President Donald Trump has given his former Attorney General Pam Bondi a new gig as a consolation prize.
Bondi, 60, was fired in early April over her handling of the Epstein files and her failure to prosecute her boss’s enemies. She was diagnosed with cancer weeks later, Axios has revealed. Todd Blanche, who was once Trump’s personal lawyer, has taken up the mantle as acting attorney general.
Bondi, whom Trump called a “loyal friend” and “patriot” as he dismissed her, has got a cushy new role. According to Axios, she’s been appointed to the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST), a panel charged with advising the White House on artificial intelligence policy.
The board is headed by David Sacks, the podcasting former White House AI adviser, and White House science adviser Michael Kratsios. Other power players on the board include Nvidia co-founder Jensen Huang, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, and Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison.
Bondi, who has also bagged an infrastructure advisory role, will act as the go-between, linking the tech titans directly to the higher echelons of government, Axios reported.
It comes as Bondi recovers from treatment following her thyroid cancer diagnosis. “Pam has been quietly kicking cancer’s a-- the last few weeks,” Katie Miller, husband of top Trump aide Stephen Miller, posted on X Tuesday, adding that the former AG “has a heart of gold.”
Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law and point man for peace talks, secretly battled the same disease while serving in the White House during Trump’s first term. He had surgery to remove a tumor from his thyroid while handling Middle East affairs for Trump, before having a second operation in 2022, after leaving the White House.
Thyroid cancer is one of the relatively few cancers where the numbers are overwhelmingly reassuring. The most common forms—papillary and follicular thyroid cancer—have five-year survival rates above 99 percent when caught before spreading, according to the American Cancer Society. Even when papillary thyroid cancer spreads to distant parts of the body, about 71 percent of patients are still alive five years later. The major exception is anaplastic thyroid cancer, a rare and far more aggressive form that carries a sharply lower survival rate, dropping to just 5 percent once it has spread widely.
Thyroid cancer often flies under the radar at first, with many people noticing no symptoms. The most common red flag is a painless lump or swelling low in the neck that gradually grows larger. Other signs can include hoarseness, trouble swallowing, swollen lymph nodes, or persistent pain in the neck or throat.
It is unclear which type of thyroid cancer Bondi has been diagnosed with.
After she was dumped by Trump, Bondi vowed to “continue fighting” for him.
“Leading President Trump’s historic and highly successful efforts to make America safer and more secure has been the honor of a lifetime, and easily the most consequential first year of the Department of Justice in American history,” she posted on X last month.
“I remain eternally grateful for the trust that President Trump placed in me to Make America Safe Again.”
