The irony here is rich. Whitaker is taken to task for being trustworthy, while critics ignore the real scandal — the disloyalty apparently pervasive in the Justice Department and elsewhere in the administration.

The proof came early: Within two weeks of Trump’s inauguration, acting attorney general and Obama administration holdover Sally Yates directed Justice attorneys not to defend the president’s travel ban, forcing Trump to fire her. Since then, congressional investigations, Freedom of Information Act requests and dedicated work by Sessions have exposed additional efforts by Justice and FBI career employees to undermine the president. And yet even after nearly two years of cleaning house, just two months ago a supposedly senior official in the Trump administration claimed anonymously in the New York Times that “many of the senior officials in his own administration are working diligently from within to frustrate parts of his agenda.”

While Trump’s opponents may cheer such insubordination, our country suffers when unelected and unknown bureaucrats seek to thwart the agenda of the man freely chosen by voters to serve as our president. Whitaker’s fidelity to Trump may be striking in contrast to the status quo in the D.C. swamp, but it is most assuredly not a stain on the acting attorney general’s credentials or character.