Attorney General Todd Blanche's Sunday appearance on NBC News' "Meet the Press" did not go as well as he may have intended, according to one analyst.

Moderator Kristen Welker asked Blanche whether he views the Department of Justice as a separate entity from the executive branch, and whether he would refuse an illegal order from President Donald Trump. Will Saletan, an analyst at The Bulwark, argued in a video published Sunday that Blanche's answers to the seemingly straightforward questions were alarming.

Asked about the DOJ's independence, Blanche replied: "No, I'm not going to pledge that I'm not going to pledge that, and no attorney general should ever pledge that."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa," Saletan responded. "This was a really simple question. The question was: Will federal law enforcement be independent of the White House and its political motives? And the fact that Blanche won't say yes to that question just tells you already that he is afraid of Trump and he is weak and he will let Trump control the Department of Justice."

Blanche's answer on whether he would refuse an illegal order from the president appeared, to the analyst, even more concerning.

"The president will never ask me to do something unethical or illegal," Blanche told Welker.

Saletan pointed to recent DOJ history that he said contradicted that claim.

"Wait a minute," Saletan said, before displaying a screenshot of a Truth Social post in which Trump directed former Attorney General Pam Bondi to prosecute several of his political enemies, including former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James.

"So, when Blanche sits there and says Trump would never ask him to do anything unethical or illegal, he is absolutely lying," Saletan said.

Blanche, a former federal prosecutor who previously served as one of Trump's personal defense attorneys before joining the Justice Department as Deputy Attorney General, now leads the department following Bondi's tenure. The exchange drew attention because the attorney general's public stance on DOJ independence is especially sensitive at a time when the department's relationship to the White House is under close scrutiny, and because Welker's questions went directly to the longstanding expectation that federal law enforcement should operate without political interference.

Source: Raw Story