The Senate Judiciary Committee is set to hear witnesses on Thursday regarding the confirmation of Todd Blanche as US attorney general. Blanche fielded hours of questions from the Senate panel yesterday, acknowledging errors in the department’s vetting of the Epstein files, but defending his handling of the case. He also called Trump’s US Capitol riot pardons “generous.”

Path to Confirmation

Blanche’s path in the committee is razor thin, as just one Republican no vote could derail his nomination. The acting attorney general had to tread carefully before the panel – reassuring Republicans that he would keep up his aggressive approach at the Justice Department, while also signaling that President Donald Trump won’t be able to interfere politically.

Republicans will put forth former Attorney General John Ashcroft, who served under President George W. Bush; Jon Adler, the president of the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association Foundation; and Jennifer Bos, the mother of an Illinois woman whose body was allegedly abused by an illegal immigrant. Democrats on the committee will call Elizabeth Oyer, who had served as a career pardon lawyer at DOJ before being fired by Blanche last year, and Dani Bensky, a Jeffrey Epstein survivor, as a witness.

Original reporting: El Paso News (HLL/CB) — read the source article.