Attorney General William Barr’s summary of special counsel Robert Mueller’s conclusions, in the fancy language of lawyers, impeaches itself. That means that its own words and reasoning call some of Barr’s conclusions into doubt, particularly Barr’s eagerness to say that Donald Trump can’t be proven to have obstructed justice.
It is hard for any of us to know how much credence to give Barr’s précis of the Mueller investigation without knowing more about the evidence. Barr’s letter, however, acknowledges that much and pledges to work to disclose as much as he can without violating Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 6(e), which bars making public grand jury proceedings. But the attorney general’s eagerness to clear Trump of possible obstruction of justice, after having the report in hand for less than 48 hours, is unbecoming of his office and Mueller’s two-year investigation. Furthermore, some of the reasoning in his letter is clearly deeply flawed.
In particular, Barr’s conclusion that obstruction can’t be proven beyond a reasonable doubt involves bootstrapping that is utter nonsense in this case. Barr—just like Trump’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani—claims that ordinarily obstruction requires a nexus to an underlying crime. Because Mueller found the evidence insufficient to prove that Trump actively conspired with the Russians to interfere with the election, traditional legal reasoning would say he’s not likely to have committed obstruction either. Barr says, “Generally speaking, to obtain and sustain an obstruction conviction, the government would need to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that a person, acting with corrupt intent, engaged in obstructive conduct with a sufficient nexus to a pending or contemplated proceeding.”
View the complete March 25 article by Scott Turow on The Vanity Fair website here.