Justice Department employees overwhelmingly contribute to Democrats, a trend that has become even more lopsided since Barack Obama’s presidential inauguration, according to a campaign finance research organization.
In the 2016 election cycle, Justice employees gave $438,077 to Hillary Clinton’s Democratic presidential campaign and $23,874 to that of Republican Donald Trump, according to OpenSecrets.org, an arm of the Center for Responsive Politics, which crunched the numbers based on Federal Election Commission reports.
Overall, Justice workers gave $819,454 to Democrats and $126,929 to Republicans in that cycle. And in the 2018 midterm-election cycle, Justice employees donated $474,690 to Democrats and $126,902 to Republicans.
Over 1,100 former Justice officials have signed a letter demanding Attorney General William P. Barr resign for intervening in the pending sentencing of former Trump political adviser Roger Stone, whom a D.C. jury convicted of lying to Congress and witness tampering. Mr. Barr says the proposed nine-year prison recommendation by prosecutors was too severe.
But conservatives have dismissed the letter by saying it merely represents the liberal “deep state,” a reference to the federal government’s many anti-Trump employees.
The Justice Department currently has 113,000 employees and the campaign-donation numbers show the department’s employees have grown more partisan Democratic in recent years.
During the Obama years, the share of Justice workers’ money going to Democrats shot up from 63% in 2010 to 87% in 2016.
In contrast, during the 2000 election cycle, a presidential year that saw George W. Bush win the White House, Justice employees gave more to Republican candidates, about $470,000 to $218,000.
It’s not just the DOJ’s employees.
U.S. attorneys offices, Justice’s local prosecutors, also gave far more to Democrats in 2016, OpenSecrets.org reported — $68,387 to $12,615.
The American Federation of Government Employees, a union representing 670,000 employees, gives over 90% of its campaign cash to Democrats.
• Rowan Scarborough can be reached at rscarborough@washingtontimes.com.
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