As Senate confirmation hearings for several of President-elect Donald Trump’s cabinet picks get underway, Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, is particularly eager to see former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi confirmed as the nation’s top law enforcement official.
“Pam Bondi did a terrific job at her confirmation hearing,” Cruz told Fox News Digital in an interview Thursday. “She’s going to be confirmed. She will be the next attorney general. And I believe, actually, every one of the Trump cabinet nominees is going to be confirmed.”
Cruz said that Bondi, who also was a personal lawyer to Trump, “may be the single most important cabinet nominee President Trump has made.”
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Sen. Ted Cruz says he is confident Bondi will follow through on her statement that she will investigate missing migrant children in the U.S. (Fox News Digital/Getty)
“And the reason for that is under Joe Biden, tragically, we have seen the Department of Justice politicized and weaponized in a way that there is no precedent in our nation’s history for how they turned the Department of Justice and the FBI into an arsenal to go after the president’s political enemies,” Cruz said.
During Bondi’s hearing on Wednesday Cruz qasked her whether she would investigate the thousands of unaccounted-for migrant children who have entered the United States.
Bondi responded, “Yes, Senator.”
When asked whether he was confident that she would follow through on that if confirmed, Cruz said, “I am.”
“These were unaccompanied minors, little girls, little boys that came into this country that were in the custody of the federal government, and the federal government handed them over to adults,” Cruz said. “Many of the adults were not relatives, and they have now lost them. They don’t know where they are.”
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Pam Bondi, President-elect Donald Trump’s choice to lead the Justice Department as attorney general, appears before the Senate Judiciary Committee for her confirmation hearing, at the Capitol in Washington, on Wednesday, Jan. 15, 2025. (Ben Curtis/The Associated Press)
Republican lawmakers have been critical of the Biden administration’s handling of the illegal migrant crisis over the past four years.
Shortly after Trump’s electoral victory in November, House Republicans grilled Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra over the administration’s process used to vet sponsors.
Speaking before the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration Integrity, Security and Enforcement, Becerra testified about his department’s Refugee Resettlement Office, which is charged with caring for, and placement of, unaccompanied migrant children.
Republican subcommittee members accused the Biden administration of rushing migrant children out of HHS custody and into the hands of unvetted sponsors, who sometimes exploited and abused them.
Cruz said that he also asked Trump’s pick for HHS secretary, RFK Jr., to conduct an investigation of lost migrant children, “because we have an obligation,” he said.
“Those were children in the custody of the government,” Cruz said. “We have an obligation to go and protect those kids.”
Migrants line up outside a migrant re-ticketing center at St. Brigid School on E. 7th St. Friday, Jan. 5, 2024, in New York City. (Barry Williams/New York Daily News/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)
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Bondi has secured the support of current and former state attorneys general across the country, as well as more than 100 former top Department of Justice officials. The Senate Judiciary Committee is expected to vote on her nomination in the coming days.
If the committee approves the nomination, the full Senate will then schedule a vote to confirm her appointment. Although an exact date for the final confirmation vote has not been announced, it is anticipated to be within the next two weeks.
Fox News Digital’s Louis Casiano contributed to this report.