People often talk about Merrick Garland like he’s a character in a slow-burn legal thriller. You know the type. The meticulous, quiet protagonist who takes five minutes to pour a cup of coffee while the world burns outside. For four years, as the 86th United States Attorney General, Garland was exactly that—a man defined by a "judge-like" temperament in a town that had mostly forgotten what a judge sounded like.
He didn't tweet. He didn't do flashy Sunday morning talk shows. Honestly, he mostly just worked.
But that silence was a double-edged sword. To his supporters, he was the institutionalist restoring the "soul" of the Department of Justice. To his critics, particularly those on the left, he was a frustratingly slow administrator who let the clock run out on some of the most consequential prosecutions in American history. Now that he has moved back into private practice as of 2025, returning to the firm Arnold & Porter, the dust is finally starting to settle on his legacy.
The Man Behind the Desk
Merrick Garland wasn't some political operative. He was a creature of the DOJ long before he led it. Most people remember the 2016 Supreme Court snub—the 293 days where his nomination by Barack Obama just... sat there. But his real "origin story" is much grittier.
In the mid-90s, Garland was the guy on the ground in Oklahoma City after the bombing. He insisted on being there. He saw the devastation of domestic terrorism up close. That experience didn't just shape his career; it colored everything he did as United States Attorney General Merrick Garland.
When he took the oath in March 2021, the DOJ was in a state of internal collapse. Morale was at an all-time low. Career prosecutors felt the department had become a political weapon. Garland’s primary goal wasn't just to prosecute crimes; it was to prove that the DOJ could be boring again. He wanted it to be an independent agency that followed the law, not the whims of the White House.
A Legacy of High-Stakes Antitrust
While the headlines were dominated by "will he or won't he" stories regarding Jan. 6, Garland was quietly launching some of the most aggressive antitrust actions in decades. He didn't just go after the usual tech giants. He went after landlords.
Think about your rent for a second. In late 2024 and early 2025, Garland’s DOJ sued several of the nation’s largest landlords. Why? Because they were allegedly using a software called RealPage to coordinate rent hikes. It was essentially a digital cartel. This wasn't just a legal theory; it was a direct attempt to use the Sherman Act to help regular people afford an apartment.
He also took aim at:
- Google’s dominance in the ad-tech market.
- Apple’s restrictive ecosystem.
- Live Nation-Ticketmaster for their grip on the concert industry.
These weren't just "business cases." They were Garland’s way of saying that "economic fairness" was a core part of civil rights. He believed that if a market isn't competitive, the average person loses their freedom of choice.
The "Special Counsel" Dilemma
We have to talk about the elephant in the room: the pace of the Trump investigations.
Garland’s philosophy was "bottom-up." You start with the foot soldiers—the people who broke windows at the Capitol—and you work your way to the planners. It’s the classic mob-boss strategy. But in the world of 24-hour news cycles and a looming 2024 election, "slow and steady" felt like "stalled and stuck" to millions of Americans.
By the time he appointed Jack Smith as Special Counsel in November 2022, many felt it was too late. Garland was obsessed with the appearance of non-partisanship. He didn't want the DOJ to look like it was interfering with an election. Ironically, by trying so hard not to be political, he became the center of a massive political storm.
Critics like former DOJ official Andrew Weissmann often pointed out that the delays in these high-profile cases ultimately led to a situation where trials couldn't happen before the next election cycle. It's a complicated debate. Was he being cautious, or was he being indecisive? History will likely spend decades arguing over that one.
Protecting the Ballot
If you ask Garland what he’s most proud of, he’d probably point to the Civil Rights Division. He doubled the size of the voting rights enforcement staff. He traveled to Selma to tell a church congregation that "the right to vote is still under attack."
He wasn't just talking.
Under his leadership, the DOJ sued states like Arizona and Connecticut over voter registration issues. They fought against discriminatory redistricting plans that diluted the power of Black voters. Garland saw the Voting Rights Act of 1965 as a living document, even as the Supreme Court continued to chip away at its power. He knew he was fighting an uphill battle against a conservative judiciary, but he kept swinging.
The AI Frontier
Toward the end of his term, Garland started sounding the alarm on Artificial Intelligence.
He was worried about two things: theft and deepfakes. He unsealed indictments against foreign nationals for stealing AI trade secrets. He also warned that AI would be used to "accelerate cyberattacks" and "polarize the country" through election interference. He even hired the DOJ’s first Chief AI Officer. For a guy who seems like he’d still prefer a physical law library to a Kindle, he was surprisingly ahead of the curve on tech threats.
Moving On
Today, Merrick Garland is back at Arnold & Porter as a partner. He’s 73. He’s back in the world of appellate law and complex litigation—the stuff he genuinely loves.
His time as United States Attorney General wasn't a victory lap. It was a grueling, four-year effort to steady a ship in a Category 5 hurricane. He didn't fix everything. He didn't satisfy everyone. But he did return the department to a state of predictable, law-bound process.
What can you take away from his tenure?
- Process over speed: Garland proved that in the legal world, doing things "the right way" often means doing them slowly, for better or worse.
- Institutional health matters: The DOJ today is more stable than it was in 2020, thanks largely to his focus on morale and career professional independence.
- Watch the antitrust space: The lawsuits he started against Big Tech and landlords are still winding through the courts. The outcomes of those cases will affect your wallet for years.
If you want to understand the current legal landscape, keep an eye on the RealPage settlement and the Google antitrust rulings. Those are the seeds Garland planted that are only just now starting to sprout. If you're following these cases, look for how the DOJ continues to use "algorithmic price-fixing" as a new frontier for consumer protection—that’s the Garland playbook in action.