Chip Roy Tells Fox News Pam Bondi’s Successor Must Be More ‘Aggressive’

 

Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX), a member of the House Judiciary Committee, reacted to the ouster of Pam Bondi as attorney general Thursday, telling Fox News Republicans want her successor to be more “aggressive.”

President Donald Trump announced Thursday that Bondi would be leaving her post, with Deputy Attorney Todd Blanche stepping in as interim AG. Fox News’ Peter Doocy reported that he had spoken with the president and he had said he still liked Bondi and other White House sources emphasized there was “no bad blood;” in Trump’s post he referred to her as “a loyal friend.”

Roy, who is currently in a runoff in the GOP primary for Texas Attorney General, appeared on Thursday’s episode of America Reports to discuss the latest news.

Anchor Sandra Smith asked Roy for his reaction to the news, and he replied that the DOJ was “an agency that is near and dear to my heart, as a former United States attorney,” and he believed it was “critical that we have a great leader at the top of the Department of Justice.”

Roy said that Bondi should be thanked for her service to the Trump administration, but “the next person who’s heading the Department of Justice has got to be aggressive,” adding that Republicans have “a limited period” with Trump in the White House and Republican majorities in the House and Senate, so they need “to be on offense for justice and accountability.”

The congressman described his constituents as including “J-6ers, people that are looking at what are we doing about Antifa, and what they’re doing radically across this country to endanger us, open borders, the radical marxist networks,” and said there were “so many things we need to be doing and pursuing,” including the Arctic Frost investigation.

“How many things do we have to see, before we see some heads roll, and we see some accountability?” Roy continued. “Everybody I talked to at home in Texas wants to see action — on the Epstein files, they want to see action, they want to see prosecutions, and that is, I think, the most important thing for that new head of the Department of Justice is we want to see action and accountability.”

Anchor Benjamin Hall asked Roy if he thought Blanche or EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin — whose name has also been floated as a possible replacement for Bondi — would be able to get “more action moving forward.”

“We’ll see,” replied Roy, saying that Zeldin was “a good friend” and he was “proud to serve with him” in Congress, and had worked with Blanche too, but he was “going to defer to the president to build his team.”

“But look, I think whoever the president chooses, it does need to be someone who is aggressive,” Roy emphasized. “Lee has done a lot of good things over at EPA. And, again, we’ll defer the president, but we need somebody with experience, who’s been in a courtroom, who’s been a good and smart and talented lawyer, who can head that agency and deliver — and again, we got election riggers, we’ve never really gotten to the bottom of stuff involving Fauci, and the horrors that they perpetrated on the American people, human smuggling and traffickers, fentanyl pouring into our communities.”

“We need heads to roll, and an active Department of Justice to preserve our country,” he said. “So that’s what I expect out of the president’s nominee.”

Smith asked Roy if he had someone in mind.

Roy demurred and said he was “not going to speculate on that,” that there were “a lot of capable people” who had served with him or were in the administration, and repeated again that he would “defer to the president,” because he has “excellent judgment.”

“But we do need someone who can come in and aggressively do the job,” Roy circled back. “I don’t think what we want — we don’t want a show. We don’t want statements. We want action. And that’s what I think the American people deserve. If we do not break the backs of the Marxist networks, of the Islamic networks, of the networks that have been funneling people illegally into a country, then we will no longer have a country. They are organized. They are well funded. We need to stop them. We need to stop the Antifa and the radical organizations that the president has rightfully declared as terrorist organizations. We need to follow the money, and I can promise you, that’s not being done to the level it needs to be done that needs to be changed.”

Watch the clip above via Fox News.

New: The Mediaite One-Sheet "Newsletter of Newsletters"
Your daily summary and analysis of what the many, many media newsletters are saying and reporting. Subscribe now!

Tags:

Sarah Rumpf joined Mediaite in 2020 and is a Contributing Editor focusing on politics, law, and the media. A native Floridian, Sarah attended the University of Florida, graduating with a double major in Political Science and German, and earned her Juris Doctor, cum laude, from the UF College of Law. Sarah's writing has been featured at National Review, The Daily Beast, Reason, Law&Crime, Independent Journal Review, Texas Monthly, The Capitolist, Breitbart Texas, Townhall, RedState, The Orlando Sentinel, and the Austin-American Statesman, and her political commentary has led to appearances on television, radio, and podcast programs across the globe. Follow Sarah on Threads, Twitter, and Bluesky.