Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche tried to assert his independence from President Donald Trump during his confirmation hearing Wednesday before the Senate Judiciary Committee.
“President Trump trusts me to give him counsel,” said Blanche, who is Trump’s former defense attorney. “Counsel does not mean a ‘yes man.'”
In his opening statement, Blanche said he was there to earn the lawmakers’ “trust once more,” saying he welcomed fair questions from committee members “about the hard debates of the past year.”
Senators took that invitation, pressing Blanche about his relationship with Trump, the Justice Department’s handling of the Epstein files and Trump’s IRS lawsuit settlement.
Watch the clip in the player above.
Blanche stepped into the role of acting attorney general after Pam Bondi was fired in early April. In March 2025, the Senate approved his nomination as deputy attorney general.
“The Senate has already judged your fitness for high office and confirmed you as the department’s second in command,” committee chair Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, said in his opening statement. “Today we consider you for a promotion. and we’re not starting out from a blank slate.”
Grassley said Blanche “should take pride in delivering the law enforcement promise the American people voted for in 2024.”
Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., said Blanche should not be confirmed.
“This isn’t a confirmation hearing. This is more of a performance review,” Booker said. “And clearly when it comes to the treatment of Epstein victims, when it comes to politically motivated prosecutions, when it comes from avoiding appearance of impropriety with corporations, you failed.”
Here are major takeaways from the confirmation hearing.
Blanche says he didn’t discuss IRS settlement with Trump
Since taking the top role at the Justice Department, Blanche has faced the most scrutiny over a deal to settle Trump’s $10 billion lawsuit over the IRS’ leaking of his personal tax returns.
The settlement granted Trump, whose family business has been convicted of criminal tax fraud, immunity from tax audits. It also included the creation of a nearly $1.8 billion fund to pay people who say they were victims of government “weaponization.” The fund has since been scrapped following bipartisan criticism.
On Monday, a federal judge said Trump’s lawsuit was filed for an “improper purpose” that misused the court system.
WATCH: Schiff grills Blanche on Trump tax settlement
Several lawmakers asked Blanche about his role in the settlement.
Blanche told Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, that he did not speak with Trump about the settlement until after the Justice Department had determined the case would not move forward — “when it was dead.”
However, when Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., asked Blanche whether he advised Trump against the fund’s creation, Blanche refused to answer, saying he would not talk about conversations he had with the president.
Watch the clip in the player above.
Even though Blanche repeatedly said the Justice Department had ended the anti-weaponization fund, several members of the committee pressed him to explain why the department hadn’t agreed to put in writing that the fund was dead.
The Justice Department refused to make a sworn declaration after a judge asked for it last month.
Blanche said the department didn’t issue a formal declaration “because there’s longstanding precedent that judges cannot ask Cabinet secretaries or people like me to put in declarations.”
“It has nothing to do with whether the fund is alive,” Blanche said. “I’m under oath today and I’ve said it’s dead repeatedly.”
But Cornyn pressed Blanche further, citing language from the settlement agreement that states it can only be modified with a written agreement from the parties. Blanche said the settlement had not been modified and agreed with Cornyn that the document is enforceable as a contract.
Watch the clip in the player above.
Blanche said Trump can’t force the Department of Justice to create the weaponization fund, but that Trump’s legal team could say the department has breached the contract by not creating it.
“They haven’t done that and I’m not aware that they’re planning on doing that,” Blanche said.
Blanche defended his handling of the Epstein files
Several lawmakers grilled Blanche on the Justice Department’s investigation into the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and his former girlfriend, Ghislaine Maxwell. The federal government’s handling of the case has been the source of bipartisan criticism and a congressional investigation.
Former Attorney General Pam Bondi has said in a House Oversight interview that Blanche was in charge of the Justice Department’s release of files related to Epstein.
An Epstein survivor wears a butterfly pin during the confirmation hearing for Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., July 15, 2026. Photo by Evelyn Hockstein/Reuters
READ MORE: Trump administration ‘screwed up’ Epstein files communication, Vance says
Blanche defended his actions Wednesday, saying he and the Justice Department “undertook a herculean task to review millions and millions of potentially responsive files” after Trump signed the Epstein Transparency Act, passed by Congress last year to force the release of materials related to Epstein.
However, Blanche also acknowledged that his department made redaction mistakes and said dozens of lawyers were on call to quickly correct the errors. Several documents revealed personal information and images of survivors.
“That doesn’t excuse the mistakes, of which I take responsibility,” Blanche said. “But it does mean that we tried to fix them.”
Watch the clip in the player above.
Addressing criticism that he has refused to speak with Epstein’s survivors, Blanche said the department has spoken with more than 30 representatives of dozens of victims and asked survivors and their lawyers to meet with the FBI.
He added that the Justice Department will indict and prosecute people if additional information is revealed. That’s a departure from the unsigned memo the FBI and Justice Department released in July 2025 that said investigators did not uncover evidence that would merit an investigation against people who had not been charged.
WATCH: Booker presses for details about Blanche’s meeting with Ghislaine Maxwell
Later in the hearing, Blanche said the information available to the FBI and Justice Department does not contain evidence that Epstein trafficked women to other men, but “that does not mean it didn’t happen, and I want to be clear about that.”
“If there’s anybody out there, victim or otherwise, that has information, I beg them to come forward,” he added.
Blanche addressed recent deaths at the hands of immigration agents
In the past week, federal immigration officers have fatally shot two people during traffic stops.
READ MORE: ICE should continue traffic stops despite recent shootings, Trump says on social media
Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., asked Blanche whether he agreed that federal agents should not “fire their weapons into cars unless there is an imminent threat.”
Watch the clip in the player above.
Blanche said “there’s a well-established standard as to when an agent can discharge their firearm, and I think that that’s something that should be followed in every case.”
Sen. Alex Padilla, D-Calif., asked Blanche what role the Justice Department should play in investigations of federal officer-involved shootings.
Blanche said it depends on the agency, adding that generally the officer’s agency has its own investigation procedures, which usually involve an inspector general.
Watch the clip in the player above.
Padilla said a lack of justice in the cases of Alex Pretti and Renee Good, who were both killed by immigration officers in Minneapolis in January, “undermine any confidence anybody should have in the Department of Homeland Security’s ability through the inspector general or otherwise to investigate its own.”
Blanche said “the mere passage of time between January and today doesn’t mean there’s no justice,” and that “these investigations do take time.”
More takeaways from the hearing
- On Trump’s Jan. 6 pardons: “The Constitution gives the president the full power to pardon anybody for any reason he wants,” Blanche said, adding that he doesn’t question Trump’s decision to pardon Jan. 6 rioters.
- On impeaching judges: Blanche said he doesn’t believe in impeaching judges who rule against Trump, which is a departure from the president’s past calls for the impeachment of several judges.
- On whether he’s friends with Trump:“I’m his lawyer,” Blanche said before correcting himself, saying he “was his lawyer.” Blanche said he met Trump as his criminal defense attorney. “I’m not sure there’s very many people who have ever had a criminal defense attorney who calls that person their friend,” he said.
- On Justice Department subpoenas for reporters: “We’re not targeting reporters,” Blanche said in response to questioning about New York Times journalists receiving subpoenas for reporting on the defense capabilities of the new Air Force One plane gifted by Qatar. He said the Justice Department wants to know who provided the reporters “with classified national security information, which everybody in this body should want to protect.”
