President Donald Trump has privately mused about firing his Attorney General Pam Bondi and replacing her with EPA administrator Lee Zeldin, multiple sources familiar with the matter told CNN.
Frustrated by the backlash and anger in his base over the administration’s handling of the Jeffrey Epstein files, 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, the sources said. He has also fumed that she hasn’t investigated enough of his political opponents.
It’s not clear the president has made up his mind, the sources told CNN. Bondi was with Trump Wednesday, riding in his motorcade as he attended the Supreme Court arguments on birthright citizenship and listening in person to his remarks on the Iran war that night. Trump voiced confidence in her in a statement to CNN.
“Attorney General Pam Bondi is a wonderful person and she is doing a good job,” the president said.
Asked for comment, the Justice Department referred to the White House statement. A source familiar with the matter told CNN that Trump and Bondi have spoken repeatedly in the past several days, and that the discussions were “business as usual.”
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.
Zeldin is not seen as a final choice to replace Bondi if she’s dismissed. Trump has mentioned other candidates, but Zeldin the most often, one person told CNN.
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.
CNN has reached out to the EPA for comment.
The New York Times first reported on Bondi’s potential ouster.
Bondi has several strong allies within the administration, including White House chief of staff Susie Wiles. One source familiar with the discussions said that there were several moments in recent months when Trump soured on Bondi, and Wiles stepped in to advocate her.
But in remarks to a reporter for Vanity Fair, Wiles previously acknowledged that the attorney general had “completely whiffed” in her handling of the Epstein files.
Of particular note: Bondi said in a February 2025 interview on Fox News that an Epstein client list was “sitting on my desk right now to review,” only for the department to later assert no such list existed. (Bondi has since said that she was referring to all the paperwork related to the Epstein investigation, such as flight logs, and not to a specific client list.)
Trump recently ousted another high-ranking member of his government: Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, who was the first Cabinet member to be ousted from her post during Trump’s second term.
Bondi was Trump’s second pick to lead the Justice Department, after former Republican Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida withdrew due to a lack of support from GOP senators. He first considered Bondi for a post in his administration in 2018 after firing then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions.
She was confirmed as attorney general in 2025 with a 54-46 vote mostly along party lines, with Bondi telling lawmakers she would not improperly target people with criminal probes like those against Trump.
This story has been updated with additional details.
