Attorney General Merrick Garland released a policy memo on July 21 reasserting the Department of Justice’s independence from the White House. The five-page memo (pdf) sets the Biden administration’s policy for all communications with the White House and is meant to boost the public’s trust in the nation’s top law enforcement agency. “The success of the Department of Justice depends upon the trust of the American people. That trust must be earned every day. And we can do so only through our adherence to the longstanding Departmental norms of independence from inappropriate influences, the principled exercise of discretion, and the treatment of like cases alike,” Garland wrote. “Over the course of more than four decades, Attorneys General have issued policies governing communications between the Justice Department and the White House,” the attorney general continued. “The procedural safeguards that have long guided the Department’s approach to such communications are designed to …