LOS ANGELES (AP) — Luka Doncic scored 34 points, LeBron James had 24, and the Los Angeles Lakers snapped their three-game losing streak with a 125-101 win over the Sacramento Kings on Sunday night.
Nick Smith Jr. had 21 off the bench for the Lakers, who had dropped four of six and all by at least 13 points, including a 23-point demolition at the hands of Houston on Christmas Day in their previous game.
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Los Angeles Lakers forward Lebron James, center, drives to the basket against Sacramento Kings guard Demar Derozan (10) as center Maxime Raynaud (42) watches during the first half of an NBA basketball game, Sunday, Dec. 28, 2025, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Jessie Alcheh)
Los Angeles Lakers forward Lebron James (23) reacts after scoring a basket as forward Rui Hachimura, back left, looks onduring the first half of an NBA basketball game against the Sacramento Kings, Sunday, Dec. 28, 2025, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Jessie Alcheh)
Los Angeles Lakers guard Luka Doncic (77) reacts to a call as center Deandre Ayton (5) looks on and guard Marcus Smart, back center, gestures during the first half of an NBA basketball game against the Sacramento Kings, Sunday, Dec. 28, 2025, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Jessie Alcheh)
Los Angeles Lakers forward Lebron James, center, retrieves the ball against Sacramento Kings forward Precious Achiuwa, left, and forward Doug McDermott (7) during the first half of an NBA basketball game, Sunday, Dec. 28, 2025, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Jessie Alcheh)
Los Angeles Lakers guard Luka Doncic (77) passes against Sacramento Kings center Maxime Raynaud, second from left, and guard Keon Ellis (23), as center Deandre Ayton (5) watches during the first half of an NBA basketball game, Sunday, Dec. 28, 2025, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Jessie Alcheh)
DeMar DeRozan had 22 for the Kings, who have won consecutive games just once this season. Maxime Raynaud finished with 16, as Sacramento had six players in double figures.
After two-plus days of stewing over the no-show against the Rockets, including a team meeting on Saturday and a rare Sunday morning shootaround, the Lakers found themselves in the second quarter, with Doncic scoring 15 of his 24 first-half points in the period for a 68-53 halftime lead.
Smith’s production was just as important, with 10 points in eight minutes while making all four of his shots from the field in the first half. Coach JJ Redick had identified Smith, a third-year shooting guard from Arkansas, as the player with the most to gain while Austin Reaves misses the next month because of a strained left calf.
Determined to get back into the win column, Los Angeles kept the pressure up after the break. Doncic, Rui Hachimura and James each knocked down 3-pointers during a 13-2 run to start the third quarter that pushed the lead to 26.
The Kings couldn't maintain the defensive improvement shown over their previous four games, allowing the Lakers to shoot 52.8% from the floor. James made 11 of his 13 shots from the field.
Kings: Visit the Clippers in Inglewood, California on Tuesday night.
Lakers: Host the Pistons on Tuesday night.
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Los Angeles Lakers forward Lebron James, center, drives to the basket against Sacramento Kings guard Demar Derozan (10) as center Maxime Raynaud (42) watches during the first half of an NBA basketball game, Sunday, Dec. 28, 2025, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Jessie Alcheh)
Los Angeles Lakers forward Lebron James (23) reacts after scoring a basket as forward Rui Hachimura, back left, looks onduring the first half of an NBA basketball game against the Sacramento Kings, Sunday, Dec. 28, 2025, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Jessie Alcheh)
Los Angeles Lakers guard Luka Doncic (77) reacts to a call as center Deandre Ayton (5) looks on and guard Marcus Smart, back center, gestures during the first half of an NBA basketball game against the Sacramento Kings, Sunday, Dec. 28, 2025, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Jessie Alcheh)
Los Angeles Lakers forward Lebron James, center, retrieves the ball against Sacramento Kings forward Precious Achiuwa, left, and forward Doug McDermott (7) during the first half of an NBA basketball game, Sunday, Dec. 28, 2025, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Jessie Alcheh)
Los Angeles Lakers guard Luka Doncic (77) passes against Sacramento Kings center Maxime Raynaud, second from left, and guard Keon Ellis (23), as center Deandre Ayton (5) watches during the first half of an NBA basketball game, Sunday, Dec. 28, 2025, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Jessie Alcheh)
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump said Thursday that Pam Bondi is out as his attorney general, ending the contentious tenure of a loyalist who upended the Justice Department’s culture of independence from the White House, oversaw large-scale firings of career employees and moved aggressively to investigate the Republican president’s perceived enemies.
The departure of the country's chief law enforcement officer followed months of scrutiny from angry conservatives over the Justice Department's handling of files related to the Jeffrey Epstein sex trafficking investigation and failed efforts to please Trump through unsuccessful efforts to build criminal cases against prominent foes, investigations that in some cases have been rejected by judges or grand juries.
Trump named Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche as the acting attorney general, though three people familiar with the matter have said he has privately discussed Lee Zeldin, the head of the Environmental Protection Agency, as a permanent pick.
“Pam Bondi is a Great American Patriot and a loyal friend, who faithfully served as my Attorney General over the past year,” Trump said in a statement. He added: “We love Pam, and she will be transitioning to a much needed and important new job in the private sector, to be announced at a date in the near future.”
Bondi, a former Florida attorney general, came into office last year pledging that she would not play politics with the Justice Department, but she quickly started investigations of Trump foes, sparking an outcry that the law enforcement agency was being wielded as a tool of revenge to advance the president’s political and personal agenda.
She ushered in a period of intense turmoil at the department that included the firings of career prosecutors deemed insufficiently loyal to Trump and the resignations of hundreds of other employees. Her departure continues a trend of Justice Department upheaval that has defined Trump’s presidency as multiple attorneys general across his two terms have either been pushed out or resigned after proving unwilling or unable to meet his demands for the position.
Bondi rejected accusations that she politicized the Justice Department and said her mission was to restore the institution’s credibility after overreach by President Joe Biden’s Democratic administration with two federal criminal cases against Trump. Bondi’s defenders have said she worked to refocus the department to better tackle illegal immigration and violent crime and brought much-needed change to an agency they believe unfairly targeted conservatives.
Bondi’s public embrace of the president, however, marked a sharp departure from her predecessors, who generally took pains to maintain an arm’s-length distance from the White House to protect the impartiality of investigations and prosecutions. Bondi postured herself as Trump’s chief supporter and protector, praising and defending him in congressional hearings and placing a banner with his face on the exterior of Justice Department headquarters.
She called for an end to the “weaponization” of law enforcement she said occurred under the Biden administration, even though Biden’s attorney general, Merrick Garland, and Jack Smith, the special counsel who produced two cases against Trump, have said they followed the facts, the evidence and the law in their decision-making. Bondi’s critics, meanwhile, said she was the one who had politicized the agency to do the president’s bidding.
“You’ve turned the People’s Department of Justice into Trump’s instrument of revenge,” Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland, the top Democrat on the House Judiciary committee, said at a February hearing.
Bondi delivered a combative performance but few substantive answers at that hearing as she angrily insulted her Democratic questioners with name-calling, praised Trump over the performance of the stock market — “The Dow is up over 50,000 right now” —- and openly aligned herself as in sync with a president whom she painted as a victim of past impeachments and investigations.
Even Republicans began to challenge her, with the Republican-led House Oversight Committee last month issuing a subpoena to her to appear for a closed-door interview about the Epstein files.
Under Bondi’s leadership, the department opened investigations into a string of Trump foes, including Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, New York Attorney General Letitia James, former FBI Director James Comey and former CIA Director John Brennan. The high-profile prosecutions of Comey and James were short-lived as they were quickly thrown out by a judge who ruled that the prosecutor who brought the cases was illegally appointed.
Trump repeatedly publicly praised and defended Bondi but also showed flashes of impatience with his attorney general’s efforts to meet his demands to prosecute his rivals. In one extraordinary social media post last year, Trump called on Bondi to move quickly to prosecute his foes, including James and Comey, telling her: “We can’t delay any longer, it’s killing our reputation and credibility.”
Bondi oversaw the exodus of thousands of career employees — both through firings and voluntary departures — including lawyers who prosecuted violent attacks on police at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021; environmental, civil rights and ethics enforcers; counterterrorism prosecutors; and others.
She struggled to overcome early stumbles over the Epstein files that angered conservatives eager for government bombshells about the case, which has long fascinated conspiracy theorists. She herself had fed the conspiracy theory machine with a suggestion in a 2025 Fox News Channel interview that Epstein’s “client list” was sitting on her desk for review. The department later acknowledged that no such document exists.
Bondi was ridiculed over a move to hand out binders of Epstein files to conservative influencers at the White House only for it to be later revealed that the documents included no new revelations. And despite promises that more files were going to become public, the Justice Department in July said no more would be released, prompting Congress to pass a bill to force the agency to do so.
The Epstein files fumbles led to a stunning public criticism from White House chief of staff Susie Wiles, a close friend of Bondi’s, who told Vanity Fair that the attorney general “completely whiffed.” The Justice Department’s release of millions of pages of Epstein files did little to tamp down criticism, prompting a House committee with the support of five Republicans to subpoena Bondi to answer questions under oath.
Bondi, who defended Trump during his first impeachment trial, was his second choice to lead the Justice Department, picked for the role after former Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida withdrew his name from consideration amid scrutiny over sex trafficking allegations.
FILE - President Donald Trump, stands with then-defense attorney Todd Blanche, May 14, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Craig Ruttle, Pool, file)
President Donald Trump speaks with Attorney General Pam Bondi during a roundtable discussion on public safety at a Tennessee Air National Guard Base, Monday, March 23, 2026, in Memphis, Tenn. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein)
Attorney General Pam Bondi arrives before President Donald Trump speaks about the Iran war from the Cross Hall of the White House on Wednesday, April 1, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, Pool)
President Donald Trump participates in a roundtable discussion on public safety at a Tennessee Air National Guard Base, Monday, March 23, 2026, in Memphis, Tenn., with Attorney General Pam Bondi, right. (AP Photo/Bruce Newman)
Attorney General Pam Bondi listens during a Cabinet meeting at the White House, Thursday, March 26, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
President Donald Trump walks from the Blue Room to speak about the Iran war from the Cross Hall of the White House on Wednesday, April 1, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, Pool)
