Report: Trump mulling purge of DOJ staffers involved in his prosecution

Though the Biden administration's campaign of lawfare against Donald Trump appeared to help propel his presidential bid to ultimate success, that is not to say that the president-elect is necessarily willing to let bygones be bygones.

As the Daily Wire reports, Trump is said to be planning a firing spree targeting all those at the Justice Department who collaborated with special counsel Jack Smith on the criminal cases brought against him in recent years.

DOJ purge on tap?

Citing a report from the Washington Post, the Daily Wire noted that insiders close to Trump suggested that those on the chopping block will also include career DOJ bureaucrats who typically retain their positions when presidential transitions occur.

Further striking fear into the hearts of Justice Department stalwarts are reports that Trump may spur the creation of investigative groups charged with pursuing evidence of electoral fraud in battleground states during the 2020 presidential contest.

Seemingly giving credence to the aforementioned reporting was a statement issued by Trump press secretary Karoline Leavitt, who said, “President Trump campaigned on firing rogue bureaucrats who have engaged in the illegal weaponization of our American justice system, and the American people can expect he will deliver on that promise.”

Anxiety grips agency

ABC News recently noted that employees within the Justice Department have been living in a state of fear since Trump's election to another four-year term, particularly after he nominated former Rep. Matt Gaetz to serve as attorney general.

Though Gaetz has since taken himself out of the running for the top job, fears of massive overhauls and sweeping Trump-orchestrated reforms have gripped career attorneys and staff alike.

After Gaetz's withdrawal from contention, Trump nominated former Florida attorney general Pam Bondi to lead the DOJ, and while she may be a less incendiary choice than his prior pick, she is viewed as extremely loyal to the president-elect's agenda and capable of bringing significant change to the agency.

Schmitt weighs in

Though talk of massive firings at the DOJ currently remains just that, there is at least one Republican lawmaker who believes such a purge is just the right idea.

Sen. Eric Schmitt (R-MO) has weighed in on the rumor and said that Trump would indeed do well to fire anyone at the Justice Department who had a hand in the cases brought against him since he left office.

Speaking during an interview on NBC's Meet the Press, Schmitt said, “First and foremost, the people involved with this should be fired immediately. And anybody part of this, this effort to keep President Trump off the ballot and to throw him in jail for the rest of his life because they didn't like his politics, and who continue to cast him as a quote, unquote, threat to democracy, was wrong, and so we'll see where that goes.”

Schmitt went on to say that the prosecutions of Trump “all fell apart under the weight of the law. And so I do think there needs to be accountability. I think that getting it back to crime fighting is important, but there has to be accountability for these kinds of abuses,” and that is a sentiment millions of Americans surely share.