some of the conduct surrounding the pardons and the Biden White House.
18:34Did you have a follow-up, Ben?
18:36I do, but you answered my pardon follow-up.
18:38But just on weaponization, you've been making a lot of public comments, media appearances,
18:44saying that you intend to release information on people, even who you don't charge.
18:49My reading of the Justice Department manual is that it clearly states prosecutors shouldn't name people,
18:55especially people who they don't intend to charge.
18:57So how do you square those two things, what you've been saying publicly and what the DOJ manual says?
19:03Well, I'd have to look at what the provision you're referring to to see.
19:05We want to square ourselves with doing the things correctly.
19:08But I will say that the prosecutor's role and at this moment in our history is to make clear what the truth is and to get that out.
19:16And when Chuck Grassley is asking for more transparency from the government, we need to listen.
19:23When whistleblowers are talking about what's going on,
19:25and it can't be that the system is stifling the truth from coming out because of some, you know, procedure.
19:36If it's in the manual, if there's a law, look, I'm the guy that stands here and tells you the January 6th defendants,
19:41every one of them wants all their documents back.
19:43They want us to release all the video.
19:44And we said that's not how it works.
19:46We have to be thoughtful and serious about how the system works.
19:49If you want all that information, there is a path.
19:51If you're suing about it, there is a way.
19:54But we have to be serious about it, just like we have to be serious about getting to the truth.
19:58There are some really bad actors, some people that did some really bad things to the American people.
20:03And if they can be charged, we'll charge them.
20:06But if they can't be charged, we will name them.
20:08And we will name them.
20:09And in a culture that respects shame, they should be people that are shamed.
20:14And that's a fact.
20:16That's the way things work.
20:17And so that's how I believe the job operates.
20:20When you're talking about weaponization, you're talking about...
20:22I'm sorry, sir.
20:23I was going to call on somebody in the back.
20:25Hey, it's Scott from CBS.
20:27Just picking up on the last point you just made, Mr. Martin, reviewing the pardons.
20:31I think you acknowledged your inquiry into Congressman Garcia from California and Senator Schumer from New York.
20:38Can you tell me where those stand and whether this review may include members of the January 6th committee for, I guess, criminal misconduct?
20:45Well, let me say on the first thing, Senator Schumer, who someone asked how I didn't get confirmed.
20:50Senator Schumer made it a point, I think, on my confirmation to be very active.
20:54That's what I'm told by senators and Senate staff because I talked about his threats.
21:00You know, last week I was assaulted on the steps out here.
21:03You probably saw it.
21:04But that's a direct result of the kind of conduct that Chuck Schumer has done and continues to do and encourage others, too, on both sides at times.
21:13But we don't stand for it.
21:15When I wrote a letter to Elon Musk, I said, we'll prosecute people that threaten your people.
21:20When I wrote a letter to Chief Judge Boesberg, I said, we'll prosecute people that threaten your people.
21:24When I meet with my staff, I say, we will prosecute people that threaten our U.S. attorneys or dox them or pizza dox them.
21:30There has to be one standard, and the standard has to be more respectful and serious than that.
21:34So I can't comment on an ongoing investigation.
21:37I can tell you that Chuck Schumer's matter, we looked at it closely.
21:40He had apologized on the floor.
21:42He had gone out of his way to make clear that he wanted to take back the threats.
21:46I think that ultimately we decided that that was probably made it difficult to charge him with a crime.
21:52But I'm happy to say out loud that what he did was shameful.
21:55Back to my point.
21:56It was a shameful thing to do.
21:57It's something that is destructive to the discourse and very intentional in a way that was very different than on the floor of the Senate.
22:06And so that's, I think, the problem was there.
22:09And, again, I won't comment on any other investigations.
22:12Mr. Martin, Ted Oberg from News 4.
22:14In your opening remarks, you questioned D.C.'s right to home rule.
22:18I want to ask you a little bit more about that.
22:20Do you truly believe D.C. is at a point where they should lose home rule?
22:23And have you told the president your feelings on that?
22:25Wait a second.
22:25I didn't question their right to home rule.
22:27Well, they have a right to home rule.
22:29That's the law.
22:29Okay?
22:30They have a right to it.
22:30I'm not questioning their right.
22:31That's the system.
22:32I'm saying that if they can't get their house in order, they shouldn't be surprised that people are asking questions about it.
22:37Did you talk to the president about it?
22:38No, I haven't talked specifically about that.
22:40But when the pardon came down of the two police officers who had been railroaded by this office and he pardoned them, one of the conversations that we did have was, how do we get the judges under control?
22:52Everybody in this town knows that the Superior Court judges, we have problems with the judges.
22:56And there are currently upwards of 15 vacancies that the president appoints, and he asked about the judges.
23:02We know that's a problem.
23:03So my point in this is to make sure that people know, again, you have to speak the truth.
23:09If you don't want to speak the truth, you can move along and wonder how this keeps happening.
23:12The truth is being a sanctuary city makes it more dangerous for the citizens.
23:16The truth is that letting people that have this kind of firepower and these kind of drugs in their possession, letting them get away from being detained is not good for the community here.
23:27It makes it more dangerous.
23:29And therefore, I think people should be having the conversation.
23:32Yes, sir.
23:32And of the 189 people that were picked up in Operation Restore Justice, I got that right, how many of them had prior criminal records and how many are solely immigration violators?
23:42So, yeah, I think many of them, most of them are administrative.
23:53So, meaning that they're, I think it's, I think it's, we'll find out for you.
23:57I think it's, I think it's probably something like 10 or 12 were criminal and then the rest were administrative.
24:01So, like 90 plus percent were administrative.
24:03Yeah, but it's against, it's against the law.
24:05I mean, still, it's still an important thing to do.
24:07And, and by the way, you know, we've asked the, for example, we've asked the shelters here.
24:11Look, the bad guy, again, you've got to speak truth.
24:13The bad guys in this, in this country know it's a sanctuary city.
24:16So, on their way to Miami and New York, they come and stay in the, in the shelters here.
24:20And so, you ask the shelters, can you give us the rosters?
24:23And they say, no, we don't want to give them to you because we're a sanctuary city.
24:26That's, that's a problem, right?
24:29Metropolitan Police Department, if an officer stops someone, they're not allowed to ask about their status.
24:33If they do, they'll be fired.
24:35That, that's a, a safety, that should be a safety concern for people.
24:39All right, go ahead, please.
24:40Two questions.
24:41Yes.
24:41One, you mentioned the woman who spit on you.
24:42Any update on that case?
24:44Are there charges in investigation, anything?
24:45It's a new experience for me as the victim.
24:47I'm not allowed to be involved at all.
24:49So, I don't, all I know is that they, soon after when they interviewed me, the FBI and the marshals gave the impression that they knew.
24:55Anyone from the office, can they comment?
24:56I don't think they want to comment.
24:57Second, going back to your point about transparency, I think you said there has to be transparency when you hide it and then prosecute, that creates a problem.
25:07The former chief of the criminal division in this office, Denise Chong, says she resigned because she was pressured to investigate something where there wasn't evidence of a crime, Biden climate spending.
25:18Was she pressured to do that?
25:20Is that one of those instances where we can be transparent and talk about it?
25:24If we, if we don't and then prosecute, it's a crime.
25:26I mean, it's an issue, is what you said.
25:29Well, no, I mean, again, I, the characterization by a disgruntled employee, I, you know, I just think everybody takes it with a grain of salt.
25:35Let me comment on the specifics.
25:37Again, when you see unprecedented conduct, you, you, as a prosecutor and as Americans, you should look and say, what's going on here?
25:45$6.7 billion transferred to one nonprofit that was created six months earlier, is a, nine months earlier, by three nonprofits that came together as a consortium.
25:55That's the facts, right?
25:56If you can look it up, it's public record.
25:57I'm not revealing anything in investigation.
25:59That should make everybody go, what's that?
26:01That's the largest transfer of wealth ever from the government to a nonprofit.
26:05And it was done with a massive lawyer, effort of lawyering and a massive application.
26:10So when you look closely at it, you say to yourself, is this a criminal conduct?
26:15And it's not clear, but it does make you pause.
26:17That's what you're supposed to do is pause.
26:19Just like if there's the Biden pardons are unprecedented in their extent, right?
26:24Back to when Hunter Biden was whatever age, you say, that's uncommon.
26:28We ought to take a look at that.
26:30That doesn't, as a prosecutor, that doesn't mean you're indicting anyone or subpoena anyone or putting them in.
26:34And when we talked to folks about that, the concerns were real and serious, unprecedented.
26:39So the woman that you're talking about had never seen anything like this.
26:42So she's saying whatever she says now, but that's not what an unprecedented situation calls for.
26:48And we used exactly the process you're supposed to use.
26:51You go through the process.
26:53You talk to the magistrate judge.
26:54You go and say, do we have a situation where we can go further?
26:57And that's what we did.
26:59So, again, I will tell you, whether it's USAID or a climate action fund, we're seeing unprecedented conduct in the last four years especially that we've never seen before in a way that's different than we've ever seen.
27:13Weaponization as well as money transfer.
27:16And I think Americans deserve to have people saying, what's going on here?
27:20This might, go ahead.
27:21There's a follow-up, and then I'll take you.
27:23You'll be the last.
27:23You said in your letter to Elon Musk that you would be willing to investigate people who act even unethically.
27:28Is that a sufficient predicate to open an investigation in this office, unethical behavior?
27:32It's what I mean by that.
27:34It's the same thing I meant to Judge Boesberg.
27:36When people send a nasty email about his daughter or when they do something like that, we have a process.
27:43We take in the threats.
27:45We have a threat portal, and we process it both for data and to understand it.
27:49And so the term, I'm not sure we'd open up a legal investigation into unethical behavior, but we certainly would be tagging it.
27:56Again, unethical behavior is conduct that gives you an indication that someone is in a certain direction.
28:03It may not be a crime, but you can at least say, okay, what is this person doing and how are they doing it?
28:07And I think that's what I meant there.
28:09Go ahead, sir.
28:10Have you changed any of your views since you joined?
28:12Sorry, where are you from?
28:14Ryan Riley, NBC News.
28:15I was curious if you had any change in any of your views since you joined.
28:18I know Dan Bongino, you've been working on the pipe bomb investigation.
28:21Have I changed any of my views on the pipe bomb?
28:25Is it your pipe bomb or anything related to January 6th or elsewhere as you learn more information in this position?
28:30So everything or January 6th?
28:32After the pipe bomb, I guess, specifically.
28:34What's the update on the pipe bomb investigation?
28:37Well, the FBI, as well as us, took a new look at it, put new people on it, new eyes on it to get to the bottom of it.
28:45I would say anything like an investigation that complex, there's a lot to it.
28:51There's a lot of data.
28:52And so I think a new set of eyes is always good.
28:54Beyond that, I think we have to leave it go because it's active.
28:58And I think that we're optimistic.
29:00And in terms of the working group, what work product do you expect to ultimately come out of this?
29:05What kind of updates will you be having as we go forward?
29:08Well, you heard me allude to, I think one thing is we're going to be more public-facing.
29:12When I was asked to switch over here, I was told, you know, this job, you need to be out more and talk about what's going on.
29:18So I think we'll be a little bit more outward-facing in terms of talking about what's happening.
29:21We'll also be asking people to come towards us.
29:25At one of our recent meetings of the working group, the question was, how do we set up a portal where people can come and talk about whether a government's been weaponized against them?
29:33As to work product, we're in the Department of Justice, right?
29:36So we've got U.S. attorneys and we've got the Civil Rights Division in DOJ that can take up cases, can prosecute cases.
29:43So I think we have the full set of tools on the table across the country to look at, and I think we'll be doing that.
29:51And, you know, there's a lot of remedies under the law that can be taken up, but the starting point is to make sure that the public sees what we're doing, understands it, and has confidence.
30:01Is there any concern that you're picking the targets?
30:03There's some concern that you're sort of picking the targets of the investigation before, you know, going forward with the full investigation?
30:09Are you sort of open to finding out that there was no criminal wrongdoing?
30:13100%. I'm happy to find that.
30:14It would be great if we could find out that.
30:15But first of all, I take two things.
30:17The president won the election, and his executive order on this topic was day one.
30:23Pam Bondi was confirmed by the Senate as attorney general, and her memo was whatever day she was, her day one.
30:29And that gave us specifics.
30:30So I work in the system, and her specifics are the ones we're operating off of to start, which I mentioned was targeting Catholics, January 6th, Jack Smith, Letitia James.
30:39And we've got a whole bunch of people looking, a bunch of us looking at all those.
30:43So that's the starting point.
30:45I think it's the opposite.
30:46If you look back, and I'm now looking closely, you know, the Biden administration was targeting people.
30:51They targeted the J6 people to destroy them, to put them in jail.
30:54They were going for Trump.
30:56They were going for Trump.
30:57And so, what's that?
30:58I mean, there was evidence of a crime there specifically.
31:00No, no, no.
31:00That's not what I'm talking about.
31:01Of course, there was evidence of crime.
31:03But I'm talking about when they used the 1512, they targeted individuals to make sure that they could put them in jail to build a case, and then it was thrown out.
31:10So my point is, the weaponization we're looking at, and I'm happy to go back into the first Trump administration, further back in terms of weaponization.
31:18It seems like what we're seeing so far is that the weaponization, the real focus is in the Biden administration.
31:25But I'm happy to have any targets we can find.
31:28And if there were Republicans in government doing those things, we're happy to focus on them.
31:33Democrats, independents, it doesn't matter.
31:35It matters if government's been used against the citizens.
31:37Any specific statutes you're looking at?
31:40Anything that was a violation of law, including civil rights, including people's civil rights.
31:44I think one thing's missed is that the Biden administration did a lot of violating of the citizens' civil rights, and that's something that could be a big opening, too.
31:53So that's it.
31:54Okay, thanks, everybody.
31:55Thank you for everything.
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