'Mr. Bove Said F-U To The Courts': Sheldon Whitehouse Issues Blunt Takedown Of Emil Bove

Forbes Breaking News

At today's Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) slammed judicial nominee Emil Bove.

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00:00In the record, we will grant that request. Senator Whitehouse.

00:06Thank you, Chairman. Let me, as to Emil Bove, let me start with this nominee.

00:15Having told a room full of Department of Justice lawyers that if the federal courts didn't back off

00:23on restricting unlawful deportations, they would have to tell courts, F.U.

00:35I hope we can agree that telling courts, F.U., is not an attribute we want in someone seeking to be a judge.

00:46We know that he said it because it is so abundantly corroborated in real-time communications among the lawyers present.

01:03They talk in texts about the F.U. comment contemporaneously in that very matter.

01:13Prosecutors don't get better corroboration than that.

01:20We'd also be on solid ground concluding that he lied about it to us in committee.

01:28He said he didn't recall.

01:32Really?

01:33Didn't recall saying something like that in a Department of Justice meeting surrounded by career lawyers?

01:45It's not remotely credible.

01:49Lying to our committee also is not a great attribute of a candidate to be a judge.

01:57Somehow, he seemed to know that he would get away with it.

02:07He also played a bit of verbal dodgum, saying he never instructed anyone to disobey a court order.

02:15Correct.

02:16But that was not the allegation.

02:17He told them to be ready to disobey court orders to tell courts, F.U.

02:25Obviously, if you change the statement, you can mislead the committee.

02:32But we should demand better than that.

02:36Meanwhile, over in the United States District Court of Appeals,

02:44there is an order suspending Judge Bosberg's investigation into this matter.

02:55He announced a contempt investigation to look into what the hell went on at the Department of Justice

03:04with respect to these illegal deportations.

03:08Emil Bovey is in the thick of that.

03:13He absolutely will be part of that contempt investigation.

03:21And two Trump judges on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals suspended that investigation.

03:35There's a lot of commentary now about how on earth that temporary hours and days suspension has now lasted, what, a month?

03:45Perhaps just in time for this committee to ram through this nominee likely to be a subject of that criminal contempt hearing

03:58while it's delayed.

04:03If we are being played that way, with Trump judges delaying a contempt hearing that necessarily involves our nominee

04:17so that he can be shoved through,

04:21something is really rotten in Denmark.

04:24This whole mess around those deportations and his lying to this committee is all consistent with Bovey's lawless character.

04:35He helped cook up an improper deal in a criminal case against the mayor of New York,

04:41which his own DOJ colleague called a quid pro quo

04:44and an improper offer of immigration enforcement assistance in exchange for a dismissal of his case.

04:54That is disgraceful prosecutorial behavior.

04:58That colleague, the acting U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York,

05:01then resigned rather than go along with that rotten scheme.

05:05And another Trump administration crony also admitted it.

05:11Bordazar Tom Homan appeared on Fox News with that mayor and said,

05:16speaking of the mayor, if he doesn't come through,

05:20if he doesn't deliver the immigration support we need,

05:23I'll be back in New York City and we won't be sitting on the couch.

05:27I'll be in his office up his butt saying,

05:30where the hell is the agreement we came to?

05:35The agreement.

05:39Separately, this nominee tried, with acting U.S. attorney Martin,

05:43to confect a fake criminal investigation.

05:48Tried to confect a fake criminal investigation.

05:51Listen to those words.

05:52To allow an improper seizure of funds Congress had appropriated

05:58and that were obligated and disbursed to the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund.

06:03Career prosecutors pointed out,

06:07you can't have a criminal investigation with no crime,

06:12with no predication, with no basis.

06:15And the career criminal chief, who'd worked through multiple administrations,

06:21was forced out of her job for her pains,

06:26pointing out that this was a fake criminal investigation

06:30and they went forward with it anyway, Bovey and Martin.

06:34These are not minor prosecutorial glitches.

06:37These are true violations of the basic oath of a prosecutor.

06:42Another principle prosecutors follow is not to publicly disparage

06:47subjects of your investigation,

06:49both because it's low, it should be beneath a prosecutor,

06:55and because longstanding DOJ policy prohibits it.

07:01Bovey's official client, the EPA administrator,

07:04made repeated public statements accusing the fund

07:08and its participants and its administrators.

07:11By the way, among its participants

07:12was that notorious criminal organization, Habitat for Humanity.

07:18Accused them of being corrupt, of being criminal,

07:22of engaging in kickbacks, of theft, and of graft.

07:29None of that is even remotely appropriate.

07:33All of it is in violation of DOJ policy,

07:36and we couldn't even get answers about that violation.

07:39I ask consent that my June 18, 2025 letter to the Department of Justice

07:43on these topics be entered into the record.

07:45Without objection.

07:46These are truly evil abuses of DOJ's powers that this person led.

07:52Those are some of the problems with this nominee.

07:54Then come the problems with our committee process,

07:57in which he was pre-licensed to refuse to answer questions.

08:00The committee conceded something Congress has never before conceded,

08:04that deliberative process and attorney-client privileges

08:06overcome our constitutional powers of oversight and advice and consent.

08:12Senator Kennedy and I noted this in our bipartisan report

08:15on executive privilege in December of 22.

08:17I quote,

08:19Congress maintains that all other components of executive privilege,

08:25besides presidential communications,

08:27that the executive branch recognizes,

08:29including deliberative process and attorney-client privilege,

08:33still quoting here,

08:34are not constitutionally grounded,

08:36and therefore cannot supervene Congress's oversight authority.

08:40The majority, having made that astounding reversal and concession,

08:45then didn't even follow the rules for assertion of those supposed privileges,

08:51neither as to their scope,

08:53nor as to the process for claiming them.

08:56These privileges need to be asserted.

08:59It's notable that this nominee never actually asserted them.

09:04He likely realized that they don't, in fact, actually pertain,

09:11and he didn't want to get caught out in the legal error

09:13of asserting a non-pertinent privilege.

09:18Plus, he didn't have to,

09:20since his non-answers were blessed in advance by the majority.

09:25Instead, he hid behind vague claims,

09:28not privilege assertions,

09:30vague claims of inappropriateness,

09:33or things not being public,

09:36or failures to recall.

09:39Just to remind,

09:41attorney-client privilege and deliberative process privilege,

09:43even if they pertain here,

09:46do not apply to administrative decisions within a department,

09:50and deliberative process,

09:52indeed any executive privilege,

09:54does not apply

09:57where the allegation is misconduct.

10:00Again, from my report with Senator Kennedy,

10:02quoting the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals,

10:04the privilege disappears altogether

10:07when there is any reason to believe government misconduct occurred.

10:13We have enormous reason to believe

10:16that this individual, now a nominee,

10:19participated in government misconduct.

10:22The only executive privilege that Congress does recognize requires some proximity to the president.

10:30It is not applicable in ordinary agency administration,

10:34and the president must invoke it according to the Reagan memo.

10:38None of that took place under the blanket authorization to refuse to answer.

10:46We are dealing here with the nominee's attempts from a very high position in the Department of Justice

10:51to cook up a fake criminal investigation

10:54and to use an existing criminal case for political leverage over an elected official

11:02with too many accompanying violations of DOJ rules and practices to count.

11:09The result was a hearing that more resembled a rackets hearing from the Godfather

11:17than a nomination hearing for a Circuit Court of Appeals judgeship.

11:22Throw in the attorney general and deputy showing up in person

11:26to give Republicans in this committee the eyeball

11:29and the resemblance gets worse.

11:34Hearing by hearing, month by month,

11:39the bar is lowered and lowered and lowered

11:42for our constitutional advice and consent oversight.

11:46Now to the point where a witness can say,

11:49I don't recall,

11:51and it would be inappropriate,

11:53and that's not public

11:56to any question

11:58no matter how bad the behavior,

12:02no matter how good the corroboration,

12:05and get away with it.

12:06Even with multiple credible backstopped allegations

12:10of prosecutive misconduct by this individual before us,

12:15we are become a partisan rubber stamp.

12:20Neither the committee nor the judiciary

12:21is well served by our learned

12:24and servile helplessness.

12:27I yield back.

12:29I will now go to voting

12:31because we have...

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