After a tumultuous tenure clouded by two failed criminal prosecutions against the incoming president, Attorney General Merrick Garland is leaving the Justice Department the same way he came in: trying to defend it against political attacks.

A Justice Department lawyer who worked under five attorneys general, Garland had burnished his reputation as a hard-charging prosecutor supervising the case against Timothy McVeigh for the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing that killed 168 people. Garland has called his work on the investigation “the most important thing” he has ever done.

In a farewell speech to Justice Department staffers, outgoing Attorney General Merrick Garland on Thursday appeared to rebuke attacks from President-elect Donald Trump and his allies who have "wrongly criticized" the department as politically motivated.