Trump is no longer hinting at weaponizing the Justice Department — he’s doing it in the open. Former Pardon Attorney Liz Oyer says it plainly: Trump “made it clear that he is running the show at DOJ,” treating the agency like his “personal law firm.” By installing personal attorneys in top roles and firing career experts, he gutted the guardrails meant to keep justice independent. What’s left is a hollowed-out department built for loyalty tests, not law.
Susan presses on what that really means, and Oyer recalls the memo she and the whole DOJ staff received from Attorney General Pam Bondi declaring “we are all the president’s lawyers.” It was a declaration that public servants no longer worked for the people. Once independence is stripped away, prosecutions become political favors or punishments. That is exactly the danger Oyer warns about: a two-tiered system where enemies face charges and friends walk free.
That danger crystallized when Trump designated Antifa a terrorist organization — a move Oyer called “a big step toward criminalizing free speech.” Without a real group to target, the designation becomes a weapon to use against critics, protesters, or even voters. It’s the same playbook autocrats use worldwide. Free speech isn’t a partisan issue; it’s democracy’s baseline.
For Oyer, the lesson is that silence equals surrender. “We need to not censor ourselves in advance because we fear retribution,” she says, a warning Susan notes is central to the fight ahead. Oyer’s own firing — for refusing to restore Mel Gibson’s gun rights at Trump’s demand — is proof of how high the cost can be. But it also shows that integrity is nonnegotiable.
Tune in for this conversation with Susan Demas and Liz Oyer, and hear how the fight for justice now falls to those willing to speak up.
The Trump House(™)
In a world where the sweeping scandals, rampant cruelty and corruption, economic arson, and international betrayals at Trump’s hands are eroding our institutions, I read today about the removal of an ancient magnolia tree from the White House grounds and found it unspeakably sad.
