An Attorney General needs three basic qualities. She or he needs to be a leader. Someone who has the maturity, temperament and expertise to run the world’s foremost law enforcement agency, from preliminary investigation to complex litigation.

She or he needs to be respected. She needs to be respected by her vast workforce, which includes the agents of the FBI, ATF and DEA, Immigration Judges, U.S. Attorneys, subject-matter attorneys in all areas of federal law, the Bureau of Prisons, the Antitrust Division, and the Environment and Natural Resources Division. She needs to be respected by the federal bench, before whom her Department will appear and argue its cases, if the interests of the United States are to be effectively prosecuted or defended. She needs to be respected by opposing parties and opposing counsel. This includes opposing parties who are foreign states and foreign nationals who may be subject to U.S. jurisdiction.

Finally, the Attorney General needs to have personal and professional integrity. Just like a Justice of the Supreme Court, the Attorney General must be beyond reproach in terms of integrity. There must be no trace of bias, personal interest or conflict of interest in any of her words or actions. Blind loyalty to a party or a President should be nowhere in her character. She should protect elections, not undermine them. Malice or retribution should be ideas she repudiates, not endorses. She must serve only the interests of the American people and their Constitution and laws. Not the interests of wealthy individuals, wealthy foreign entities, or corporate monopolies.

Can we say, with a straight face, that the person whom President-elect Trump wants to be our next Attorney General possesses any of these three qualities?  Rarely has a negative answer to such a question been so embarrassingly obvious.

Chuck Redman, retired federal trial attorney, U.S. Department of Justice and U.S. Department of Homeland Security