Tag: Bill Barr

How Deep Does Barr’s Intervention Go?

Attorney General William Barr’s shocking intervention to help Roger Stone is a blatant abuse of power. It confirms that Barr sees his job as protecting Trump’s political interests rather than enforcing the law. By overturning the prosecutor’s sentencing recommendations, Barr is abandoning longstanding norms to insert himself into a range of cases that implicate Trump and his cronies. His behavior also raises important questions about whether—or how—the attorney general has intervened to protect Trump on a host of other politically sensitive matters.

  • Mueller’s criminal referrals: Appendix D of the Mueller report lists 14 referrals for “potential criminal activity that was outside the scope of the Special Counsel’s jurisdiction.” All except two—Mueller’s referral of Michael Cohen for the Stormy Daniels hush-money scheme and former White House Counsel Greg Craig for alleged violations of the Foreign Agents Registration Act—were redacted for “Harm to Ongoing Matters.” (Cohen pleaded guilty to the relevant charges; Craig was found not guilty.) In addition, documents obtained through Freedom of Information Act Requests appear to show that the Department of Justice (DOJ) closed seven applications for court orders related to Mueller’s investigation on April 1, 2019, just 10 days after Mueller filed his report and more than two weeks before the report became public; it is unclear whether these are related to Mueller’s criminal referrals.
    • Were the cases that the DOJ closed on April 1 related to the criminal referrals?
    • Was Barr involved in the closing of those cases? If so, why?
    • What were the nature of the redacted referrals, and what are their current statuses?
    • Has Barr had any involvement with the redacted criminal referrals?
  • Erik Prince referral: After Mueller’s report was published in April 2019, House Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff (D-CA) made a criminal referral to the DOJ for Prince, alleging that the former Trump adviser lied to Congress about his contacts with Russian officials on behalf of the Trump transition team. More than 10 months later, on the day before the Senate voted in Trump’s impeachment trial, the DOJ finally confirmed that it was investigating Schiff’s referral. On February 11, the same day Barr reportedly intervened to reduce Stone’s sentencing recommendations, The Wall Street Journal reportedthat the DOJ is “in the late stages of deciding whether to charge” Prince for the contacts as well as potentially illegal arms trading.
    • Why did it take more than 10 months for the DOJ to respond to Schiff’s referral?
    • What role, if any, has Barr played in deciding whether to charge Prince? Continue reading.

Trump maintains he can intervene in cases after Barr urges him to curb tweeting

The Hill logoPresident Trump on Friday asserted he has “the legal right” to insert himself into the Justice Department’s handling of criminal cases one day after Attorney General William Barr said the president’s tweets were making his job more difficult.

Trump cited Barr’s comments from an ABC News interview in which the attorney general said Trump had not asked him to take certain action in a criminal case.

“This doesn’t mean that I do not have, as President, the legal right to do so, I do, but I have so far chosen not to!” Trump tweeted. Continue reading.

‘Plausible deniability’: Experts warn on Barr’s ‘carefully staged PR pushback’

AlterNet logo‘Diversionary Tactics’

Attorney General Bill Barr’s record and not his remarks should govern how the people and the press perceive the Justice Dept. chief. So say experts who are weighing in Thursday afternoon after Barr gave an interview to ABC News in which he appears to complain about President Donald Trump’s tweets.

“I’m not going to be bullied or influenced by anybody … whether it’s Congress, a newspaper editorial board, or the president,” Barr told ABC News. “I’m gonna do what I think is right. And you know … I cannot do my job here at the department with a constant background commentary that undercuts me.”

But government, legal, and authoritarianism experts, and some journalists are saying “don’t fall for it,” literally. Those words came from NBC News National Security Contributor Frank Figliuzzi, a former FBI Assistant Director, on MSNBC minutes ago.  Continue reading.

41 prosecutors blast Attorney General Barr for ‘dangerous and failed’ approach to criminal justice

Washington Post logoForty-one elected prosecutors in a joint statement condemned Attorney General William P. Barr for his recent rhetoric that attacked progressive policies, arguing that his “dangerous and failed” approach to criminal justice disproportionately punished poor people and racial minorities while diverting resources away from more serious crimes.

“Sadly, we are perceived as a threat by some who are wedded to the status quo or, even worse, failed policies of past decades,” the 41 state, county and city prosecutors wrote. “Critics such as Attorney General William P. Barr seek to bring us back to a time when crime was high, success was measured by how harsh the punishment was, and a fear-driven narrative prevailed.”

In their statement, the signatories warned against returning to a “‘tough on crime’ era” that ignored facts and encouraged mass incarceration. Instead, they argued, evidence shows that a data-based approach is not only more effective, but also strengthens community trust. Continue reading.

Barr breaks with Trump: His tweets ‘make it impossible for me to do my job’

The attorney general’s declaration of independence comes as he and the president have faced blowback over the handling of Roger Stone’s case.

Attorney General William Barr on Thursday sharply criticized President Donald Trump’s prolific Twitter habit, saying that the president’s affinity for opining about the goings-on at the Justice Department “make it impossible for me to do my job.”

“I think it’s time to stop the tweeting about Department of Justice criminal cases,” Barr told ABC News’ Pierre Thomas in an interview, acknowledging that he had a problem with “some” of Trump’s tweets.

The attorney general‘s very public distancing from Trump’s complaints comes as both men have faced fierce blowback over the handling of a court case featuring Trump’s longtime political adviser Roger Stone.

NOTE:  Our concern is that  AG Barr’s statement was neutral enough to not clearly say what President Trump’s behavior is interfering with.  Is it stopping AG Barr from conducting impartial judicial investigations or is it calling too much attention to his actions to shield the president’s abuses of power?  

Barr: Trump’s tweets make it ‘impossible for me to do my job’

The Hill logoAttorney General William Barr told ABC News in an interview that aired Thursday that President Trump had never asked him to do anything in a criminal case but advised the president to stop tweeting about the Justice Department, saying it makes it “impossible for me to do my job.”

The remarks are a significant and rare public break by the attorney general from the president, following days of controversy surrounding the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) decision to lessen a sentence for Trump ally Roger Stone after the president tweeted about his displeasure with the gravity of the original sentence recommendation.

“I think it’s time to stop the tweeting about Department of Justice criminal cases,” Barr told ABC.  Continue reading.

 

The degradation of William Barr’s Justice Department is nearly complete

Washington Post logoMARK THIS as another big step in the erosion of standards at Attorney General William P. Barr’s Justice Department.

The department on Tuesday suggested a light sentence for President Trump’s old friend Roger Stone, by overturning a previously filed and tougher proposal. It did so over the strong objections of four career line prosecutors, all of whom resigned from the case; one left the department entirely. This extraordinary intervention played out publicly after Mr. Trump tweeted his displeasure over the initial recommendation that Mr. Stone spend seven to nine years in prison for obstructing Congress and witness tampering, which was in line with the department’s sentencing guidelines.

The Justice Department insists that the decision to reverse course came before the president’s tweet. But senior officials did not need a tweet to conclude that the president would react angrily to a tough sentence for his longtime crony, and to act in anticipation — or fear — of the president’s predictable reaction. Continue reading.

Trump seeks to bend the executive branch as part of impeachment vendetta

Washington Post logoPresident Trump is testing the rule of law one week after his acquittal in his Senate impeachment trial, seeking to bend the executive branch into an instrument for his personal and political vendetta against perceived enemies.

And Trump — simmering with rage, fixated on exacting revenge against those he feels betrayed him and insulated by a compliant Republican Party — is increasingly comfortable doing so to the point of feeling untouchable, according to the president’s advisers and allies.

In the span of 48 hours this week, the president has sought to protect his friends and punish his foes, even at the risk of compromising the Justice Department’s independence and integrity — a stance that his defenders see as entirely justified. Continue reading.

Conservative judge stands up to Trump and slams AG Barr in ‘jaw-dropping opinion’

AlterNet logoDemocrats and Never Trump conservatives have been highly critical of U.S. Attorney General William Barr as well as Republicans in Congress for becoming loyal servants of President Donald Trump and doing his bidding at every turn. But law professor and former federal prosecutor Kimberly Wehle, in a February 12 op-ed for Politico, asserts that there is one conservative in the judiciary who clearly doesn’t consider himself a Trump servant: Judge Frank H. Easterbrook of the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Wehle opens her op-ed by lamenting that it was painfully evident how much Trump has “defanged Congress’ oversight authority” when “the Senate acquitted the president of obstruction” during his impeachment trial. But Easterbrook, Wehle quickly adds, is “one conservative judge isn’t willing to let the executive branch steal power from his branch of government.”

n a “jaw-dropping opinion issued by the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals,” Wehle asserts, Easterbrook “rebuked Attorney General William Barr for declaring in a letter that the court’s decision in an immigration case was ‘incorrect’ and thus, dispensable.”  Continue reading.

William Barr officially becomes Trump’s personal attorney — with the power of the US Department of Justice behind him

AlterNet logoOn Tuesday, Donald Trump tweeted that the sentencing recommendations for his longtime associate Roger Stone were unfair. Stone, who was convicted in federal court on seven counts, including lying to Congress and obstruction, including death threats against a judge and threats to murder a witness’ dog, could have received 20 years in prison or more. The recommended sentence of seven to nine years was solidly in the middle of the possible range and was made by a quartet of veteran prosecutors.

But rather than ignoring Trump’s tweet, within hours Attorney General William Barr had instructed the Department of Justice to take an appallingly unprecedented move. The DOJ announced that it was overruling the action of the U.S. attorneys in order to reduce Stone’s suggested sentence—even as Trump threatened to pardon his henchman altogether. It was a moment when American justice teetered on the edge.

Then, overnight, it fell over completely. And the attorney general of the United States officially became Trump’s personal attorney. Continue reading.