00:00Let's go back to the nomination of Emil Bovi to a New Jersey seat on the Third Circuit Court of Appeals.
00:08An unusual thing occurred with this.
00:12He came and answered a questionnaire, as he should, for the White House as well as for the Judiciary Committee,
00:20and then appeared before us under oath and answered questions.
00:24But what was unusual about this situation is that many questions that he tried to answer, he didn't get close to coming to the truth.
00:34So egregious were his statements that individuals who worked with him were willing to risk their career in public service
00:44to come forward as whistleblowers to members of the committee in Congress to tell them that Mr. Bovi had misrepresented the facts before us.
00:54They risked their public careers to come and tell us this information.
00:59And as a result of it, some of them are going to have to leave the Department of Justice.
01:04But it seems that when given a test of values and ethics, time and again Mr. Bovi fails and those around him step forward and risk their own careers to tell the truth.
01:16So we said, as Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee, to the Chairman, we believe these whistleblowers are credible.
01:24They're telling us things about Mr. Bovi that contradict his testimony before the committee, and we believe that they should be heard.
01:33They are willing to come before the committee and take an oath to tell the truth and run the risk of retribution or penalty if they are found to have misled the committee and misrepresented the facts.
01:48You can't ask for more than that.
01:50Someone willing to risk their job to tell the truth and then to appear before our committee under oath and testify as to what happened.
01:58I think that's credible, and I don't think it's avoidable.
02:02We're talking about Bovi being pointed to a federal circuit bench that is a lifetime appointment.
02:09This is a critical decision, and we need to have the facts before the American people.
02:15So what was the response of the Republicans on the committee and the Chairman?
02:19They turned us down.
02:21They don't want to hear any whistleblowers.
02:24They don't want to hear people who are willing to stand before us under oath and tell us what actually happened with Mr. Bovi and his misrepresentations to the committee.
02:35As members of the conservative legal establishment have noted, Mr. Bovi's nomination represents an alarming departure from the type of nominees we considered under the first Trump administration.
02:47Like other individuals, President Trump has installed in the highest positions of our government during his second term.
02:54Mr. Bovi's primary qualification appears to be his blind loyalty to this President.
03:02As Acting Deputy Attorney General, Mr. Bovi personally ordered the terminations of dozens of career federal prosecutors who worked to put violent January 6 offenders behind bars.
03:15Remember what happened January 6?
03:18Vice President Pence was sitting in the President's chair.
03:21We were counting the ballots for the Electoral College to determine who won the President's election, and we had to stop.
03:27The Capitol Police came in, took the Vice President off the podium, and then notified us that there was a demonstration taking place in the Capitol building that was dangerous.
03:40I remember the first thing they said to us, stay in your seats.
03:43This is going to be a safe room.
03:45You can stay here.
03:47Ten minutes later, the same policeman came up and said, we're wrong.
03:50It isn't safe.
03:51Leave as quickly as possible.
03:53We filed out that exit door.
03:55All the members of the Senate.
03:57The Vice President was gone.
03:58These demonstrators swarmed through the Capitol, attacked the Capitol Police who were there trying to defend the building and the people in it, causing 140 of them to be injured, and five of them lost their lives as a result of this.
04:14And then they went on and started doing their job of ransacking this chamber and the offices of the Senators in this building.
04:23They did great damage to this building, millions of dollars, and even worse in my estimation, they desecrated what I consider to be a cathedral to democracy, the United States Capitol building.
04:36Many of them, of course, when they were aping for the cameras, were creating videotaped evidence that was used against them.
04:44The Department of Justice went into an investigation of these demonstrators who had ransacked the Capitol and threatened the lives of people who were here.
04:53And as a result of it, more than 1,500 were prosecuted for that wrongdoing.
04:57It took a long period of time, a lot of investigation.
05:01U.S. Attorneys were asked all over the United States to participate in this.
05:05What happened?
05:06The 1,500, many of them ended up with criminal sentences, some very serious sentences, and some were incarcerated.
05:14Then came Donald Trump and gave a full, unconditional pardon to the January 6 rioters who came into this building.
05:23Full and unconditional.
05:24Then, to make it even worse, his new administration in the Department of Justice came in and said,
05:29If you were an assistant U.S. Attorney following orders to prosecute these individuals and these rioters, you can be fired for doing it.
05:38We want you to disclose whether you participated in the investigation and prosecution of these individuals.
05:44Who was behind all this?
05:46Well, quite a few members of the Trump administration, but his acting Deputy Attorney General.
05:52Emil Bovey, the man who's seeking this judgeship, personally ordered the termination of dozens of career federal prosecutors who worked to put violent January 6 offenders behind bars.
06:04Mr. Bovey even made the outrageous claim that the prosecutions of January 6 rioters were, quote,
06:13A grave national injustice that has been perpetrated upon the American people.
06:19Imagine that.
06:20He doubled down on the sentiment during his confirmation process and further insulted the law enforcement officers who kept us safe and risked their lives from these rioters.
06:30In response to a question before our committee, Mr. Bovey wrote, and I quote,
06:36Heavy-handed tactics by January 6 prosecutors were, quote,
06:40Equally unacceptable as rioters' attacks on the police.
06:44Think about that for a moment.
06:46He's saying the assistant U.S. attorneys, the prosecutors, who went after the individuals who stormed through the Capitol, were just as bad as the rioters themselves.
06:56I pointed this out to my Republican colleagues, that a man seeking a lifetime appointment to the federal bench believes that those who prosecute cop beaters are as bad as the cop beaters themselves.
07:08Expecting my colleagues on the other side of the aisle to react as I have this morning, what did I get? Crickets. Silence. No response.
07:20He said the prosecutors were as bad as the rioters themselves.
07:24And Mr. Bovey has been up to a far more senior Justice Department official than just excusing the conduct of January 6 offenders.
07:34He personally led the administration's attempt to strike a corrupt bargain with New York City Mayor Eric Adams by offering to drop his pending prosecution in exchange for Mayor Adams' cooperation on President Trump's immigration policies.
07:54Get that straight. Investigations of corruption on the mayor of New York City, the response from the Trump administration from Mr. Amel Bovey was, we'll cut a deal with you.
08:08We won't prosecute you if you promise to play ball with us when it comes to mass deportations.
08:15In response to Mr. Bovey's alleged quid pro quo, several federal prosecutors in the Southern District of New York, including the U.S. Attorney herself, a staunch conservative who clerked for Justice Scalia and was appointed to the position by President Trump,
08:31made it clear that they would not participate in Amel Bovey's deal with the mayor of New York.
08:38Mr. Bovey's disdain for the rule of law has been a theme throughout his entire career.
08:44As a federal prosecutor in the Southern District of New York, he once admitted that prosecutors he supervised told the defense team, quote,
08:52flat lie regarding their disclosure obligations, flat out lie.
08:58Given that background, it appears that Mr. Bovey's time in the Trump administration has been true to form.
09:04Last month, Erez Ravini, a career DOJ attorney who defended the first Trump administration's administrative policies in court, filed a whistleblower complaint with my office.
09:17According to Mr. Ravini, Mr. Bovey told other department attorneys that they might need to say, quote,
09:24F you, close quote, to federal courts that issued orders which the Trump administration disagreed with.
09:31Remarkably, when he was under oath before the Judiciary Committee, Mr. Bovey would not deny that he had delivered such a message.
09:39He merely said he did not recall whether he had used the epithet that I characterized, the explicit language.
09:50So I asked Mr. Ravini, the whistleblower, to substantiate his claims.
09:56And he did.
09:57Mr. Ravini provided text messages, emails, and a trove of other documents corroborating his claim that Mr. Bovey had both suggested the possibility of violating court orders,
10:08and his spearheaded efforts to mislead judges.
10:12And Mr. Ravini is willing to testify under oath about what I've just said.
10:17I asked the Judiciary Committee in a formal letter to take his testimony.
10:22But apparently my Republican colleagues have no interest in even learning the truth about Mr. Bovey.
10:28Mr. Ravini is apparently not alone.
10:30According to public reporting, another whistleblower filed a complaint with Justice Department's Inspector General that further backs up his allegations.
10:39My office is working to obtain a copy of that complaint filed with the Inspector General.
10:44The contents of that complaint are one of many unanswered questions regarding Bovey's conduct.
10:49It appears my Republican colleagues fear the answers.
10:52That is the only reason I can see for their insistence on forcing this nomination through at breakneck speed before all the facts are public.
11:01In addition to the outstanding Inspector General complaint, we have absolutely no idea how involved Mr. Bovey has been in the Trump administration's Jeffrey Epstein cover-up.
11:11As I've noted previously, it was very convenient for Senate Republicans that Attorney General Bondi did not announce a plan to keep the Epstein files hidden until shortly after Mr. Bovey's obligation to answer questions before the committee.
11:26Interesting timing.
11:28Mr. Bovey has served as the most senior level of the Justice Department in these early months of the administration.
11:34It's highly unlikely that he does not have knowledge of the Epstein cover-up.
11:39So my colleagues and I sent him a follow-up question to assess his involvement.
11:43No surprise, he refused to answer.
11:46Some conservative voices have been willing to speak truth to power regarding Mr. Bovey's nomination.
11:52The editorial board of the Wall Street Journal, no liberal newspaper, pointed out that Mr. Bovey's record, quote,
11:58creates an impression of a lawyer comfortably pursuing policy outcomes by pushing legal boundaries.
12:06And conservative legal commentator Ed Whelan wrote that he has, quote,
12:11serious doubts that Bovey has the character and integrity to be worth confirmation as a federal judge.
12:17You don't have to take it from them and me.
12:19President Trump himself has made it clear that Mr. Bovey was selected for his position not because of his legal accomplishments
12:26or his dedication to the conservative method of constitutional interpretation.
12:31As the President put it, Mr. Bovey will, quote,
12:34do anything that is necessary to make America great again, end of quote.
12:39I strongly urge my colleagues to consider the implications of giving this man, Amo Bovey, a lifetime seat on the federal bench.
