Barack Obama went on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert to lecture America about presidents weaponizing the Justice Department.
Now the former FBI deputy director who spent ten months inside the bureau has something to say about that.
What Bongino said on his podcast this week is something Obama cannot dismiss and cannot answer.
Eric Holder Called Himself Obama's Wingman While Running the DOJ
Obama sat across from Colbert and delivered his lines with the calm of a man who thinks he got away with it.
"The White House shouldn't be able to direct the attorney general to go around prosecuting whoever," Obama said. "The idea is that the attorney general is the people's lawyer. It's not the president's consigliere."
Even Colbert couldn't let that fully stand – cracking that the rule apparently didn't apply to Bobby Kennedy, to which Obama laughed uncomfortably.
It should have drawn a lot more than laughter.
Obama's attorney general, Eric Holder, went on radio in April 2013 and announced – while holding the nation's top law enforcement position – that he was still "the president's wingman."
Holder said it himself, on the record, without apology.
The same wingman presided over Operation Fast and Furious – the ATF gunwalking scheme that put weapons in the hands of Mexican drug cartels and got border agent Brian Terry killed.
Holder became the first attorney general in American history to be held in contempt of Congress when he refused to hand over the documents Congress subpoenaed.
Obama shielded him with executive privilege.
Now Obama is lecturing America about prosecutorial independence.
Declassified Crossfire Hurricane Files Put Obama in the Situation Room
Declassified documents released by DNI Tulsi Gabbard last year confirmed Obama was in the Situation Room on December 9, 2016 – the meeting that preceded critical steps in opening the Crossfire Hurricane investigation targeting Donald Trump.
The participants that day included James Clapper, John Brennan, Susan Rice, Loretta Lynch, and Andrew McCabe – the same network of officials who spent the next four years running investigations against a sitting president built on intelligence analysts later described as manipulated and false.
DNI Gabbard's whistleblower release documented how Obama directed the creation of the January 2017 Intelligence Community Assessment using that corrupted intelligence as its foundation.
Senators John Cornyn and Chuck Grassley have called for a special counsel to investigate Obama's role in the hoax, and the DOJ's grand jury investigation into its origins is ongoing.
White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson put it directly: "Barack Hussein Obama is the king of weaponization. Documents declassified last year revealed he was present for key meetings that led to critical steps in the opening of the Russia Hoax investigation against President Trump."
Bongino Spent Ten Months Inside the FBI and Knows What Obama Left Behind
Dan Bongino heard Obama's Colbert comments and responded on his podcast without hedging.
"You know, I know things too, Mr. President, and so do you," Bongino said. "You were the president. I was just the deputy director of the FBI, but it's not a small thing, and I'm not letting you get away with this. No chance."
The FBI deputy director has access to counterintelligence files, surveillance records, briefings, and information that does not surface on cable news unless someone decides it is time.
Bongino was inside the building where Kash Patel found burn bags packed with Trump-Russia probe documents in a secret room nobody wanted found.
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche told CBS News this week that Democrat complaints about the Justice Department are "extraordinarily rich" – given that Trump himself spent years under criminal prosecution by the Biden DOJ.
Obama went to The Late Show expecting applause.
He got a reminder instead – from a man with a badge-level memory of exactly what that building contains – that the files he left behind did not disappear when he walked out the door.
Sources:
- Dan Bongino, The Dan Bongino Show, Episode 2510, "Obama Says The Unthinkable," Fox Nation, May 7, 2026.
- "Declassified Documents Detail Obama's Alleged Role in Shaping Trump–Russia Inquiry," Fox News, August 28, 2025.
- "Russia Hoax Whistleblower Threatened, Multiple Attempts to Suppress Findings," Office of the Director of National Intelligence press release, July 30, 2025.
- John Cornyn and Lindsey Graham, "Cornyn, Graham Call for Special Counsel to Investigate Obama Administration's Role in Russia Collusion Hoax," Senator Cornyn press release, July 24, 2025.
- "Obama's DOJ Built the 'Weaponization' Democrats Now Decry," Washington Examiner, November 13, 2025.
- Abigail Jackson, White House statement, cited in PJ Media, May 9, 2026.
- Todd Blanche, interview with CBS News, cited in "Dan Bongino Warns Obama After DOJ Comments Spark Firestorm," Conservative Brief, May 8, 2026.
