Lee Zeldin is Trump’s first choice to replace Pam Bondi
After Kristi Noem, it’s probably time for Pam Bondi to leave her highly prestigious role in the Donald Trump administration as the AG as Trump is seriously considering replacing Bondi because of dissatisfaction with how her department handled the Jeffrey Epstein Files case. Trump has asked people about replacing Bondi, who faces a deposition later this month on Capitol Hill related to the congressional investigation into the late sex trafficker, CNN reported. Trump believed that Bondi did not investigate enough of his political opponents. White House officials have discussed several possibilities as options for attorney general, but Lee Zeldin, the Senate-confirmed administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, is the likely replacement, CNN confirmed the names as a possibility. Trump met Zeldin on Tuesday. But the president doused the speculations as he issued a statement heaping praises on Bondi. “Attorney General Pam Bondi is a wonderful person and she is doing a good job,” Trump said in a statement to CNN.Some reports claimed that Trump has already conveyed to Bondi that her days as the AG are numbered but no one is saying anything officially. “The idea of replacing Bondi with Zeldin first arose in January, then subsided as Epstein coverage slipped from the news cycle, sources said. Some senior officials in the DOJ believed that the year-long headache of the Epstein files was finally behind them, a source said. But word that Trump wanted to replace Bondi with Zeldin began to circulate again in the West Wing on Monday,” CNN reported.
Who is Lee Zeldin?
An attorney and veteran, Zeldin represented New York’s 1st congressional district prior to his role in the EPA. After losing the 2022 New York governor’s race to Kathy Hochul, Zeldin remained close to Trump, regularly appearing at Mar-A-Lago throughout his 2024 campaign.Zeldin served 22 years in the US Army and Army Reserve. He was a paratrooper with the 82nd Airborne Division, deployed to Iraq in 2006 during Operation Iraqi Freedom (as a military intelligence officer), and also worked as a federal prosecutor and military magistrate. He retired as a Lieutenant Colonel in May 2025.He lives on Long Island with his wife, Diana, and their identical twin daughters, Mikayla and Arianna.
