Democrats have asked the Justice Department’s watchdog to investigate whether Attorney General Pam Bondi is quietly steering cases for her brother’s benefit — after his clients saw federal charges dropped, indictments withdrawn, and a presidential pardon secured since she took office.
Sen. Adam Schiff and Rep. Dave Min, both California Democrats, wrote to the DOJ’s Inspector General on March 11 requesting a formal investigation into what they called a “troubling pattern” of favorable outcomes for clients of Brad Bondi, a partner at Washington law firm Paul Hastings.
The letter was addressed to William M. Blier, who is serving as deputy inspector general performing the duties of the inspector general — the office’s top position is currently vacant. The lawmakers asked whether Bondi “properly recused herself from, or otherwise improperly influenced, several cases involving defendants represented by her brother.”
They have been waiting since December 16 for the department to answer that question. The DOJ has not responded.
The cases began almost immediately after Pam Bondi took office. Federal prosecutors dropped theft charges against former Florida state legislator Carolina Amesty — accused of fraudulently obtaining $122,000 in COVID-19 relief funds — after Brad Bondi joined her legal team.
Weeks later, the DOJ withdrew an 11-count wire fraud indictment against Missouri developer Sidarth Chakraverty and a co-defendant, again after Brad Bondi’s involvement — despite career prosecutors and Trump-appointed interim US Attorney Thomas Albus having previously determined criminal penalties were appropriate. Both clients denied wrongdoing.
Lawmakers also flagged President Trump’s March 2025 pardon of Trevor Milton, the Nikola Corp. founder convicted of defrauding investors, for whom Brad Bondi served as lead trial counsel — and a separate DOJ intervention in litigation pitting the Cruise Lines International Association against the state of Hawaii.
Most recently, Brad Bondi is negotiating a settlement with the Securities and Exchange Commission on behalf of Alexander Mehr, accused of running a $112 million Ponzi scheme that diverted more than $16 million in investor funds for personal use. Settlement talks remain ongoing. Neither Mehr nor his co-defendant has commented.
Brad Bondi publicly described his recent client outcomes as “remarkable victories” on LinkedIn — a post Democrats cited in their letter to the inspector general. The same post referenced “many confidential settlements, declinations, and closing letters from the SEC and other regulatory agencies” in 2025 that “didn’t make the press.”
Schiff and Min flagged those undisclosed matters in their letter, noting that the extent of DOJ involvement in any of them remains unknown. DOJ spokesman Gates McGavick said the decisions in his clients’ cases “were made through the proper channels, and the Attorney General had no role in them.”
Sen. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland was direct: “The DOJ’s interventions benefiting the attorney general’s brother are all the more suspect, and require additional scrutiny and full transparency for the American people.”
The conflict-of-interest inquiry compounds existing pressure on Bondi. The House Oversight Committee voted 24-19 on March 4 to subpoena her over the DOJ’s handling of the Epstein Files Transparency Act — a bipartisan rebuke, with five Republicans joining Democrats — and no testimony date has been set.
The Attorney General has also relocated from her Washington apartment to a secure military installation after federal law enforcement flagged threats from drug cartels and critics of her Epstein file handling, the New York Times reported.
The inspector general’s office has not publicly confirmed whether it will open an investigation.
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