The Department of Revenge? (with Devlin Barrett)

Summary

Podcast Summary: Stay Tuned with Preet

Episode: The Department of Revenge? (with Devlin Barrett)
Date: June 18, 2026
Host: Preet Bharara
Guest: Devlin Barrett, New York Times reporter and author of The Department of Revenge: How Trump Took Control of American Justice

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Overview

This episode examines the transformation of the Department of Justice (DOJ) under Trump’s second term, focusing on the weaponization of the DOJ for personal and political revenge. Preet Bharara speaks with Devlin Barrett, whose new book provides in-depth reporting on the “Revenge Investigations,” and the broader erosion of institutional norms, principles, and morale within the department. The conversation traces both personal and institutional consequences, with Barrett offering a granular look at the vindictive prosecutions, changes in DOJ leadership, shifting standards, and what these shifts mean for American democracy.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

Historical Context and the Escalation of Scandal

• Bharara and Barrett reflect on how past DOJ scandals (like the 2006–07 US Attorney firings) once seemed seismic but now appear minor compared to the current “Department of Revenge” landscape.
  • Quote: “At the time…most of the folks…would have considered that, you know, an 8 or 9 out of 10 scandal…Now you’d call it a three…if you’re comparing it to what’s happening now at the department.” (Barrett, 04:03)

The “Revenge” Mandate and Its Execution

• Use of DOJ to pursue Trump’s perceived enemies is more explicit and forceful in Trump 2.0, often targeting political rivals (e.g., attempts to indict Senator Adam Schiff, Jim Comey, Senator Chuck Schumer).
  • Quote: “If you had an American president who was openly announcing allegations of treason and the hoped for imprisonment of a duly elected senator...that would not only be front page headline…people would contemplate the destruction of that presidency.” (Bharara, 05:01)
• Barrett emphasizes this shift is not accidental: “There is an element to this administration that wants to simply shout down reality…that should be a deeply concerning thing to all Americans.” (Barrett, 01:35)

Institutional and Procedural Breakdown

• Under Trump’s second term:
  • Vital gatekeeping bodies like the Public Integrity Section (PIN) are dismantled, making it easier to bring politicized or unfounded charges.
  • Loyalty-driven appointments (e.g., Alina Habba as U.S. Attorney for NJ) replace experienced, independent leadership.
  • Investigations increasingly lack thoroughness, resulting in “crappy” indictments and high rates of case dismissal by judges and grand juries.
  • Loss of prosecutorial discretion and dissent: Internal debate is quashed, weakening case quality.
    • Quote: “You shut down internal dissent...you create, as it turns out, significantly weaker cases. You create huge embarrassment.” (Barrett, 16:55)

The Personalization of Prosecution

• Barrett explains how Trump’s own legal history drives vindictive prosecution, especially against Jim Comey.
  • Quote: “This is an angry former criminal defendant who has been given an incredible amount of power over the criminal justice system. And what we’re seeing are the consequences of that.” (Barrett, 08:28)
• The “revenge” cases often don’t distinguish between Trump’s grievances and genuine law enforcement. Trump’s focus shifts over time, targeting whomever he perceives as a current adversary.
  • Quote: “Trump, at one point last year said, ‘I used to be hunted and now I’m the hunter. It’s a big difference.’” (Barrett, 19:29)

DOJ Morale and Exodus

• Massive loss of personnel; offices described as “mole people” trying to avoid political attention and erratic directives. Many talented staff have left; those remaining report feeling powerless or hope to avoid being drawn into political prosecutions.
  • Quote: “Morale is terrible at the department and at the FBI.” (Barrett, 26:55)
  • Quote: “We’re mole people now, meaning they’re trying to just avoid the attention of the political leadership…hope they don’t get tasked with a case that feels completely political…” (Barrett, 27:00)

Distinguishing Trump 1.0 from Trump 2.0

• In Trump’s first term, tensions existed between DOJ and political leadership. In the second term, loyalists loyal to Trump run the DOJ and FBI, executing political orders with little opposition.
  • Quote: “Now what you have is you have committed Trump loyalists running these institutions and pushing to deliver what the President wants.” (Barrett, 12:27)

Weakening of Checks, Process, and Legal Standards

• PIN’s dismantling led to “more bad prosecutions” because career prosecutors and internal checks lost their protective influence.
  • Quote: “When they killed pin, we all sort of understood…there would be a lot fewer corruption prosecutions. What we didn’t understand was that there would be more bad prosecutions, for lack of a better term…” (Barrett, 35:10)
• The administration is described as “outcome focused” rather than process oriented; careers and facts are dismissed if in the way of preferred results.

High-Profile Cases and Failures

• Bharara and Barrett analyze:
  • The “Seashells indictment” of Jim Comey: Weak, rejected by multiple offices, pursued in a jurisdiction where leaders would comply.
  • Efforts to indict Senator Schumer: Blocked only by the still-functional Public Integrity Section in 2025, an option gone by 2026.
  • The IRS immunity deal, SPLC prosecution, and the Ghislaine Maxwell transfer—all cases where the highest political appointees issued directives.
  • The Blanche/DOJ approach: “Blanche's bros” delegated major decisions, often lacking expertise, pushing “crappy” cases on career prosecutors.

Consequences for Institutional Credibility

• The reputation of DOJ suffers with every vindictive case, impacting not only morale but trust among the public, judges, and jurors.
  • Quote: “You’re really entering an interesting new world where both judges and a large number of jurors…I think the juror issue is going to be fascinating in the next couple years…” (Barrett, 56:33)
  • Quote: “The benefit of the doubt is no longer there.” (Bharara, 58:34)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “There is an element to this administration that wants to simply shout down reality. And I think shouting down reality and shouting down justice, shouting down fairness, should be a deeply concerning thing to all Americans.”
  — Devlin Barrett (01:35)
• “I used to be hunted and now I’m the hunter. It’s a big difference.”
  — Donald Trump (recounted by Barrett, 19:29)
• “Morale is terrible at the department and at the FBI. ... We're mole people now.”
  — Devlin Barrett (26:55, 27:00)
• “Now what you have is...Trump loyalists running these institutions and pushing to deliver what the President wants.”
  — Devlin Barrett (12:27)
• “I think plain speaking is something that, frankly, the Justice Department often doesn't do well, but is more important than ever now.”
  — Devlin Barrett (65:12)
• “Separation between the political side of the executive branch and the law enforcement side…that’s not persuasive or compelling. It’s a norm because the principle…is paramount in our system.”
  — Preet Bharara (61:57)

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Important Timestamps

• 01:35: Barrett on the administration “shouting down reality”
• 04:03: Comparison of DOJ scandals, 2007 vs. now
• 08:28: Trump as an “angry former criminal defendant” wielding DOJ power
• 12:27: Shift from friction to full Trump loyalist control in DOJ/FBI
• 16:55: Results of quashing internal dissent in DOJ
• 19:29: Trump’s “hunter” mentality regarding Jim Comey
• 26:55: Morale inside DOJ and FBI
• 35:10: Consequences of dismantling Public Integrity Section
• 56:33: The “hollowing out” of DOJ; impact on credibility, juries, and public trust
• 58:34: Loss of institutional trust and judges’ deference to DOJ statements
• 65:12: Barrett’s call for plain language and the press/courts’ challenge to confront lying

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Themes & Takeaways

• Erosion of Norms to Advance Personal Vendettas: The episode illustrates how the second Trump administration has shifted the DOJ from an institution of independent law enforcement to one bent toward enacting the President’s personal grudges.
• Collapse of Institutional Defenses: The breakdown of internal checks, loss of personnel, and appointment of loyal but inexperienced leaders has directly led to a wave of poorly vetted, politically motivated prosecutions.
• Enduring Damage to Rule of Law: Both the process and outcome of justice are undermined, risking continued retaliation cycles and making it easier for future administrations to further politicize prosecutions.
• Importance of Principles and Truth: Barrett and Bharara both stress that principles—more than norms or etiquette—must be reclaimed and defended if the justice system is to regain trust and function for the public good.

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Final Word & Optimism

Barrett closes with a note of hope, emphasizing that many in government and civil society are fighting to preserve integrity, truth, and reality in law, even under duress. “I do think you have to argue for principles…without those things the court system doesn’t really function.” (Barrett, 59:46).

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For listeners and non-listeners alike, this episode is a sweeping, plainspoken, and urgent account of how American justice is being repurposed for political revenge, and why the response—by the public, media, and those still inside—matters now more than ever.

Transcript

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[Devlin Barrett]

There is an element to this administration that wants to simply shout down reality. And I think shouting down reality and shouting down justice, shouting down fairness, should be a deeply concerning thing to all Americans.

[Preet Bharara]

Welcome to Stay tuned. I'm Preet Bharara. My guest this week is Devlin Barrett. He's a reporter for the New York Times and he's out with a new book. It's called the Department of How Trump Took Control of American justice. That's coming up. Stay tuned. Devin Barrett, welcome to the show.

[Devlin Barrett]

Hi, Preet. Thanks for having me.

[Preet Bharara]

So congratulations on the book the Department of How Trump Took Control of American justice by Devlin Barrett. And I will tell you, it's a very important book. It's a very important read. Not just for people like me who are alums of the department multiple times over, but for, I think, anyone who cares about justice in America, which hopefully is everyone. And if you had told me that there would be a book like this, and there are other similar books with similar unfortunate but appropriate titles, it would have broken my heart. And I should announce to the audience that you and I go back, I think like 19 or 20 years when I was working on the Hill and I and others were investigating another set of scandals at the Justice Department, the political firing of US Attorneys and things of that nature, and the political hiring or not hiring of interns and people in the honors program. And you were among the reporters who intrepidly was covering that. And it occurred to me that that stuff was a big deal. It led the news many nights in the spring and summer of 2007. And given your recent research and the work you've done on this very impressive book, if you had to say on a scale of 1 to 10, the level of impropriety and scandal that you would attribute to the goings on from 2006 and 07, what number from 1 to 10 would it be and what number from 1 to 10 would you attribute to the first year of Trump 2.0?

[Devlin Barrett]

Well, I think at the time of the U.S. attorney firing scandals and the other stuff you mentioned, I think most of the folks who covered and worked in that space would have considered that, you know, an 8 or 9 out of 10 scandal because it led to the departure of the attorney general himself. It was a very consequential scandal and it was very, very much a front page scandal. But I think, I actually think about that.

[Preet Bharara]

We have to change that. We have to change the Overton window for the, for the, for the scale.

[Hunter Biden (via quoted posts)]

Right.

[Devlin Barrett]

Correct. Because, because what I was about to say is I think now you'd call it a three. If you, if you are comparing it to what's happening now at the department, the firing of those US Attorneys would be notable. But it would not necessarily, not only wouldn't it be a top story for, you know, weeks and weeks, depending on what else is going on on any given day at the department, it might not even be the top Justice Department story of the day.

[Preet Bharara]

You talk a lot about, obviously, given the title the Revenge Investigations, I have said I represent, as listeners know, Alyssa Slotkin and Adam Schiff. And when that was a little bit more in the news, the Senator Schiff case, I remember thinking aloud that if you had an American president who was openly announcing allegations of treason and the hoped for imprisonment of a duly elected senator in a co equal branch of government from the largest state in the country and basically directing his Justice Department to find some criminal conduct on the part of that person, that would not only be front page headline in every major newspaper. People would contemplate the destruction of that presidency. And I don't think it was like in the top five for periods of time.

[Podcast Host/Narrator]

What has happened to us, Devlin?

[Devlin Barrett]

I think one. This has been coming for a while. Right. I think there was a fair bit of telegraphing of this during the presidential campaign. And one of the things I hear constantly when I turn talk to folks in the administration or I talk to supporters of the administration, when you talk about the revenge cases, when you talk about the president's desire to use the Justice Department to go after other people and punish them, I hear, frankly, I hear a lot of people, administration people say things like, the American people voted for this. This is what the American people voted for. I find that a difficult argument because I didn't have the sense as a reporter in the 2024 campaign that that was something that the American people had reached some sort of significant consensus on. I think you can say a number of Americans were unhappy about the prosecutions of Donald Trump, but I think that's. It's a pretty big leap to go from there to indicting Jim Comey for a picture of seashells on a beach.

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[Preet Bharara]

I mean, we should talk about that for a moment.

[Devlin Barrett]

Yeah.

[Preet Bharara]

And one should put oneself. I try to do this as much as possible, and we've done it on the podcast in the sort of moral or psychological position of Donald Trump and the MAGA folks, and not for the purpose of justifying or excusing, but for the purpose of understanding. If Donald Trump had been engaging in this conduct, the revenge prosecutions, and he had not been indicted multiple times and impeached twice and evaded all consequences essentially, on all of that investigative activity and enforcement action. Do you think he'd be getting away with all this in the same way?

[Devlin Barrett]

That's a great question. I'm not entirely sure. One of the things the book really tries to explain, because it feels incredibly true through the reporting over the last year, is I don't know that anyone really considered how significant it would be to put a former criminal defendant into the White House. And what I mean by that is so.

[Preet Bharara]

Well, I considered it.

[Devlin Barrett]

Well, I've covered courts and trials for a long time. Right. I'm an old guy at this point, and this is what I've been doing for a long time. I will say, like criminal defendants, whether they win or lose their case, whether they're indicted or not, whether they're convicted or not, most of them that I have interacted with over the decades come out of that process very bitter and angry about what, in their words, was done to them. And I think what you're seeing here, as much as there are, you know, there is political meaning to what the president is doing, as much as there is, you know, a power play to what he's doing. I really think it's important. And one of the book tries to explain this. I think it's really important to understand that this is an angry former criminal defendant who has been given an incredible amount of power over the criminal justice system. And what we're seeing are the consequences of that.

[Preet Bharara]

Do you think that it is possible to explain to MAGA folks the distinction, if there are any, and I think there are a number, but I wonder if in your travels and your research, you came across any of this,

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[Preet Bharara]

distinctions between what happened to Trump and what he's doing to other people, and how would you describe that distinction?

[Devlin Barrett]

So that's a great point. And I think one of the. I have a chapter in the book about the New Jersey U.S. attorney's office, because I think it's really instructive what happens there to exactly that question, because

[Preet Bharara]

very pointed about Ms. Alina Haba.

[Devlin Barrett]

Well, so she gets put in. Ms. Alina Haba is obviously, for those who don't know, she's a Trump lawyer. She becomes a White House advisor, and pretty quickly in the administration, she is appointed to be the U.S. attorney in New Jersey. And as the book describes, she sets out on a pretty clear path to try to bring criminal charges against particularly the mayor of Newark, but also other Democrats in the state. And what was so interesting, I think, about her experience in the U.S. attorney's office is she believed that there was no functional or practical difference between her pursuit of Newark's mayor then. She believed that was no different than Jack Smith's pursuit of President Trump. And one of those investigations was based on months and months of grand jury work, hundreds and hundreds of FBI interviews. And on the other hand, the investigation in charge of the mayor of Newark was based on one brief confrontation in a parking lot and a video, and charges were filed within a matter of hours. What's fascinating to me about the MAGA folks is they often do not distinguish in any way, shape or form the difference between a thoughtful, detailed, you know, extensive investigation and just charging someone on the fly.

[Preet Bharara]

I mean, the difference to me is, of course, there's that difference

[Podcast Host/Narrator]

between something

[Preet Bharara]

being directed by the commander in chief

[Devlin Barrett]

versus not, and also just someone who put in the work and someone who didn't. I mean, One of the things, one of the features and hallmarks of the revenge campaign. Right. Is that a lot of these cases are falling apart. Why are they falling apart? Well, they're falling apart.

[Preet Bharara]

They suck.

[Devlin Barrett]

Right. Because they often don't have good facts that apply to the law. And they're also falling apart because people aren't doing their homework. People aren't willing to wait even just a matter of a few days in some cases to figure out what actually happened.

[Preet Bharara]

You spend a lot of time distinguishing between Trump 2.0 and Trump 1.0.

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[Preet Bharara]

For folks who don't have yet a copy of your book, could you just describe the main one or two features of difference, both in policy approach and also, I guess, personnel.

[Devlin Barrett]

Right. So I think the main issue is, if you think about Trump won, certainly folks who care about the Justice Department know there were a lot of fights over how the Justice. What the Justice Department was doing in Trump won. But those fights were largely between the White House and. And the Justice Department leadership or between the White House and the FBI leadership. This is a fundamentally different environment. And I think even the Justice Department folks, even the FBI folks, did not realize at the beginning of 2025 how different it was going to be, because now what you have is you have committed Trump loyalists running these institutions and pushing to deliver what the President wants. That has incredibly huge consequences for basic principles of the department, like prosecutorial discretion, and it has incredible consequences for how people in the department try to do their jobs.

[Preet Bharara]

As you say in the first chapter of the book, this is a story of right and wrong. Then you also say of courage and cowardice. I think people know some of the stories on both of those, but give us an example of cowardice.

[Devlin Barrett]

One of the things I say in the book is courageous. People were often quiet or silent, and cowards sometimes bellowed. I think there was a moment in particular that I found very striking when Pam Bondi was testifying before Congress and she was being asked about the Epstein files, and. And she just started yelling about how the dow was at 50,000. And it was such a strange and, I would argue, politically ineffective argument to make. But there is an element to this administration that wants to simply shout down reality. And I think shouting down reality and shouting down justice, shouting down fairness, should be a deeply concerning thing to all Americans. After the horrible, horrible Charlie Kirk killing, the Attorney General of the United States, the nation's top law enforcement official said that hate speech was a punishable crime, which just is a horrible mangling misstatement of the law. And so what I mean by shouting cowards is I think there are times in this Justice Department when the people making decisions try to get their way simply by loudly insisting that what you see is not real and what you know is not true. And I think that is a dangerous dynamic to inject not just into our politics, but into our legal system.

[Preet Bharara]

Yeah. You know, the. No more countenancing of debate and hearing bad news that this president has ushered into the White House, in particular in Trump 2.0 is stunning. And what's so interesting about all of that is a general observation I have, if I may, Devlin, is that there are lots of people who claim to have heroes and models and people they admire. And the disconnect between their professed admiration for those folks and the degree to which they do or do not emulate their heroes is interesting. And I don't know that. I don't know if Steve Jobs is a hero to Trump or others, but he's a model of entrepreneurship and success and innovation to a lot of people, literally. I just read this morning the story of. And I had to check with AI. Is this true that Steve Jobs fired apparently, two members of the board of directors of Pixar? Do you know why?

[Devlin Barrett]

No, I don't know this one.

[Preet Bharara]

Because they always agreed with him. He's like, if these dudes are always agreeing with me, they're providing no value. And I don't know. It was an interesting factoid that I read this morning, but how does that bear on what's going on between Trump and the Justice Department?

[Devlin Barrett]

So I think it's hugely relevant because one of the things I mentioned before, the issue of essentially the Attorney General Pambani issuing that memo in the early days saying there had to be zealous advocacy. You cannot deviate.

[Hunter Biden (via quoted posts)]

You.

[Devlin Barrett]

You cannot deviate from whatever command you're given. You see, that acted out. One of the things the book tries to do is show what that looks like in practice. And look, lawyers. I mean, you know this. But like lawyers in the Justice Department, it's part of their job description to argue with each other. It's also, for the, by the way, part of the job description in the FBI for agents to see cases differently. And the whole premise of the work is that you create better work. You build better cases by challenging each other's assumptions, by testing each other's views of the evidence. And when you shut down internal dissent, even disagreement, for the purpose of making a stronger case, what do you create? You create, as it turns out, some significantly weaker cases. You Create huge embarrassment. I would argue for the administration, every time a judge ends up looking at a weak case and saying, this is garbage, like, this is going away, or for that matter, jurors look at a weak case and say, this is garbage. We're chucking this. And that's happening over and over and over again.

[Preet Bharara]

Do we misapprehend and get wrong what Trump's goal is? And what I mean by that is the following. We assume that the revenge he's trying to obtain is to actually send his political rivals to prison, right? Have them incarcerated. He threatens charges of treason, which has historically carried the punishment of the death penalty. But he puts incompetent people in charge. They bring incompetent cases that are contrary to the law, that grand juries are rejecting at a historically unprecedented pace. And it reminds me of the statement that he made in the Ukraine scandal that was the basis for the first impeachment, which is, you don't have to just announce that there's an investigation and I'll do the rest. Because you would think if you really wanted to be successful in these prosecutions, there would be a better strategy. It's not just that the facts aren't there, I don't think. Is there something to that? Is he just trying to cause them misery and grief and expense and doesn't ultimately care if he wins cases or not? Because you would think that after this much failure, they would be more careful. But they had the crappy indictment against Jim Comey the first time, and they have an even crappier indictment of him the second time.

[Podcast Host/Narrator]

What's going on here?

[Devlin Barrett]

So I think Comey is, in some ways a unique figure in Donald Trump's mind. You can go through the history and sort of, like, catalog with the reasons why, but my reporting for this book shows that the president is still incredibly focused on Comey in particular. Trump, at one point last year said, I used to be hunted and now I'm the hunter. It's a big difference. And I think that's an incredibly accurate statement, and it really shows you how he thinks about this. His top target, his top prey, is Jim Comey. And the book sort of lays out how, again and again and again, careers are told they have to pursue charges against Jim Comey, and if they don't, they'll be fired. And in the instance of the others, because I think there's a broader point here that's beyond just Jim Comey. In the instance of the others, I would say they are trying to see how far they can get that is what career, what current and former careers tell me is there's just constant pressure to see how far they can get. And the other piece of that is part of what the book describes is the degree to which they have removed the institutional pieces that would prevent them or slow them from doing that. And I think that's all very deliberate.

[Podcast Host/Narrator]

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[Preet Bharara]

Does anyone around Donald Trump ever remind him that there's a very powerful argument that but for Jim Comey's conduct with respect to Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump doesn't become president? In other words, that there's a very, very powerful argument that Jim Comey and his actions put Donald Trump in the White House and he should be thanking him instead of trying to send him to prison?

[Devlin Barrett]

Look, you're preaching to the choir because I wrote a different book that basically made that argument. But I will say that argument carries no weight inside the administration that I can see.

[Preet Bharara]

Is it because of the humiliation of being told about a pee pee tape? I mean, it's a serious question given the background, given that serendipity basically allowed Trump to become president at the hands of Jim Comey, Many people believe. How is that so overcome by animosity that he's engaging in this conduct?

[Devlin Barrett]

Because Trump, when he thinks about the wrongs done to him, in his mind, it all comes back to Jim Comey. That's how he thinks about this, because he thinks about the Russia investigation that started when Comey was the director. He thinks about the P tape conversation during the transition. That's another big friction point. And he thinks about those first months when Trump is the president and Trump won and Comey is the director and Comey is kind of trying to manage a difficult relationship and writing these memos detailing his private conversations with Trump and then those memos are put out there after he is fired. And I think all of those things sort of like build the notion that the original deep state actor to Donald Trump is Jim Comey. That's how Donald Trump views it. And so there is nothing he won't tell the Justice Department to do to

[Preet Bharara]

pursue that man in your conversations with current members of the Justice Department, and I presume you have a number of those. What's morale like? And why is morale the way it is? But the reason for the question is, and I've stopped saying the following thing, look, there are these rarefied cases, there are very few in number that relate to a president or a presidential candidate and they distort your view. But most of the rank and file, they do non political, apolitical, you know, gang cases, fraud cases, et cetera. And that's still well and good. I don't say that anymore for reasons that I'm not the guest, so I won't go into detail, but talk about that for a moment.

[Devlin Barrett]

Right. So morale is terrible at the department and at the FBI.

[Preet Bharara]

And even for, even for people who are not involved in this work that

[Devlin Barrett]

we're talking about, there are people who can still do their jobs, you know, without any sort of, you know, chaotic interference. But even for those people, there's. There's two things that, that, well, three things really, that change. My one is if you talk about just the department, they have lost so many bodies. You know, there are U.S. attorney offices in this country that, where every third desk is empty. That is a huge change and, and complication and creates major problems for, for the people who are still there, the same caseload or a similar caseload to what they had before. The second issue is the directives to, okay, now we're going to run it in this direction. Now we're going to run in that direction. Particularly at the FBI, you see a lot of frustration even in just sort of, let's say someone works on a violent crime squad. In theory, not much has changed for them except that there's constantly new directives and new top priorities being issued on a near weekly basis from headquarters. And that creates a real lack of continuity, a real lack of purpose, a real lack of long term strategy. When, if you think about how these agencies work, the Justice Department and the FBI, they are fundamentally supposed to be the people who do the bigger, harder, longer cases. That doesn't mean they're always successful in doing that, but that is why they exist. And more and more, I think morale is being worn down by the degree to which people are just being told, run over here, and then no, now run over there. And that is a significant problem. And then there's the final issue which we're talking about here, which is the revenge cases. And I can't tell you how many people described to me the feeling of someone said we're mole people now, meaning they're trying to just avoid the attention of the political leadership of their agencies and hope that they don't get tasked with a case that feels completely political or very shaky. But it's just hope that's the most they can do. Because you never know when your phone's gonna ring and get assigned some really crazy case. That's one of the things I describe in the book is a guy on his very first day on the job gets assigned an absolutely wild conspiracy minded case and he lasts barely a month in that job because of that assignment.

[Preet Bharara]

People, particularly ambitious and hardworking people who feel their jobs are not just jobs but part of a calling, want their institutions to be held in high esteem. Right. If you're on a team, you want the team to be winning. If you're at a company, you want the company to be profitable, you want it to be reputationally sound. When I was a junior AUSA Assistant US Attorney in the Southern District, I was doing terrorism and gang work. I'm sorry, and organized crime work. And during that time, then U.S. attorney Jim Comey brought the case against Martha Stewart. And every family function I went to and every party, every get together with people who were outside the office, I felt I had to personally defend the prosecution of Martha Stewart. I had nothing to do with that case. I wasn't even in that unit. I was several floors away. And I think about that because all these people in the Justice Department, tens of thousands of them, when they go to Thanksgiving or they go to the fourth of July picnics that they go to, even if they have nothing to do with these revenge, they're all getting asked about it by their friends and relatives. And so they have a stake in it. So I guess that's part of it. I'm going to ask you a very open ended question about my former supervisee, Mr. Todd Blanche. Discuss.

[Devlin Barrett]

I think when the second Trump term started, there was a bit of hope, let's say, within the department and the FBI, that Todd Blanche would serve as sort of a more thoughtful manager. And as a former AUSA, as a former manager in a U.S. attorney's office in New York, that he would. And because I think a lot of current and former federal prosecutors knew him to varying degrees, there was some cautious hope that he would be a good influence on how the department made decisions. I think a lot of folks you talk to now would say that hope was misguided, that he has in fact enabled or advanced some of the worst impulses of the President. The President trusts him very much. There's a Pretty small number of people who the president places as much trust in as Todd Blanche. And I think that really goes back to their sort of the, the being and being in a trial together, having worked, having sat through a trial together that way. But I think within the department, there's a great deal of frustration that it seems like Todd doesn't seem to be able or willing sometimes to help protect any careers from any of the bad decisions that come down.

[Preet Bharara]

Well, with one exception, at least one, it seems to me, from your book, which was this story that I have some connection to in a distant way, and that is there was an effort by Ed Martin, you can explain who he is in a moment and who he was for a time, acting U.S. attorney in the District of Columbia, was planning to, and fully intended to, with great gusto, to indict Senator Chuck Schumer for a statement he made about the Supreme Court that he then retracted for making a threat. Maybe it sort of it was a forerunner to the Seashell indictment of Jim Comey. And there your reporting suggests that Todd Blanche stepped in. Is that right?

[Podcast Host/Narrator]

Right.

[Devlin Barrett]

And I think the interesting thing that that shows is the degree to which there are moments when even the political leaders, DOJ says, no, this is a bad idea. And in that case, what happened was Ed Martin, a Trump loyalist, someone who does not have a prosecutorial resume, but became almost immediately in the administration the person tapped to run the U.S. attorney office in D.C. which is an incredibly important office for a bunch of reasons, particularly for this administration. So Ed Martin was tapped run that office. He tried very hard to get Chuck Schumer indicted. One of the things that the book lays out is that while it was reported back at the time that Ed Martin tried to get Schumer indicted, what the book sort of reveals is that not only did he try just the once, he kept coming back and kept trying to come up with new ways to get Schumer indicted. And he was really stymied mostly by the Public Integrity section. And I think one way to think about what's different, you know, we talk about what's different between Trump 1 and Trump 2. One of the things I think that it's important to understand and hopefully the book lays out, is that there's a big difference between even just 2025 and 2026, because in 2025, the Public Integrity section is still there and still able to stop a bad indictment when you get to 2026, because the administration has dismantled Public Integrity, and it's largely irrelevant to how the justice department functions in 2026. By 2026, you're getting prosecutions and grand jury presentations that PIN would have stopped if it still existed. And I would include the. You're familiar with the case about lawful. The video about lawful orders. That's the kind of case that a functional public integrity section would have stopped. And I think a lot of people at the Justice Department, one of the things that was really striking to me in reporting for the book, one of the things a lot of people said to me was when they killed pin, we all sort of understood that this likely meant there would be a lot fewer corruption prosecutions. What we didn't understand was that there would be more bad prosecutions, for lack of a better term, because public integrity would no longer be functional to say, no, you can't or shouldn't do that. And I think that's one of the ways in which the damage being done inside the building is. Is more extensive than May, than maybe the outside world really understands.

[Preet Bharara]

What is the consensus view, if there is one among lawyers and experts, of Mr. Blanche's performance at the trials of Donald Trump defending him in court?

[Devlin Barrett]

So I think the consensus view is that he was a good trial lawyer who often did bad trial lawyer things because the client seemed to demand it of him. I think, you know, I'll be honest, I covered. So I personally covered the Manhattan trial that went on for six weeks regarding the hush money allegations which led to conviction on all counts. I will tell you, I found a lot of the lawyering in that case subpar on all sides. I was genuinely surprised to watch the first trial of an American president be handled, I thought, kind of poorly by the lawyers themselves. I thought the prosecutors made significant errors. I thought the defense made significant errors. I thought the judge made at least one significant error.

[Preet Bharara]

What's the one error the judge made?

[Devlin Barrett]

Well, the judge got very mad at one point with a witness and basically threw the reporters out of the room, threw the public out of the room, but left, you know, sort of the, essentially Trump's row of observers in the room for this moment when he decided to really give the witness a tongue lashing. And of course, when you keep a bunch of people who love to tweet in the room, but you throw out all the reporters in the room, one of the dynamics you end up having is that the only people to. To explain what happened are people who have one very particular view of the event and one very particular view of who's right and who's wrong in this event. It was, I would argue it was a moment where the judge just lost his temper and didn't want the public to see him lose his temper. And I just think that's, you know, that's not great judging. I would argue.

[Preet Bharara]

Is it your understanding that Todd Blanche gave the green light to the indictment of Jim Comey on the seashell point?

[Devlin Barrett]

Well, what I've reported is that, is that Blanche's office, his deputies, pushed for the seashell indictment. Now his, you know, I've talked to people close to him who deny that, but I think the reporting is solid there.

[Preet Bharara]

I'll tell you my understanding as a general matter, when I was in the department that a prosecution like that look, and I would know better than almost anyone, because we were more loath to inform Washington, D.C. about our actions and intentions than any other of the other 92 offices in the country. And I will tell you that that is not a case that we would have brought or could have brought without the express written understanding of Major League Baseball and the Attorney General and the Deputy Attorney General. Do you have any reason to think that that was otherwise for this?

[Devlin Barrett]

No. And in fact, the real backstory of the Seychelles case, as I explained in the book, is that Blanche's office tried last year to get that case indicted by edva. The prosecutors in Virginia and the. And the prosecutors in Virginia and the Secret Service and the FBI all refused to proceed on that case. That was an important moment in. Because it said two things, really. It showed you just how intent the administration was to charge Jim Comey with a crime. But it also showed you, I think, that there were careers still able and willing to beat back that kind of pressure. But what you see happen is, you know, fast forward eight months, a new prosecutor, this time in North Carolina, is willing and able to proceed with that case despite other careers having said no. And I think it's very telling, frankly, that when Todd Blanche announced the charges against Jim Comey, he framed that case, the indictment against Jim Comey, over the seashells, he framed that case as being brought by career prosecutors in an office. And he never mentioned the thing that the book reveals, which is that this was a case that was rejected by careers in another jurisdiction. And the investigators.

[Preet Bharara]

He also said it was a garden variety case. And cases with these facts are brought all the time, referred to a case that had been brought in Florida. I think that day or the day before I went and looked at that case, it involved a threat that I think explicitly talked about shooting and a gun, not seashells that someone had happened upon in the Formation of the number 86. Do you have any understanding as to whether there is a factual reason why, whether you believe in the case or not? It's a simple case. What investigation necessitated an 11 month delay? Because I believe I've heard him say that there's more to this than meets the eye. I mean, the indictment itself is like two pages. I think it's not a speaking indictment, which is odd in these circumstances. As I've said before on this podcast, any understanding of what we're going to be hit with in terms of additional evidence beyond the photograph.

[Devlin Barrett]

So they won't say what the additional evidence is, but they have hinted a number of times, Blanche specifically has hinted a number of times that it's essentially digital data from his phone or his electronic communications that would demonstrate what I

[Preet Bharara]

mean, the speculation I have heard is he was the head of the FBI. When he was the head of the FBI, people who threatened a President were prosecuted. And he did the same thing that the people who were prosecuted when he was head of the FBI. Ergo, Aristotle is a man, Right? That's syllogism.

[Geico Advertiser]

Is that it?

[Preet Bharara]

Is that what they're going to be hanging their hat on?

[Devlin Barrett]

I think they are hanging their hat on the belief that they can show some sort of intent beyond just the slang term of 86, some sort of understanding of what that term means, beyond just why would they want to keep

[Preet Bharara]

that as a surprise? Want to put it in the. What I don't understand is I want to keep as open a mind as possible. But in the circumstances, if they have the goods, why would you put out a vacuous, empty, non speaking, universally foreseeable, criticized indictment when you have some other goods? I don't understand it. Is it rank incompetence? Is it because they're lying? What is it?

[Devlin Barrett]

I think this is a very outcome focused group of human beings. And I think if you think back to the other Jim Comey case and the whole saga that went on in Virginia, which I describe in the book, the President just says, he just publicly posts that he wants to see these cases brought to court. And I think in some ways the why is that simple. Look, I think they have to be held to their proof, right? Like anybody. And I am struck by the fact that after the Secret Service interviewed him, the day after this post, right, he goes into the office, he talks to the agents about what his intent and what his understanding of what that was meant. And the Secret Service agents whose job it is to protect the President said not only don't we think there's charges here. We don't think there's an investigation here. This is over. And obviously the administration found a way to keep it open and pursue it. I think. I think they're. I think we had a vindictive prosecution argument, a selective prosecution argument, over the last Jim Comey case. I think we're going to see that exact same thing again. And I think, you know, the. The whole. The whole specter, frankly, of firing people until you get the answer you want, I think is not one that has worked yet for the administration, but we'll see. It'll be tested.

[Preet Bharara]

How responsible is he, if at all, for Mr. Rocia's winning his vindictive prosecution motion? He's the person people will recall was sent out of the country. He was ordered back to the country because there was a judicial order in place preventing him from leaving. He was indicted on drug charges. He brings one of these motions. Vindictive and selective prosecution. The court cited Mr. Blanche multiple times. What's your understanding of that?

[Devlin Barrett]

I think that case and that decision there is a tremendous example of exactly the problem Blanche has when he tries to deliver these kinds of cases for the White House, which is, in that case, what you saw is one of the Blanche's top deputies, a guy named Akash Singh, push and push the local U.S. attorney in Tennessee to pursue that case and deliver those charges. And after having delivered them, when the obvious question was raised in court, was this directed by Washington or did this happen organically within the office? The Justice Department officials said this happened organically within the office. It was not directed by Washington, and the emails that were released later on just show that to not be the case. This was a case that was pushed by Akash Singh, who works directly for Blanche. I think there's a really interesting dynamic in that office where a lot of times Blanche does not give an order himself, but one of his close, trusted deputies, you know, makes it clear.

[Preet Bharara]

A lot of delegation.

[Devlin Barrett]

Yeah, there is. And you, frankly, you see that?

[Preet Bharara]

No, I love to delegate. I delegate. Look, if someone else can do the work that I, you know, will do less. Well, I have. I'm not criticizing delegation, but it is also the case. Is it your understanding that the statements made by former Attorney General Pam Bondi relating to how she delegated all sorts of sensitive things, including the Epstein matter, to Todd Blanche, that. That's all correct?

[Devlin Barrett]

I think in many ways that is correct, because I think in many ways, Todd Blanche is making a lot of the day. Todd Blanche has been making a lot of the day to day decisions at the department and still is making a lot of the day to day decisions at the department. I think that's basically right. But I also think one of the interesting dynamics of this whole thing, and you see it in the Comey case, in the Kilmar Abrego Garcia case, you see it in a bunch of different cases, is that oftentimes those instructions come not specifically from Blanche, but from someone like Akash Singh or some of the other guys who work in his office. And I say guys because it became a joke among some of the careers that they began referred to as Blanche's bros. Because there were these young guys fairly confident, often seemingly not well informed about even the basic elements of the crimes they were demanding be charged. And, you know, the careers struggled with. How do you tell this powerful person in the Deputy Attorney General's office that they don't know what they're talking about?

[Preet Bharara]

Yeah. Is it your understanding, I just want to put these on the record since you've done all this reporting. Is it your understanding that the acting Attorney General gave the green light to the prosecution of the Southern Poverty Law Center?

[Devlin Barrett]

Yes, yes, I think that's absolutely right. I think that case does not happen without the Deputy Attorney General's blessing. And I think he enthusiastically embraced the announcement and public argument for that case.

[Preet Bharara]

Is it your understanding that the sitting Acting Attorney General of the United States gave the green light to this IRS immunity deal? That is the subject of a lot of discussion, yes.

[Devlin Barrett]

Although that one's a little trickier in terms of he said something very interesting when he was pressed on that point recently in Congress, which he said that decision is not part of any settlement deal. He characterized the protection from tax audit inquiry as a standalone decision by him as the acting Attorney General. I think a reasonable person can say that's him trying to make sure that that condition does not get too closely scrutinized by a judge or by Congress. I'm not saying whether that strategy will work or not, but I found it very interesting that when pressed on that particular point, he suddenly presented that as a standalone decision that he made that is not part of the settlement.

[Preet Bharara]

Do you have any understanding of whether the acting Attorney General was involved in the transfer of Ghislaine Maxwell to a lesser security prison or who's responsible for that? Because that's a mystery to many.

[Devlin Barrett]

I think he is responsible for that because he defended it as she's facing threats and therefore her transfer was justified. He has said a version of yes, it's a decision by the department. So it's my decision.

[Preet Bharara]

Do you know if it's ever occurred to folks in the department or in the administration that if you took the standard for indictment, right, whether it's the 86, 47 or it's Jim Comey answering a compound, complicated, vague question from a United States senator at a hearing to speaking words that are true about military orders, that members of the administration have already engaged in conduct and activity and made statements under oath that meet that standard, that people have already come before Congress and said things that are more clearly provable as lies than the former officials. I mean, for example, Hamil Bove, who now himself is a judge in the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, from reading your account, you believe that he lied to Congress. And I don't know if he did or not. And I wasn't there. I don't know all the facts. But certainly the way you put it down, if the Trump Department of Justice standard were to be put to him,

[Podcast Host/Narrator]

he'd be indicted in a minute.

[Preet Bharara]

Is that fair or not?

[Devlin Barrett]

I think that's fair, according to what the people who were in those meetings with Emil Bovey have said. And remember, as the book describes, there is a recording of one of those conversations. That recording does exist. And, you know, I have quotes from it in the book. I'll give you to your point. Exactly. I will just say I have spoken to current former law enforcement officials who say they can make a better case for lying to Congress against Emil Bovey than they could make against Jim Comey. And you know, I'm not saying, to be clear, I'm not saying that, you know, this person should be charged or that person charged.

[Preet Bharara]

I'm not saying you can convict the person.

[Devlin Barrett]

Correct.

[Preet Bharara]

But on matter after, look, there are reportedly there are three members of the Cabinet who have mortgage fraud issues. And again, there are lots of reasons to understand and to believe that those are not criminal in the cases that are being pursued. But if that's the standard you adopt, then there's trouble for these folks. And I guess just going back to my original. Does anybody think about that or everyone's living for the moment. Your book is called the Department of Revenge. There are various philosophies of revenge. And thoughtful revenge is one thing. Impulsive revenge is something else. No one's ever accused Donald Trump of being thoughtful or many of the people around him. But they are tactical. And not all the people who are involved in this are the president and have immunity or have the power to pardon and maybe just hope they get pardoned do they not? They love to talk about f around and find out. And they're all thinking about the first cycle of this. They did this to him. We're going to do it to them. And not to bring in a mob reference once again. But at some point, it's not just f around and find out, but then you f around and then you're going to find out also in the next cycle. Do they think about it? Do they talk about it? Did this come up in your research or your interviews?

[Devlin Barrett]

They do, but I'll be honest. I think, one, there is a degree of faith that there may well be pardons coming at the end of this administration. Two, I think there is also, you see it, I think, in the battle over the bar discipline issues. I think you see a desire to try to insulate themselves in that way. And look, I found it was fascinating to me as the administration tried to fight the idea of bar discipline. They invoked the presidential immunity decision by the Supreme Court and made the argument, in essence, that because the president has immunity, lawyers who work for the president and the government can't be disciplined by bars.

[Preet Bharara]

No, we've talked about that.

[Devlin Barrett]

That's an incredible interpretation of the Supreme Court immunity decision. But can I also just, like, take a step back? Because I think the point you're making is super important in this way. What you see, what the book tries to do, obviously we've all seen different news stories about this or that thing that has happened at the department. That is shock. What the book tries to do is establish both the public things we've known and heard about and the private conversations behind closed doors inside the department all point to a pattern. And the pattern is one of lowering standards. I cannot emphasize enough how much of what they are doing is about lowering standards. And it's a great question. Well, if you lower the standard so far, what is to prevent that lower standard from, you know, biting you in the butt in some future point? But I think there is a basic lack of concern in some ways that there is anything to, you know, to come back on anyone. And in fact, they don't, in some ways, they don't really believe in the process. Right. If you only, like I said before, because they care so much about outcomes, not process, a lot of them take the view that the process is sort of fake, that the facts you gather and the evidence you present and the legal analysis you do is all just sort of nerd posturing. And I think a lot of times you see as they put these cases together very quickly and very haphazardly, I would argue some of them, it reflects that their basic view that a prosecution case is kind of a joke to begin with.

[Preet Bharara]

You could argue that the thoughtlessness in pursuing these investigations and prosecutions is terrible, and it is. But their thoughtlessness in execution of these things betrays their incompetence and is a silver lining for the people who get targeted. All right, so Devlin, you wrote this book that consumes a lot of pages, but they're page turning. But that's only a year of the four. And here we are in June, so we're a year and a half in. When you write the next book, after year two or after year three, what do you expect will be in it? Let me put it another way. The Department of Revenge. How much more revenge is there to be done?

[Devlin Barrett]

Well, look, I think one of the things that was happening even as I was writing the book was you could see the administration turning its focus away from maybe sort of the past grudges, the past targets, the real time, real time grudges. Right. To things like the video by lawmakers about lawful orders, to things like the Fed. One of the things that you can see happening is the degree to which the President's targets and fixations are changing. And I think that's going to be part of the story at the Justice Department. I also think part of the story at the Justice Department is going to be the hollowing out of both the bodies and the principles of the place that is underway that's significantly underway already. I think that will continue in a way that will continue to weaken the place as an institution. And the thing I sort of try to end the book on is this notion of credibility. And for an institution that has long had not perfect credibility certainly, but pretty good credibility has generally been trusted, especially by judges. You're really entering an interesting new world where both judges and a large number of jurors. I think the juror issue is going to be fascinating in the next couple years because in Washington, D.C. where I live, for example, there is a group that trains jurors in the principles of jury nullification. I sat through one of those seminars. It was as a longtime court reporter. It was fascinating to watch jurors learning that, in theory at least, their obligation to the country is to not convict people.

[Preet Bharara]

The damage that's being done is incalculable. And this issue of trust is incredibly important because it's earned over generations to an institution. The benefit of the doubt is no longer there. On my other podcast that we just Finished taping. A short while ago, Joyce Vance and I discussed this issue of whether you deferred to the Department of Justice on statements made. Speaking of Todd Blanche. Todd Blanche said in front of a congressional hearing that he didn't call it the slush fund, but I call it the slush fund. Slush fund is not going forward, period. With great emphasis. Judge is like, yeah, I don't know. The acting Attorney General of the United States, the chief federal law enforcement officer, as I've always understood that identity to be, not the president, but the attorney general said a thing publicly to an equal branch of government, and that wasn't good enough. Right. So that's one example among many that I think are terrible for the department. One word of hope and then I'll let you go.

[Devlin Barrett]

I think as much as there have been very, very dark and difficult days inside this department over the last 18 months, there are still a great number of people doing their jobs well as best they can and who haven't lost sight of the mission and haven't lost sight of the way that the job should be done. I also think that change in itself, one of the things I personally am not a big fan of is the term norms, because I feel like arguing for norms is sort of, in this era, especially of general distrust of institution. It feels too much like arguing for status quo, which I don't think is really a great sell. But I do think you have to argue for principles and you have to argue for truth and reality. And I think without those things, the court system doesn't really function. And I do think there are lots of people still, both in the government and outside the government, who understand the stakes and who understand the principles and are working for those things. I'm not a particularly pessimistic person. I'm a pretty optimistic person. But I think there is a tremendous amount of harm that's been done already, and there's. There's going to be more fights and there's going to be more battles inside the department and inside the FBI.

[Preet Bharara]

I want to thank you for a lot of things and the research and the work you do on this and the reporting you do. I sent you a text separately before the interview a couple of days ago where I said, thank you for calling this the Department of Revenge and not the Department of Retribution, which I used to use that word, retribution. I still use it from time to time. I think you've used it in the interview, but not in the title of the book. We have to use plain English.

[Devlin Barrett]

Absolutely.

[Preet Bharara]

And we have to use basic words like revenge, which is what this is. And you gave another example a minute ago when you said, what are norms? Norms that we want to keep, Norms that are in place for good reason and in good faith are there because they're principles that they stand for. Right. Lots of bad things were norm.

[Devlin Barrett]

Absolutely.

[Preet Bharara]

And the separation between the political side of the executive branch and the law enforcement side with respect to particulars, particular people, not just priorities, that's a norm. But that's not, as you just say. I'm very glad you said it. That's not persuasive or compelling. It's a norm because the principle of the separation is paramount in our system. And in our system, unlike in banana republics, you don't have a political figure directing the harassment, persecution, prosecution, imprisonment, and potential execution of political rivals. That people understand. That's a principle people understand. And the norm talk, which I am very guilty of over the course of the last number of years, doesn't quite cut it. Sometimes in the same way, by the way, that your industry, and I'll get off my high horse, your industry at the beginning didn't know how to call a lie a lie. You don't have to comment. You don't have to comment.

[Devlin Barrett]

No, the lie thing is always.

[Preet Bharara]

Because it was very jarring, because some things are lies, some things are lies. And I think we have on occasion let etiquette, a certain kind of norm of etiquette. Right. Get in the way. Now, there's a principle that underlies that norm of etiquette in certain times and in certain circumstances. I'm not a student of this, but I would imagine it includes things like having credibility with the audience, not looking like you're putting a thumb on the scale. Civility gives you credibility. Name calling is never great, but when someone's fricking lying really, really badly and really demonstrably so, then that norm is not justified by the same principle that established it. Right, Right.

[Devlin Barrett]

And look, one of the ways in which that whole idea is being tested, I mean, look, the press struggles with this at times. I will concede that on any day. But I also think the courts, I think one of the sort of defining characteristics of the last year is the courts are struggling with that too. Because you see over and over and over judges opining, suggest, in suggesting, hinting, or just accusing government lawyers of lying to them, but not wanting to, often not wanting to go the additional step of saying, and what are we going to do about that? And I will say, you know, I think as a reporter. It's really important to speak plainly. I think that's like the core function of what we do. I tried to write a book that, while it was about lawyers, was not written certainly for lawyers, it was written to explain why non lawyers should care about these things, why this matters to a lot more than just lawyers. And I think plain speaking is something that, frankly, the Justice Department often doesn't do well, but I think is more important now than ever because there are these larger and larger challenges of people not telling the truth, people trying to snow judges. And the more that happens, the more I think judges are going to be forced one way or another, to confront it.

[Preet Bharara]

Devin, you've been very generous with your time. Congratulations on the book the Department of Revenge, How Trump Took Control of American Justice. I wish for you, given the topic, that there's not enough material for a sequel. And if there is, it is a slim volume. Devlin Barrett, thanks very much.

[Devlin Barrett]

Thank you, Preeth. Great to talk to you.

[Podcast Host/Narrator]

My conversation with Devlin Barrett continues for members of the Insider community. In the exclusive bonus content, Devlin and I discuss why Justice Department employees are more willing to stand up against Trump this time around.

[Devlin Barrett]

We're sort of this strange balance between both, on one hand, admiring the forces that have created enormous fortunes and and at the same time, very wary of them.

[Podcast Host/Narrator]

To try out the membership, head to cafe.cominsider again. That's cafe.cominsider. after the break, I'll share my thoughts about Hunter Biden's emergence as a prolific and unusually candid public voice.

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[Podcast Host/Narrator]

So I've gotten some questions from folks along the following lines. This came in an email from Calvin, who asked, have you been following Hunter Biden on X? What do you make of what he's been saying? So Calvin and others As I said last week, I sure have been following Hunter Biden on X. And at least for me, it has not been a disappointment. His very first post came just a month ago on May 19, and it read simply, I'm Hunter Biden. You've never actually heard from me. And that's pretty much true.

[Preet Bharara]

We've heard a lot about Hunter Biden.

[Podcast Host/Narrator]

We've heard allegations, We've heard innuendo. We've heard slurs and attacks. We've heard grand conspiracy theories. And throughout all of it, Hunter, whether constrained by his lawyers or his predicament or his judgment at the time, asserted his right to remain silent. As he explains elsewhere, the reason I am doing this is because for seven years, for a whole myriad of reasons, I haven't been able to tell my story. Mostly, though, what I want to say is the one thing that I know I am qualified to talk about is addiction and recovery. And he does a lot of that. So silent he is no longer. He's gone from zero to prolific in a matter of weeks, and he has earned hundreds of thousands of followers and significant buzz for it. Why is that? Well, for one thing, he's owned up to a lot. Seven years sober, he claims to be, and he readily admits in some gory detail his transgressions with drugs and alcohol in particular. His posts are anything but excuses or rationalizations. He also seems to have mastered every mode of the platform from confessional to clapback. He appears open and honest about his drug use and is not overly celebratory about his seven years of sobriety. In June, he posted a video in

[Hunter Biden (via quoted posts)]

which he said, seven years clean and sober. I'm more proud of that than anything. I've ever done in my life. And I just want everybody to know that is still out there. Sick and suffering. There's a way out. And that way out is together.

[Podcast Host/Narrator]

The next day he spoke about gratitude. Gratitude can turn what you thought broke you into the very thing that made you whole. The only way that you get to true gratitude is to be grateful for all of it.

[Preet Bharara]

Then he says this.

[Hunter Biden (via quoted posts)]

I'm grateful that I was a crack addict. And I don't say that with even the slightest bit of irony or bullshit. It has given me to me right here. All that addiction took away from me and then all of the consequences took away from me. Any sense of me being better than anyone or having to be better than anyone. I get to approach you and you get to see all of me. You get to see the nude pictures. You get to see me in grief. You get to see me at my worst. You get to see everything about me. You get to see all of the disgusting pieces and all of the beautiful pieces of it. And you get to see all of it. And you know what? And here I am. I've just broken down every barrier that you could possibly have to find a connection with me.

[Devlin Barrett]

That's beautiful.

[Podcast Host/Narrator]

That moved me. In another post he said, radical honesty does not give you back who you were. It hands you the clean slate of who you always wanted to be. The mask comes off the cartoon other people drew of you stays on the page. Here he is in a post that I also found moving about his dad, Joe Biden. It's from June 6th. The thing my dad did for me was that he never let go. As much as I tried to run, I always knew he was waiting. And I know I tortured him. It still makes me cry to think about what I put him through. But I came back and he was where he always was. Waiting to love me. And whatever you think of the Bidens, whatever you think of Hunter Biden, if that doesn't move you, you're made of stone. But what balances out the heavy and earnest confession and soul bearing is one of the sharpest wielding of wit and snark we've seen in some time. And it hits hard or harder because of the source, who has been a punching bag for years now. He can be disarming. For example, on June 4th, he wrote this. I know this may sound petty, but I can't stand it when people Photoshop a meth pipe in my mouth.

[Preet Bharara]

A crack pipe doesn't have that little

[Podcast Host/Narrator]

bowl at the end. This is why we can't trust AI Please make the appropriate edit. Thank you for your attention to this matter. Now that's a tweet. On the same day, he responded to a somewhat obnoxious critic who thought he cleverly dunked on Hunter and his troubles. Hunter noticed that the critic had a Johnny Cash profile picnic. So he had this to I see your profile picture. That's Johnny Cash. My hero, too. Arrested seven times, smuggled 668amphetamines across the Mexican border in 1965, took every drug there was and drank like I did. Cheated on his first wife, slept with more women than I ever did. Hit bottom in a cave in Tennessee in 1968 trying to crawl off and die. And then he got up. He got clean. He spent the rest of his life singing for prisoners and addicts and the people of the country threw away because he knew he was one of them. That was the whole point of the man in Black. You picked his picture. You did not pick his message. Try listening to the words so you see why people are talking about his account. Hunter expresses surprise at all of this. Sometimes I don't know why any of you haters are surprised. I'm the one actually engaging here. You're the ones who have obsessively poured over 10,000 photos, the 30,000 text messages, and the 128,000 emails from my hacked icloud and stolen devices. If anything, I am prolific.

[Preet Bharara]

You know what?

[Podcast Host/Narrator]

You won't find any of the most heinous, hateful things you keep posting about me. In other moments, he compares himself persuasively and favorably against the Trump sons, against the MAGA haters, and against the conspiracy theorists. He has clapped back at the President, too. After Trump said in a video that Hunter had a quote unquote checkered past, the young Biden posted, wait, did he just say checkered past? I'm 28 felonies, six bankruptcies, and one Epstein bromance short of his checkered past. And then this on June 10, in the midst of the NBA Finals. Seems like President Trump is losing some of his mojo. Napping at home in the Oval is one thing, but on date night with Dolan at the Garden, get that man a Diet Coke. I thought that was kind of funny. In the end, and this may seem odd to you, the Hunter Biden account and style reminds me of the rap battle at the end of 8 Mile, where Eminem famously playing B Rabbit in the final round. Knowing the crowd knows his flaws, knowing his opponent knows his baggage, realizing that this is his strength, that this is his power. He raps with radical honesty.

[Hunter Biden (rap battle reference)]

I know everything he's about to say against me. I am white. I am a fucking bum. I do live in a trailer with my mom. My boy future isn't up in time.

[Podcast Host/Narrator]

Then he makes the case against Papa Doc. Kind of like Hunter makes the case against the Trumps.

[Hunter Biden (rap battle reference)]

But I know something about you. You went to Cranbrook. That's a private school. What's the matter, dog? You this guy's a gangster. His real name's Clarence.

[Preet Bharara]

And then, of course, B.

[Podcast Host/Narrator]

Rabbit issues the challenge here. Tell these people something they don't know about me. Literal mic drop. And Papa Doc goes mute. For reasons that are not important, I keep a rough hierarchy in my head of what I believe are the three most compelling storylines in all of narrative. You may disagree, and I'd love to hear from you, but this is my ranking. Love stories.

[Preet Bharara]

They're great, but they're number three.

[Podcast Host/Narrator]

Revenge stories.

[Preet Bharara]

They're great, too.

[Podcast Host/Narrator]

I like a lot of them, but they're number two. What is the most compelling storyline across centuries of human storytelling?

[Preet Bharara]

Stories of redemption, the rise after the

[Podcast Host/Narrator]

fall that beats all of them, at least in my book. Is Hunter Biden redeemed? Is Hunter Biden redeemable? These are questions way above my pay grade, but I'm here for it, to see what happens. Well, that's it for this episode of Stay Tuned. Thanks again to my guest, Devlin Barrett. If you like what we do, rate and review the show on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen, every positive review helps new listeners find the show. Send me your questions about news, politics and justice. You can reach me on Twitter or blueskyeetbarara with the hashtag AskPreet. You can also call and leave me a message at 833-997-7338. That's 83399, Preet. Or you can send an email to letterscafe.com stay tuned is now on substack. Head to staytuned.substack.com to watch live streams, get updates about new podcast episodes and more. That's staytuned.substack.com

[Preet Bharara]

Stay Tuned is presented by

[Podcast Host/Narrator]

Cafe and the Vox Media Podcast Network. The executive producer is Tamara Sepper, the deputy editor is Celine Rohr. The supervising producer is Jake Kaplan. The lead editorial producer is Jennifer Indig. The associate producer is Claudia Hernandez. The audio and video producer is Nat Weiner, the senior audio producer is Matthew Billy, and the marketing manager is Leanna Greenway. Our music is by Andrew Dost. Special thanks to Tory Paquette. And Adam Harris. I'm your host, Preet Bharara. As always, stay tuned.

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[Preet Bharara]

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