22/09/2025
There’s an inevitability to the politicization of the Department of Justice, just as with any branch of law enforcement, because it operates under elected politicians, and different politicians have different priorities. Some openly campaign on lighter enforcement, others on heavier enforcement. Some emphasize white-collar crime, others street crime or illegal immigration. And many, frankly, target nothing at all. That’s part of our system, and arguably a desirable one: public law enforcement should always be accountable, even if only indirectly, to the public.
What should never happen, however, is for law enforcement to be weaponized against political opponents. This was true when Trump was targeted, and it’s true now, when Trump himself explicitly demands that opponents be subjected to DOJ investigations. Public officials should not be immune from scrutiny, but when investigations are warranted, there must be a degree of independence. It was a miscarriage of justice for prosecutors in New York to campaign on the promise of prosecuting Donald Trump and then, once elected, to do exactly that. The conflict of interest could not be more obvious. By the same token, it is equally wrong to demand that the Attorney General target political rivals, or to suppress legitimate inquiries. That is precisely why we have special investigators, the benefit of which Trump received when Robert Mueller investigated him and ultimately cleared him of the whole Russian-interference narrative.
This is more than worrisome. It reveals a repeated pattern of misusing federal authority for personal or political ends. Government is meant to be a shield, not a weapon. And it becomes the latter not in an instant, but step by step, until one day you look back and realize you can no longer see where you began, much less find your way back to it.
