Acting AG Blanche Fires Back at Obama’s DOJ Criticism
Former President Barack Obama sharply criticized the Trump administration this week over what he described as growing political influence inside the United States Department of Justice, prompting an aggressive response from Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche defending both the administration’s prosecutions and President Donald Trump’s authority over the executive branch.
The escalating public dispute comes as the Justice Department faces mounting scrutiny over a series of criminal investigations and indictments involving several longtime Trump critics and political adversaries, including former FBI Director James Comey.
Obama raised the issue during an interview with Stephen Colbert on CBS’ The Late Show with Stephen Colbert that aired Monday night.
“The White House shouldn’t be able to direct the attorney general to go around prosecuting whoever,” Obama said during the interview. “The idea is that the attorney general is the people’s lawyer. It’s not the president’s consigliere.”
Obama suggested the principle of DOJ independence may ultimately need to be codified into law by Congress, arguing that the justice system risks becoming politicized if presidents are perceived as directly targeting political opponents through federal prosecutions.
The comments immediately triggered pushback from the Trump administration.
White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson accused Obama of hypocrisy, arguing that his administration played a central role in the origins of the Trump-Russia investigation.
“Barack Hussein Obama is the king of weaponization,” Jackson said in a statement, referencing declassified documents related to the FBI’s Russia probe.
But the administration’s most extensive response came Wednesday from Blanche during an interview with CBS News in Phoenix.
Blanche forcefully rejected accusations that the DOJ is engaged in political retaliation and defended the president’s constitutional authority over the executive branch.
“Article Two says, ‘the executive power shall be vested in the President of the United States of America,’” Blanche said while holding a pocket copy of the Constitution during the interview. “It does not say that the Attorney General stands off to the side.”
Blanche emphasized that the attorney general serves within the executive branch and argued that presidents are fully entitled to direct priorities involving law enforcement, immigration, drugs, and national security.
“To the extent that President Trump calls me and says that he thinks we have a problem in this country, whether it’s the scourge of drugs, illegal immigration, every American wants him to do that,” Blanche said. “And he should.”
The acting attorney general also dismissed accusations that the DOJ is pursuing politically motivated cases against Trump critics.
“We are absolutely doing nothing but what we should be doing at the Department of Justice,” Blanche said. “I wake up with a very clean conscience every morning.”
The public clash comes amid multiple high-profile investigations involving Trump adversaries.
Most notably, Comey was recently indicted after prosecutors alleged a 2025 Instagram post featuring seashells arranged to form the numbers “86 47” constituted a threat against Trump, the 47th president. Prosecutors argue “86” is commonly understood slang meaning “to eliminate” or “get rid of.”
Blanche defended the case, arguing threats against the president must be treated seriously given recent assassination attempts and escalating political extremism.
Last year, Trump publicly urged then-Attorney General Pam Bondi to pursue prosecutions against Comey, James, and Sen. Adam Schiff, writing on social media that “JUSTICE MUST BE SERVED.”
Blanche declined to discuss private conversations with Trump when asked whether the president personally directed prosecutions.
“But rest assured,” Blanche said, “he has much better, bigger and important things to do than to worry about me doing my job.”
Blanche also turned Democrats’ criticism back against them by pointing to the multiple criminal prosecutions Trump himself faced before returning to office, including cases brought by state prosecutors in New York and Georgia as well as federal investigations overseen by Special Counsel Jack Smith.
“So I welcome criticism. Let’s go,” Blanche said. “But if you’re sitting in a glass house, you ought not throw stones.”
Trump Admin Says It Uncovered $10 Billion Obamacare Fraud Scheme
The Trump administration says it has uncovered what it describes as a massive fraud scheme within the Affordable Care Act.
Members of Trump’s administration allege that roughly $10 billion in taxpayer money was improperly paid out between 2021 and 2024 because of weakened enrollment safeguards under former President Joe Biden.
According to a Department of Health and Human Services report, officials have already removed nearly three million fraudulent or improper Obamacare enrollments and estimate another 2.6 million questionable enrollments remain.
Administration officials say the findings are part of a broader government-wide effort to eliminate fraud, waste, and abuse across federal programs.
The report traces the alleged problems to changes made during the Biden administration that expanded enrollment opportunities while relaxing income verification and eligibility checks.
At the start of Biden’s presidency, approximately 10 million people were enrolled through the Affordable Care Act exchanges. By 2024, enrollment had surged to roughly 22 million.
Federal investigators now believe millions of those enrollments were improper, fraudulent, or created without the knowledge of the individuals involved.
“By our estimate, improper, phantom, and fraudulent enrollment peaked at 5.6 million people in 2025,” the report states.
“We estimate 2.6 million improper and phantom enrollments remain, including over 1 million enrollments without a Social Security number.”
According to the report, several different forms of abuse contributed to the alleged fraud.
Officials say some applicants intentionally understated their income to qualify for larger taxpayer-funded subsidies.
Others allegedly received premium assistance despite failing to meet eligibility requirements.
Investigators also identified what they describe as “phantom enrollments,” in which insurance brokers allegedly enrolled people in Obamacare plans without their knowledge to collect federal commissions.
The report argues that reduced verification requirements made those practices significantly easier to carry out.
Since taking office, the Trump administration says it has restored stricter income verification requirements, ended several special enrollment periods, increased screening for duplicate Medicaid enrollment, and launched investigations into brokers suspected of creating phantom policies.
Officials also say they have strengthened oversight of agents participating in the federal marketplace.
As a result of those efforts, nearly three million enrollments have already been removed from the Affordable Care Act exchanges.
Even after those removals, approximately 19.2 million people remain enrolled.
The administration says its goal is not to reduce legitimate coverage but to ensure taxpayer dollars are being spent only on individuals who actually qualify.
“Preserving the fiscal and programmatic integrity of the ACA Exchanges is key to safeguarding taxpayer-funded resources for those that truly need them,” the report states.
“The federal government paying brokers to enroll individuals without their knowledge is not.”
The report also says the administration will continue pursuing additional enforcement actions against brokers and others accused of exploiting the program.
“The Trump Administration continues to aggressively root out fraud, waste, abuse, and corruption by promulgating new regulations to improve program integrity, investigating suspected improper or fraudulent enrollment, and taking action against agents and brokers committing fraud.”
The findings are likely to reignite debate over the Affordable Care Act and how aggressively eligibility rules should be enforced.
Supporters of the administration argue the report demonstrates that stricter oversight is necessary to protect taxpayers and preserve benefits for those legally entitled to receive them.
Critics of previous verification rollbacks have long warned that loosening enrollment safeguards could increase improper payments and fraud, while supporters of the Biden-era policies argued the changes made healthcare more accessible to eligible Americans, Fox News reported exclusively.
The administration says its investigations remain ongoing, with an estimated 2.6 million additional enrollments still under review as officials continue auditing the federal health insurance exchanges.
Trump has been pushing to replace Obamacare for over a decade, and this may give Republicans enough motivation to actually do something.
