President-elect Donald Trump’s decision to nominate Pam Bondi to lead the Justice Department set off a wave of speculation about whether she would open investigations into Trump’s political nemeses.

Trump repeatedly called for investigations and arrests of his top political enemies on the campaign trail, and Bondi unequivocally reiterated those calls last year. While Trump’s base has enthusiastically cheered on the notion of retribution, he has sent mixed signals since his election about how his administration might proceed.

Installing Bondi and some of his other fiercest legal defenders, such as FBI director nominee Kash Patel, could have set off alarm bells for Trump’s targets. They include former Rep. Liz Cheney, who served on the committee that investigated Trump over the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, and special counsel Jack Smith, who brought two criminal prosecutions against him that Republicans widely denounced as unfair. The president-elect called for both to be arrested, while Bondi said last year that “bad” prosecutors and investigators would have the tables turned on them.

“The prosecutors will be prosecuted, the bad ones,” Bondi had said. “The investigators will be investigated because the deep state, last term for President Trump, they were hiding in the shadows, but now they have a spotlight on them.”

Bondi’s ascent

Bondi, 59, had a successful career as a state prosecutor in Hillsborough County, Florida, including as the county’s top cop, for nearly two decades before rising to state attorney general in 2011.

She began developing a loyalty to Trump, a resident of her state, after endorsing him over Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) the day before the primary in 2016. She worked on Trump’s defense team during his first impeachment and supported some of his claims about election fraud in 2020. News of her nomination, following the failed nomination of former Rep. Matt Gaetz, was well-received across much of the Senate GOP conference.

Alan Dershowitz, a Harvard Law School professor emeritus who worked on the impeachment defense team with Bondi, described her as “extremely smart” with an “incredible ability to understand the legal system in the context of politics.”

He said he did not believe Bondi was interested in exacting revenge on prosecutors and investigators of Trump.

“That’s not who she is at all,” Dershowitz told the Washington Examiner. “She is a very nice person. In addition to her great abilities as a lawyer, she’s a really nice person. She treats people well. … I just like her very much as a human being.”

Some of the loudest voices in Trump’s base, such as War Room podcast host Steve Bannon and Article III Project founder Mike Davis, have outlined high expectations for prosecutorial retribution against people including Cheney, Smith, judges in Trump’s cases, and even line attorneys whose names are lesser known.

As recently as this week, Davis warned U.S. Attorney Matthew Graves, who has led prosecutions of nearly 1,600 defendants tied to the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot, that “justice is coming.”

“Lawyer up, Matthew Graves and his @USAO_DC January 6th prosecutors and agents,” Davis wrote on X. “Nobody is above the law.”

After winning the election, Trump himself has, however, tempered expectations about going after people he has previously aggressively accused of weaponizing their authority for political purposes. Trump vowed during a recent Meet the Press interview, for example, that he would not direct the DOJ and FBI to pursue Cheney or anyone else who served on the Jan. 6 committee.

Deep state ‘criminals’

Patel, Trump’s pick to be the DOJ’s chief investigator as head of the FBI, has made more controversial suggestions for departmental reform that could make his Senate confirmation process more difficult than Bondi’s.

Prior to his nomination, Patel talked a big game about going after those who have politically betrayed Trump. He identified in his book Government Gangsters: The Deep State, the Truth, and the Battle for Our Democracy members of the deep state who he said were “criminals.” The list included dozens of prominent Democrats, Republicans who have fallen out of favor with Trump, and other current and former agency officials.

Asked for comment on Patel’s plans, Trump transition spokesman Alex Pfeiffer said in a statement provided to the Washington Examiner that Patel would not pursue “law-abiding” citizens.

“Kash Patel is going to end the weaponization of law enforcement,” Pfeiffer said. “The FBI will target crime, not law-abiding individuals with Kash leading the bureau.”

Side investigations

One of Trump’s top allies in the House, Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH), does not believe Trump’s DOJ will attempt to punish those who charged Trump with felonies, brought civil lawsuits against him, issued unfavorable court orders against him, or otherwise brought legal complications to his life.

“Chairman Jordan has been clear that President Trump and the Republican Party aren’t for political prosecutions,” a Judiciary Committee spokesman told the Washington Examiner. “We’re for upholding the rule of law, securing the border, and fixing the mess the Biden administration made these past four years.”

Meanwhile, Jordan, and his incoming Senate committee counterpart, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA), could be the ones appeasing the faction of Trump supporters who are thirsty to see prosecutors of Trump and his supporters suffer for going after their elected leader. Both have sent recent preservation notices to the DOJ, citing concerns that it is politically biased. Their oversight investigations could put prosecutors, especially Smith, in the limelight and force them to testify. Rarely do congressional investigations lead to federal prosecutions.

Grassley told the Washington Examiner that his committee’s first step with Trump’s nominations will be processing Bondi’s confirmation in January and then beginning to gather answers on dozens of pending requests he has made to the department.

“From an oversight perspective, I’ll be hard at work ensuring the Justice Department responds to the more than 100 outstanding inquiries I’m waiting on, so the American people can get answers,” Grassley said.

Grassley has a binder full of all of these requests that he showed to Bondi and Patel during his recent meetings with them, an aide said.