Sen. Dick Durbin, the top Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, on Wednesday excoriated Emil Bove, a top Trump Justice Department official and nominee for a seat on the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, arguing that he was uniquely unqualified for the seat on the federal bench.
Bove, President Donald Trump’s former criminal defense attorney, is testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee along with four district court nominees. His nomination has come under fire this week after allegations that he suggested flouting court orders to fulfill Trump’s political agenda.
His nomination has become the first flashpoint judicial confirmation battle of Trump’s second term, as the president and his allies have become increasingly hostile to judges who have ruled against him.
Durbin argued that Bove’s nomination was in a “category all of his own” compared to the kind of judicial conservatives Trump had nominated to the federal bench in his first term. He pointed to, among other things, Bove’s role in ousting DOJ staffers who worked on cases tied to the Jan. 6 Capitol riot.
Durbin also pointed to Bove’s dismissal of federal corruption charges against New York City mayor Eric Adams around the time that Adams agreed to cooperate with the administration’s immigration enforcement at the city’s Rikers jail.
“Bove has led the effort to weaponize the Department of Justice against the president’s enemies,” the senator said. “Having earned his stripes as a loyalist to this president, he’s been rewarded with a lifetime nomination.”
Durbin also criticized Bove for his tenure as a federal prosecutor at the Manhattan U.S. attorney’s office. He cited an internal inquiry into his “abusive” management style, first reported by POLITICO, that determined he should be demoted from his leadership position. (The office’s leadership never implemented the intended demotion.)
Installing an enduring conservative slant in the federal judiciary was a key accomplishment of Trump’s first term. During four years, the White House shepherded dozens of new appeals court judges and three Supreme Court justices.
Sen. Chuck Grassley, chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, opened the hearing by noting that Bove had seen an “intense opposition campaign.” He added that Bove, who is currently principal associate deputy attorney general, may be bound by certain privileges, including executive privilege and attorney-client privilege.
“Turning every nominee into a political punching bag isn’t advice and consent, it’s smear and obstruct,” Grassley said, noting that opposition from home-state senators does not disqualify a candidate for a circuit court judgeship under the committee’s current rules.
“Let’s not pretend that nominees with ties to the President are somehow suspect.”
