When Christopher Moltisanti steps into that grimy apartment and finds a circle of worried family, friends, and associates waiting for him, he immediately looks for the exit. The mob up-and-comer — memorably played by Michael Imperioli in HBO’s The Sopranos — turns to bolt, only to be summoned back by the boss, Tony Soprano. One by one, the assembled crew pleads with Moltisanti to quit the habits that are wrecking him. Paulie Walnuts skips the warm-up and goes straight for the throat: “I don’t write nothin’ down, so I’ll keep this short and sweet. You’re weak, you’re out of control, and you’ve become an embarrassment to yourself and everybody else.”
That’s the energy the Justice Department needs right now — because it’s time for the Pam Bondi intervention.
No one should pretend this will be easy. Senior political appointees rarely volunteer to tell an attorney general that her strategy is collapsing in real time — especially when that strategy is tied to a president’s personal agenda. Still, the message is no longer subtle. Judges have signaled it. Grand juries have underlined it. Even veterans of the department have echoed it. The prosecutions are sputtering, the losses are mounting, and the longer this continues, the more lasting the damage to the institution.
The list of targets is no secret. President Donald Trump has made it clear who he wants to see on the far side of the “v.” in federal court, and Bondi’s Justice Department has obliged. Former FBI Director James Comey and current New York Attorney General Letitia James have already been charged — and those cases have blown up quickly, and predictably.
Last month, a federal judge tossed both indictments after concluding the Justice Department had improperly installed prosecutorial newcomer Lindsay Halligan as the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia. The dismissals weren’t merely procedural housekeeping; they were a stinging institutional rebuke. And instead of absorbing the lesson, Bondi’s department managed to compound the embarrassment.
Two weeks ago, DOJ tried to re-indict James — and a grand jury said no.
It’s hard to overstate how unusual that is. Federal grand jury practice is built for prosecutors: the government controls the presentation; there’s no defense lawyer arguing back; no judge overseeing the room; the standard is only probable cause; and prosecutors need only a majority vote, not unanimity. You’ve heard the “ham sandwich” line for a reason. This process almost always produces an indictment if the government wants one.
And yet, DOJ tried again last week — and another grand jury rejected the case again.
If Bondi’s team wants to keep going, it can. Unlike a trial acquittal, which triggers double-jeopardy protections, there’s no formal cap on how many times prosecutors can return to grand juries. But there is a practical limit: credibility. Getting rejected once is bad. Getting rejected twice is close to unheard of. At some point, someone has to tell the attorney general what the process is already screaming: this case is not going to land.
And even if the department manages to revive the Comey or James indictments, the problems don’t end there. Both defendants can plausibly argue selective or vindictive prosecution. Comey has what looks like a serious statute-of-limitations defense based on allegedly false testimony dated September 30, 2020. And even if DOJ clears those hurdles, it still has to persuade a trial jury — unanimously, beyond a reasonable doubt — using evidence that, by the account presented here, ranges from thin (James allegedly gaining only a few thousand dollars from mortgage fraud) to muddled (the exact content of Comey’s testimony is itself disputed, let alone whether any false statement was intentional).
Meanwhile, the department appears poised to widen the blast radius. Other perceived political antagonists — Senator Adam Schiff, Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook, and former Special Counsel Jack Smith — are reportedly under investigation at the president’s direction for assorted, hazy allegations. (The John Bolton matter is described as different: that investigation reportedly began before the current administration, and the classified-information allegations are framed as more serious and better supported.) If DOJ leadership is concerned about institutional survival, it should be urging Bondi not to launch more headline-grabbing fights that are likely to end the same way: with a courtroom loss, a public humiliation, and another dent in the department’s credibility.
Even Bill Barr — the focus of my 2021 book Hatchet Man: How Bill Barr Broke the Prosecutor’s Code and Corrupted the Justice Department — had a stopping point. Trump publicly urged prosecutions of Barack Obama, John Kerry, Hillary Clinton, and other prominent Democrats. Barr mostly let those demands burn out rather than operationalize them. Bondi, by contrast, has moved as if every presidential grievance comes with a deadline.
To be fair, an “intervention” aimed solely at Bondi risks missing the obvious: she is executing the will of her boss. But that doesn’t make her a bystander. She’s an experienced prosecutor with vast authority, broad discretion, and a department to run. She is not forced into the role. She owns the consequences.
And if moral arguments won’t move anyone here, maybe political ones will.
There are signs — small but meaningful — that Trump’s protective shell isn’t flawless. He may never lose his core base, but he does not automatically command perfect discipline from the rest of the party forever.
This week, four House Republicans defied Trump and forced a vote on extending Affordable Care Act subsidies. Earlier this month, Republican-led committees pressed the administration for answers about legally questionable bombings of Venezuelan drug boats. Indiana Republicans rejected Trump’s push for mid-decade gerrymandering, setting off presidential outrage. In November, after enough Republicans refused to go along with efforts to suppress the Jeffrey Epstein files, Congress overwhelmingly passed legislation requiring broad (even if not total) public disclosure. And a recent Marquette Law School study found that 55 percent of respondents disapprove of prosecutions of Trump’s political opponents — including 48 percent of Republicans and 47 percent of independents. When nearly half of your own party says you’ve crossed a line, it’s worth paying attention.
Maybe any attempt to pull Bondi back will end the way the Sopranos intervention did: shouting, accusations, insults, and nothing fixed. But even Christopher Moltisanti eventually got help — at least for a while. Trying to correct course, however messy, is still better than sprinting toward a destination everyone can already see: more losses, more institutional wreckage, and a legacy defined by predictable failure.
