WATCH: Sen. Hagerty questions Blanche in Justice Department budget hearing

Added: 2026-05-19

[00:00:01]Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Welcome, General Blanche. Thank you. General Blanche, um last week I took this topic up with Director Patel. I'd like to revisit it with you. That has to do with the work that's taking place in various jurisdictions across the country to make them more safe, and I want to commend the department for the work on Memphisafe. The task force there has resulted in a 43% decrease in violent crime. since the operation commenced. I think it's a shining example of what happens when you have state and local governments cooperating with the federal government and the dramatic improvements that we've seen in violent crime, and enhancing safety are really very much appreciated. I just wanted to ask you to take a few minutes and walk us through the whole of government approach that you've taken and, and, and how, how that's been executed and, and from that, what lessons we might learn that could be applied to other jurisdictions.

[00:00:52]Thank you, Senator. Yes, in your state, the Memphis task force is one of the shining stars of law enforcement over the past year. Also DC as well. And the way that it works is that we no longer care about stats within an agency, the FBI, DEA marshals, HSI, state and local.

[00:01:10]It's just one government. It's a one government approach. So what happens in Memphis and what should happen in every city in this country is every day law enforcement gets together in a room and they decide who they're going to go out and get that day, whether it's a a someone wanted for murder um, rape, um, any other burglary, whether it's just somebody who has a warrant out for their arrest, and then they focus on doing it and they do it if they need a prosecutor to write a warrant. They go to get the prosecutor write a warrant if they need a state DA to help because it's a state charge. They get the state DA's office, and what you saw, you just described the reduction in crime, but you have streets in Memphis now that that were unwalkable six months ago, and that now that there was a few new restaurants opening. I heard last week and, and that's complete success. I wish we could do what we were able to do in Memphis in every city in this country. Could we stay on that for just a moment because I understand that there are other jurisdictions in the United States that are refusing to cooperate. Is there anything that we could do, any tool that we could provide to help you with this, with these noncompliant jurisdictions. Look, I think one thing we can do is just keep on doing, showing the American people how what what it looks like when you do it right and hopefully these local politicians that are doing it wrong will be shamed into doing it right. We also are in many cases su ing filing lawsuits against some of these cities where they're actually violating the constitution and violating federal law in the way that they're that they're treating federal law enforcement and the work that law enforcement, federal law enforcement is doing, but all I can do as the acting attorney general is, is, is offer everybody um that we will work as hard as we can with our law enforcement to work with the state and locals to combat crime. And that's what President Trump ordered me to do, and that's what I will continue to do. Well, thank you for that. I would just like to show my colleagues I get a daily report on the results of what's happening in Memphis from from your team and many others, and it's quite impressive. The accountability makes a real difference. I'd like to turn to another issue though, one that's deeply concerning. I think it is concerning to me. It should be concerning to every American. and that's bringing to light what happened under the previous administration, the Biden Department's Department of Justice, when the weaponized the extraordinary.

[00:03:19]extraordinary powers of your department with Arctic frost. Um, if you think about it, they used this Arctic frost to persecute the president and also go after his closest allies, including me. and, and, you know, I was shocked to find out last year. that under President Biden the DOJ had secretly obtained my phone records from Verizon. and even though Verizon was obligated to let me know that they chose not to. And, and when I brought the problem to Verizon's attention. All they've done is tried to stonewall me. and we've brought it before the FCC in the form of a complaint. Again, Verizon simply continues to stonewall, and if I think about what Verizon with the Biden DOJ did, they specifically chose to ignore the fact that nothing can or should stop a phone provider from notifying a member of Congress when their constitutional rights are being violated as mine were violated. It turns out that Verizon's chief legal officer Vanana Venkatesh. used to work for Henry Waxman one of the most partisan players up here. and she is the general counsel.

[00:04:32]You know, I'm, I'm seriously concerned, at least that Ms. Venkatesh.

[00:04:37]and Verizon may have collaborated with their friends at the Biden DOJ. They never told me or my colleagues about it, because they might have been worried that the truth would come out. They might have been worried that that would endanger their plans to make a $20 billion acquisition of Frontier communications. It's contemptible. It's damning, but I think there may have been a real reason there. I want justice to be done here, and I really would appreciate your help getting to the bottom of it. So here's my question. Can I get your commitment that the DOJ will work with me and my colleague, Senator Grassley and Senator Johnson in bringing full accountability to this abuse of power. Absolutely, and obviously Senator, one way we do that is by the work we're doing to to make sure you all get your oversight responsibilities as much as you deserve to get the materials that we're reviewing and collecting, but then also in proactively the work that we're doing to make sure that what happened never happened again. I mean, make, I mean, understand that there are times when we subpoena phone records, we do not want the bad guys to know that we did it because we're still investigating, but the idea that that could be done to a United States senator. and that it will be OK for a prosecutor to just do it, not even a scintilla of evidence if anybody did anything wrong and then not provide notice to in some ways the worst form of um of abuse by the Department of Justice.

[00:05:58]Well, in fact, there's a constitutional ban, and I think a first year law students should know that, you know, when AT&T was requested to provide the same records. They saw the constitutional problem.

[00:06:07]They stopped. Verizon was willingly handing over my records and those of other of my colleagues and I just ask myself, what was the purpose?

[00:06:14]What was the motivation for them to violate my constitutional rights?

[00:06:18]Was it because they wanted to make friends with the FCC, maybe Miss Venkatesh, to get an appointment sometime later. I don't know. Was it because of this frontier acquisition that they had in mind? I don't know, but we need to get to the bottom of it. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. You're welcome, Senator