Elon Musk has endorsed Matt Gaetz for attorney general based on a very questionable understanding of the nation’s top law enforcement officer’s role.
“Matt Gaetz has three critical assets that are needed for the AG role: a big brain, a spine of steel and an axe to grind,” he wrote in a post on X. “He is the Judge Dredd America needs to clean up a corrupt system and put powerful bad actors in prison.”
Judge Dredd is a comic book character from a dystopian future with the power to summarily arrest, convict, sentence and execute suspects—basically the opposite of how pre-apocalyptic American justice is supposed to work.
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President-elect Donald Trump reportedly agonized over finding the right person to help fulfill his campaign promises to deport millions of people, unleash the military on Americans and retaliate against Trump’s perceived “enemies from within.”
Still smarting over his previous attorney general William Barr’s refusal to lie about the 2020 election results, he landed on former congressman Gaetz, who promised to “go over there and start cutting f---ing heads” if tapped to lead the Department of Justice.
Like all federal employees, the U.S. attorney general takes an oath to uphold the Constitution, not to serve the U.S. president.
Meanwhile, it wasn’t immediately clear what axe Gaetz has to grind.
He’s been investigated for paying for sex, trafficking teen girls and abusing illegal drugs. But instead of facing any consequences for his alleged ethical lapses, Trump and his supporters are trying to elevate him to a Cabinet position and bury a damning congressional report.
“Gaetz will be our Hammer of Justice,” Musk wrote.
And those pesky human trafficking allegations?
“I consider them worth less than nothing,” he wrote in a follow-up post. “Under our laws, a man is innocent until proven guilty… Case closed.”
So… due process? Or Judge Dredd? It must be exhausting being Musk.
