All right. Good afternoon, everybody. So before -- before taking questions, I thought it made sense to, since it is me here, the attorney general, to just spend a few minutes talking about the work that we're doing, um, at the Department of Justice. The first thing I'm going to talk about is terrorism. Since President Trump returned to office, FBI data shows 4,260 arrests related to FTOs, including 1,039 individuals prevented from carrying out alleged terrorist attacks.
That's 38 percent increase from the last administration. I want to talk about some recent cases, an ISIS Butler County, Pennsylvania terrorism arrest that just took place this morning out of our Pittsburgh office. A 21 year old man, Jonathan Kramer, was charged and arrested for receiving a firearm and ammunition with intent to commit terrorism on behalf of ISIS.
He was arrested, the investigation is ongoing, and there'll be more from that in the future.
Just today, in the Southern District of New York, an indictment was returned that charging multiple Russian individuals that since 2024, these individuals who worked for the services of the Russian intelligence community, were charged with financing terrorism and conspiring to commit murder for hire around the world, including efforts to murder a Russian dissident who they believe was located in the Washington, DC area.
I want to talk next about the great work that we're doing and President Trump talks about it all the time, but it's never -- it's never too much in reducing crime in this country. Under President Trump's leadership, crime is the lowest it has been in modern history. In 2025, murder rates were down nearly 20 percent.
Violent crime was down nearly 10 percent. DOJ, it's federal law partners, our state and local partners, we're working together and coordinating as never seen before and that's why you see the results that you're seeing to make America safe. Um, another point to talk about is, is the work that we've done in Memphis.
Today is the one year anniversary of us signing the memorandum of understanding with Memphis to do the great work that we've done over the past year. Um, nearly 13,000 arrests in the Memphis area, more than 2,000 illegal firearms seized and nearly 1,500 known gang members arrested over the past year. We also located more than 200 missing children.
St. Louis, over the past four weeks, our HSF platform has been extraordinarily successful, arresting over 250 violent criminals, many with outstanding warrants and extensive criminal history. And they've taken over 100 illegal firearms off the streets. That's just in the past four weeks. Um, and today, you may have heard Director Patel announce that the FBI has arrested 10 out of 10 of the criminals on the FBI's ten Most Wanted list in the first 18 months of the administration.
We've talked a lot about fraud. Yesterday, we were -- I was in Missouri with the vice president talking about a COVID fraud takedown that we've been working on in Missouri and the neighboring states. This surge resulted in fraud enforcement actions spanning over 160 criminal defendants, and involved approximately $245 million in intended loss.
And again, this was an effort just between June, mid-June and September 1st of this year. Um, we worked with the Small Business Administration and their office of Inspector General, the FBI, our federal prosecutors, and 40 US Attorney's offices to obtain these charges. Between newly charged defendants, approximately 43 defendants have already pleaded guilty to SBA-related COVID fraud, um, with nearly $50 million in intended loss.
And one more -- one more highlight on fraud. This is just today, our great US attorney in the Southern District of California, Adam Gordon, just held a press conference and announced just about an hour ago that there were 12 daycare fraudsters who were arrested this morning for funneling more than $10 million intended to help low income families pay for childcare to what were really just completely bogus daycare facilities.
Now, all 12 of these individuals were naturalized citizens from Syria, Afghanistan, Sudan, Iraq and Somalia. When it comes to unlawful voting, which I expect there may be a question about in a moment, the DOJ and DHS are working together to prioritize unlawful voting in our elections. Election integrity should not be a partisan issue.
Those who are not legally allowed to vote, shouldn't. And if you knowingly break the law, you will be held accountable. In just the past 10 days, the Department of Justice has announced charges against 11 individuals for illegally voting in 2024 and 2022, or fraudulently registering -- fraudulently registering to vote.
What we are seeing is illegal aliens voting, noncitizens who are not eligible to vote, voting, or those fraudulently registering to voters who are not eligible to vote. So just to put a finer point on this, in under two years, this administration has charged nearly four times as many non-citizen voting cases as the last administration brought in four years.
And we're currently investigating hundreds of cases across the country and our great US attorney, Ryan Raybould in the Northern District of Texas, will be announcing a big development on this topic in about an hour, so shortly after this briefing. So with that, I will take questions if there are any. And I know it's a different environment than before.
I noticed you guys are sweating, which is nice. I love to see that. Um, we'll start -- we'll we'll start out with, um, Caroline Downey from the National -- they give you a list, guys. Everybody calm down. Um, Caroline Downey from the National Review.
Hey, thanks so much. Oh, sorry. Does the Supreme Court's ruling on the mail in ballot executive order present an obstacle to future ballot fraud prosecution, in your view? And as we look to 2028, do you foresee a future legal battle for the Postal Service when it comes to preventing non-citizens from voting?
The Supreme Court's decision today, or yesterday, doesn't affect ongoing criminal investigations into illegal voting, no. I mean, look, I think the -- President Trump, there's nothing -- there should be nothing surprising about what we're trying to do when it comes to mail in voting, which is we want to make sure that there is safe voting and that there is integrity, free and fair elections, and that there is one person placing one vote and that that person is eligible to vote.
And so we're -- you saw, um, part of the decision was the timing and that we ran out of time because of the litigation, in part. And so our efforts to -- and President Trump's efforts to make sure that we have free and fair elections are not going to stop, um, just in November or after -- or thereafter. So I expect you're going to see that work continue.
Um, Mary Margaret.
Hello? Thank you, sir. I had two questions for you, if that's OK. Um, the first, Tom Homan said on Sunday that Homeland Security Investigations is actively investigating Ilhan Omar. If she's found to have committed immigration fraud, would the Trump administration deport her? And then second question is, there's concern among the MAGA base that there's a lot of ideological actors in the FBI and DOJ still that are waiting out President Donald Trump and the next possible Republican administration to get back to doing what they were before.
Are you concerned about that? And what are you doing about that?
So on the -- I'm not talking about ongoing criminal investigations and so I'm not -- I don't have anything to say about your first question or anybody that's -- or public reporting about what others have said about ongoing investigations. Ideological -- um, any ideology that any federal employee has, whether it's a federal agent or somebody at the Department of Justice or any other agency that works in this administration and the executive is never -- is never a good thing, whether it's Republican or Democrat.
And so I'm not sure exactly what you're referring to, except for just generally, but one of the things that Director Patel has been doing, and that that I've been doing and other cabinet secretaries have been doing, is making sure that everybody that works in this administration, whether you're a career or a political, are doing work that's consistent with the president's agenda.
And that's what you have to do. If you're going to work in the executive, that's what article two says. And so I don't -- it's not something that I, quote, worry about, unquote, but when we and if we learn about that happening, we'll do whatever we can to stop it. You. Sorry, you have to use microphones.
It gives me a chance to catch my breath.
No worries.
It's pretty good.
Thank you for joining us. Um, two things I want to clarify. You said prosecutions of potential election fraud are going to continue despite the court ruling, but does the Justice Department plan to suspend the attempts to establish federal mail ballot standards for the 2026 cycle? Will that end for now? And then I'm curious what you make, whether you agree with the president and what he said about his three Supreme Court nominees that they, quote, are not the people I interviewed to serve on the United States Supreme Court, they are merely a shell of their original selves.
Uh, so we're -- of course, we're going to comply with the Supreme Court's decision, as we always do. That doesn't mean that we're not going to do everything in this administration that we can to make sure that there are free and fair elections. And again, there's this -- there's this, um, constant pressure and this, this effort by the media and by -- mostly by Democrats that somehow doing that is a bad thing.
Everybody should want that. The Republicans and Democrats should want free and fair elections. So while the Supreme Court did what it did, we're not going to stop the work that we're doing, but we are, of course, going to going to follow the orders of the court. As far as President Trump's, um, truth about the justices, he is very frustrated.
And I wasn't at the interviews that he was -- that he participated in during the last administration when he selected these folks to be on the Supreme Court. He has every right and indeed, um, he should communicate his concerns with the Supreme Court whenever he has them. This isn't the first time that he's done it, and it won't be the last.
He's also publicly very appreciative of the Supreme Court when there's decisions that he very much agrees with. That's what a democracy is about. A democracy is about three branches of government and President Trump being critical of folks on the Supreme Court. We very much disagree with the Supreme Court's decision, and that should be obvious from our papers and from our -- what we've said publicly about the case.
And, and so I am also upset about the Supreme Court decision, but the idea that President Trump shouldn't be allowed to communicate to the American people his frustration, I don't share that. Just next to you. See, there's a microphone, so I can't hear you. Don't you love that? Next question.
Did you ask for Joe diGenova's resignation? And did he tell you that he felt there wasn't enough evidence to move forward with the grand conspiracy investigation?
So I don't want to talk about communications that I have with prosecutors It's not fair to them, it's not fair to the process. Um, I -- he resigned last week. He came out of retirement to help to help the president and to help us and we're very appreciative of the work that he did. Um, beyond that, there's been a few news stories about, um, he said some different things to different outlets, which is fine.
I'm just going to leave it I very much appreciate the work that he did for us and for the administration. Any investigations that he's working on, of course, continue, like they do -- like any investigation does when somebody leaves and we're not going to slow down just because -- just because somebody leaves.
Jared, Jared Halpern. Jared Halpern?
Uh, thank you, Mr. Attorney General. Two questions for you. First, from a law enforcement perspective, what are your concerns about artificial intelligence? What regulations are needed? Do you think there should be a slowdown in that technology, especially with how it's being used increasingly in law enforcement operations?
And then secondly, more broadly, what role should Americans expect the Justice Department to take in the upcoming midterm elections?
So I'll answer the first question. Um, I mean, the second question first. The federal government is always involved in elections. That's not new to this administration, it's not new to the Biden administration. And so our role is going to be the same role that that federal governments, um, play in elections under the law, as we're required to do and as we should do. So we're going to continue to do that in this election, just like the Biden administration did it during -- during the elections, when Biden was president.
And so as far as AI is concerned, we have a lot of -- there's a lot of criminal laws. And so if anybody associated with AI, um, violates criminal law, we'll investigate that. We already have. There's -- there's plenty of cases involving AI that we've charged individuals. I do not think it's the job of the Department of Justice to regulate.
Were prosecutors, not regulators, so we're not going to try to regulate AI. AI is extraordinarily beneficial to our society. Um, there's a lot of great work that AI does, and it's also something that conveniently has become a flashpoint this week and the president has spoke about that and I very much agree with him.
The second -- second row, um. Steven Nelson. Oh, it's my favorite paper, the New York Post, amazing.
Thank you very much, Mr. Attorney General.
I actually didn't know that when I called on him, I promise.
I'd like to ask you about the Iran war and about Anthony Fauci. On the Iran war, Congressman Thomas Massie today introduced articles of impeachment against Secretary Hegseth.
Who did?
Thomas Massie, for allegedly violating the War Powers Resolution by conducting the war without Congressional authorization. What's your current legal assessment of how long the war could continue without specific Congressional authorization? And secondly, on Anthony Fauci, could you describe the status of your review of his alleged contempt of Congress?
Um, are we any closer to charges there? And can you explain why your department didn't prosecute him for allegedly perjuring himself?
So, um, the first question is Secretary Hegseth is doing a phenomenal job, and the secretary of war doesn't just go off and do things. So he follows the law. And so the DOJ plays a role in that and we play an active role in making sure the laws are complied with. You called it a war. I disagree with that characterization, as does most of Congress.
Um, and so there's been votes on whether it's on whether -- on whether it's a war and what to do and why votes through Congress, which have determined there was -- that he's not doing anything wrong and the president's not doing anything wrong should result in articles of impeachment. I guess you'll have to talk to Massie about that.
As far as doctor -- as far as Fauci, um, we're -- again, it's an ongoing investigation. I'm not going to talk about it. Um, so we're -- we take anytime anybody lies to Congress or potential lies to Congress seriously but beyond that, I don't have a comment. John Decker.
Thank you, Mr. Attorney General. I wanted to follow up with your remarks regarding that decision by the Supreme Court regarding mail in voting. As you said, the president was not pleased by this ruling by the Supreme Court, and he put out a lengthy social media post. He said, in part, the Supreme Court has really let our country down.
Certain justices are petrified of these crazed and depraved Democrats, and are totally unable to show the courage necessary to save our America. You used to be the president's personal lawyer. You used to be in private practice. Would you ever encourage one of your clients to disparage a court in the manner that the president has disparaged the Supreme Court?
I mean, he's -- so you can't talk about my background and then ask me what I would have done. He's the President of the United States, so the real question is whether the president of the United States is allowed to be critical of another branch of government. And the answer to that is absolutely, of course he is. And by the way, what he wrote about that is the same thing that he's said publicly, repeatedly.
It's the same thing that DOJ's briefs have said about the issue. We do think that this decision is not the right decision. That is OK. That's the way -- the way democracy works. And so what I would have advised the client or what I would have done when I was a prosecutor or when I was President Trump's lawyer, um, isn't in any way or shape relevant to what the president of the United States should be doing in communicating to the American people.
Are you guys sweating yet? Nice. I love that.
Are you?
No, I'm comfortable. It's actually really nice. I have water, if anybody needs it.
That's all right. I want to put a finer point on that last question and then I have another question related to it. On the comments from the president specifically, that these Supreme Court justices and this decision aren't the people he interviewed, does that undermine even the perception of the court's independence, in your view?
Not at all. No, I mean, he wants another one. That's OK. He can have another one. No, I don't think it undermines -- like, I think -- look what happened after the Dobbs decision, members of Congress, the administration came out basically threatening judges for months on end. There's a full security force, OK, around every justice because of the rhetoric after the Supreme Court issued that decision.
And so the fact that the president issues a Truth saying that the justices that interviewed in front of him, you know, six, seven years ago, eight years ago, are not the justices he's seeing now, that that undermines the -- no, I don't think in any way, shape or form it does that. I think that that's -- that's just something that the media wants to put on it. He has a -- the President should be communicating to the American people about cases that are extraordinarily important to him, which this one is.
And related to this whole discussion, after all this back and forth, are you concerned at all that voters may be confused about what their options actually are now to vote by mail? And what, if anything, will the DOJ do to kind of educate people on the fallout of this case now?
I'm not sure that the American people follow this as closely as the folks in this beautiful rose garden do. So, no, I haven't seen any suggestion or any information or heard from secretaries of state that that's an issue. That's the -- I mean, listen, ballots are confusing in every election. The way they're distributed, the way they're talked about, that's something that the state and locals handle very well every single election cycle for one reason or another.
So no, that doesn't concern me. Go ahead.
Thank you so much. And just acknowledging that you're standing in front of the Oval Office and the president might be watching here, so if at any point he wants to come out --
I don't think --
-- and take our questions --
He's always watching. I don't think the mere fact that I'm standing here --
We would love to see him. AG Blanche --
No offense, I'm standing right here. OK.
You're doing a great job. Two questions here. Um, the first, you know, you go after crooks and criminals and thieves. The government has made it very clear that China has been stealing from our AI companies, so is it time to go after China? And particularly, President Xi, who will be here in Washington next week, is it time for the president to talk to him about how China has been stealing from us? Well, so when you say China, you're talking to about an entire country.
And so the president has -- those two presidents have a great relationship and they're -- they get along, they make deals together but does that -- are they're separate issues with actors in China and companies in China and bad actors, that has existed long before this administration and will exist for the next several years.
And the Department of Justice and other agencies in the executive, of course, we're doing everything we can to combat that and to go after that in the right way. But I don't think it's fair to just label China as a country. There's bad actors in China that are doing it, which we're definitely going to go after.
All right. Somebody in the back? Um, yeah, the guy pointing to his own head. That's pretty good. See, it's a microphone thing. I can't hear you. Sorry. I can't hear you.
Hey, there, thank you. Willie Nelson with SRN. Mr. Attorney General, reports say actress Hayden Panettiere may have died after taking a pill laced with fentanyl. The DEA is looking at her alleged dealer. What is the Justice Department going to -- doing to go after the people that sell these fake pills? And my second question is, uh, is the AI doomsday talk a real national security issue, or is it a way to put the government in charge of the internet?
So when it comes to fentanyl, they're not fake pills, they're death pills, right? So they're pills that kill people and there's a federal statute that allows us to go after -- assuming we can prove who the dealer is, to go after them and put them in prison for murder. And we do it in every district in this country.
And it's a big -- it's a big emphasis of DEA Administer Cole and our prosecutors around the country. So when we can prove -- and sometimes if somebody is an addict, it's difficult to prove who they actually got the pill from. But in the cases where we know who the dealer was, and we can prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the person sold the death pill to the victim who then dies, that's a that's a federal crime and that's something that we will readily prosecute as often as we can.
As far as the AI question, I answered it earlier, but I mean, there's no -- I mean, this should not be breaking news, that this AI, um, issue that suddenly come up two months before an election is being -- the president calls it a hoax. The way this has come around today and not three months ago, I mean, I was watching the news today.
Every Democrat Senator suddenly races to a microphone to talk about AI after being eerily silent for months and months and months. So to talk about the timing of this is being nothing but an effort to influence the midterms, I shouldn't have to say that out loud. Of course, that's what it is, and that shouldn't be what drives the decisions that we're making around AI. We can't lose the AI race to China, right?
President Trump says that, everybody says that, but they say it because it's true. Go. Second row, yes.
Liz Landers with PBS NewsHour. The FBI conducted a raid at Fulton County, Georgia, back in January of this year and they allege that there was impropriety with the 2020 election there. Has the Department of Justice found any evidence from the FBI of that? Why is it taking so long? If you all think that there was election fraud in 2020, why has that not come forward?
Where is the evidence?
Well, so it wasn't the FBI conducted a raid. It's that a judge authorized a search warrant based upon probable cause to allow us to search and collect those records. There are hundreds of thousands of records, and they are now many, many years old. And so I'm not sure what the question about timing is, but when we have an answer, when the investigation is complete, you will know.
I'm not -- you can't rush an investigation like that, reviewing hundreds of thousands of ballots from many, many years ago. There's -- that's something -- again, it's an ongoing criminal investigation, so getting into the weeds of what we're doing and not doing isn't appropriate. But it's also not appropriate to suggest that this is just the FBI or the DOJ going and seizing records.
It's a judge reviewing -- it's a judge reviewing an affidavit and finding that there is probable cause. All right, somebody in the back. Yes, you. Sure.
Was the president aware that his son was accepting a gift from Russian oligarch when he decided not to go to Bahamas to his wedding? What was his reaction when he learned about it? And to you as a public official, was it appropriate for the son of the president of the United States to accept such a gift from a foreign businessman, from a friend of Putin?
And are you going to investigate if everything was appropriately reported, uh, as a gift?
So the president has already talked about it. So I wasn't with the president when he learned, so I can't give you a firsthand account, but the president has talked about it, other people have talked about it. The president doesn't know who this person is. I think other members of the family don't know who this person is. The president's son has said that he's a very close friend and that he accepted a gift in the weekend of his wedding.
Um, I'm not -- so I don't -- I'm not sure what -- when you say, am I investigating, am I investigating what? And when you say this person is a friend of Putin, I don't even know if that's true or not. So I like that it's fun to talk about this issue and the rhetoric around it, but I think all the relevant people involved, the president and his kids have already addressed it. I don't have any information.
I don't know this person either, so I don't have any information about it beyond that. OK. We'll take just a couple more. You. You. I was going to say the bald guy, but that's probably going to get in trouble for that.
Cara Castronovo from Lindell TV. Thank you so much for taking my question today, and I have two questions that are deeply, I think, important to our audience. One of them is about the Department of Justice Weaponization working Group, and what the status of that working group is. Specifically, under your leadership, will the DOJ finally investigate the treatment of the January 6th political prisoners and the four deaths that occurred that day, including the killing of two women by police, and any federal agency involvement?
And will you also consider investigating whether there was any improper contact, as it was reported by sources between Merrick Garland's DOJ and activist DC judges?
So on -- so again, the same question about ongoing investigations, it's not appropriate for me to talk about them and it never will be. When it comes to the Weaponization Working group, we've been putting out a work product almost every month for the past several months, including in August, addressing another one of the issues that we were charged with looking into.
So that work continues. All the work that we're doing around the, um, around the anti-weaponization, fixing what we believe and what we know went wrong during the last administration, doesn't just happen overnight. It involves, like any investigation, reviewing records and interviews and having lawyers and agents, in some cases, do work.
And so that work continues but it's not fair to the process, to the prosecutors or to anybody involved for me to give nuggets along the way of what we're doing or not doing, so I'm not going to do that. Yes, you.
Thank you, Mr. Attorney General. Um, so on -- OpenAI has said that they are working with Google and Anthropic on security measures for their AI models. Do they need antitrust waivers? Do you see that in the future? Plus, um, are you concerned about who controls the information that is coming out of AI models?
Well, whether entities need an antitrust waiver is not something I can answer from the podium of the White House. There's dozens of factors that go into that and there's an application process, and there's a -- kind of a process that DOJ and others use to determine, so I can't address that. I can say that to the extent that, um, those companies are looking to regulate themselves or fix problems that they have, that they should do that, but working with us if necessary.
So that's all I can say about that. All right, one more. Go ahead.
Thank you.
Sorry. All right, I'll come to you next.
Thank you very much. Two questions. Earlier today, President Trump said that there was new evidence in the assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania. He said it was a Democratic plot. Moments later, Kash Patel testified that the shooter wasn't speaking to anyone other than his parents. Can you please explain both how this was a Democratic plot and what this new evidence is? And a second question, which is in the same post, he said that Christopher Wray should be punished for his lack of oversight during this investigation.
Is the Justice Department considering bringing charges against Chris Wray?
So the Department of Justice doesn't punish, by the way, but -- so, look, I was with President Trump during the time period before and after the attempted assassination attempt on his life, and he was shot. He was a victim. There was an innocent man killed. There were other people who were very seriously injured when that happened.
Um, what President Trump said today about the new information, and this new information is information that we found, that the FBI found that produced to the Senate in response to inquiries that they had, it is new information about the shooter and about his background, about his history and that's stuff that we didn't know before.
So that's the new information. As far as the president's frustration with the FBI, I was there with him, I lived it. I mean, you have a situation where it's not really clear what the leadership of the FBI were doing in the weeks and months ahead of the attempted assassination to protect President Trump. That's the same organization that was simultaneously trying to put him in prison until he dies.
So his frustration and concern about what the former director was doing is something that is not new. He's said that for a very long time. I was with him during the investigation and trying, you know, before he was elected president, trying to understand what happened and why. And -- and Director Patel has undertaken a Herculean effort to go through all the documents and understand what was missed, if anything, and to provide anything that hadn't come forward to the American people, to the American people and that's what he's done.
OK. Last question, for you.
Thank you very much, Attorney General. Mr. Curtis here. Two questions. What is your plan for ISIS prisoners in Iraq and Syria, including those captured by the Peshmerga forces in fight against ISIS and terrorism? This is very important issue. And second one, what are you doing to stop Iran backed militias in Iraq from using the US financial system to fund their activities?
Well, the first one, working with Treasury Secretary Bessent and, um, DHS, we spend a tremendous amount of resources and effort to keep our financial system clear of any terrorist financing. If we find money that is linked to terrorism, to freeze that money and to seize it, if we ultimately can. That's something that we always do and we'll continue to do. As far as what we're going to do with prisoners in those countries, it depends.
I mean, if the prisoners are charged here with crimes, we'll obviously we want people we charge with crimes to come here and face justice, but it depends on the circumstances around that. OK. Can I just say and can I -- no, I'm done with questions. I stayed ten minutes longer than I was supposed to. Um, I, uh, I will tell you, the fact that Caroline Leavitt did this for as long as she did is incredible.
Um, so thank you guys very much for letting me, uh, join you all today. I'm very sorry that you're sweating. I'm not really sorry. Um, but -- but thank you very much. And I want to thank, uh, publicly thank Karoline Leavitt for doing this for a long time for President Trump. She's a very -- she's a lot better than me and so thank you guys very much.
I appreciate it.