Last week, former Justice Department lawyer Liz Oyer testified in the Senate against the confirmation of Todd Blanche as attorney general. Then came the death threats. 

Oyer oversaw the DOJ’s pardon office before President Donald Trump ousted her last year and promptly turned the office into a tool to help out his donors and political allies. She has said she was fired for refusing to restore actor Mel Gibson’s gun rights after his 2011 misdemeanor conviction for domestic violence, a claim the Trump administration has denied.

And she was a key witness urging senators to vote against confirming Blanche, who has already sought as acting attorney general to quash further inquiry into the Epstein files and drew criticism over his softball interview with convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. 

And it seems Republicans are now fueling attacks against Oyer as they try to make Blanche the nation’s top law enforcement official.

“Hey everybody, I started getting death threats after I testified against Todd Blanche last week,” she said, showing images of expletive-riddled messages she received.

Oyer attributed the threats to dubious accusations — peddled by Missouri’s Republican senators, Josh Hawley and Eric Schmitt, and in conservative media — that she was basically an ally to rapists and murderers.

At the Senate hearing, the two senators homed in on President Joe Biden’s decision to commute most federal death sentences. In an effort to undermine Oyer’s credibility, Schmitt and Hawley cherry-picked examples of macabre crimes committed by some of the death row prisoners to suggest she didn’t take the crimes seriously. The attacks were reminiscent of Hawley’s attacks on current Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson during her confirmation hearing.

Ja’han Jones

Ja’han Jones is an MS NOW opinion blogger. He previously wrote The ReidOut Blog.