Tag: Bill Barr

Barr clears Justice Dept. to investigate alleged voting irregularities as Trump makes unfounded fraud claims

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Attorney General William P. Barr on Monday gave federal prosecutors approval to pursue allegations of “vote tabulation irregularities” in certain cases before results are certified and indicated he had already done so “in specific instances” — a reversal of long-standing Justice Department policy that quickly drew internal and external criticism for fueling unfounded claims of massive election fraud pushed by President Trump and other conservatives.

Richard Pilger, head of the Justice Department’s Election Crimes Branch, stepped down from his position in protest over Barr’s directive — though he remains at the agency, according to people familiar with the matter, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss a politically volatile situation.

The people said Barr had first broached a similar idea some weeks ago and that political leadership in the Justice Department’s Criminal Division, of which the Election Crimes Branch is a part, pushed back. Those officials were blindsided when Barr’s memo was released on Monday, the people said. Continue reading.

Trump weighs firing FBI director after election as frustration with Wray, Barr grows

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President Trump and his advisers have repeatedly discussed whether to fire FBI Director Christopher A. Wray after Election Day — a scenario that also could imperil the tenure of Attorney General William P. Barr as the president grows increasingly frustrated that federal law enforcement has not delivered his campaign the kind of last-minute boost that the FBI provided in 2016, according to people familiar with the matter.

The conversations among the president and senior aides stem in part from their disappointment that Wray in particular but Barr as well have not done what Trump had hoped — indicate that Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden, his son Hunter Biden or other Biden associates are under investigation, these people say. Like others, they spoke on the condition of anonymity to disclose internal discussions.

In the campaign’s closing weeks, the president has intensified public calls for jailing his challenger, much as he did for Hillary Clinton, his opponent in 2016. Trump has called Biden a “criminal” without articulating what laws he believes the former vice president has broken. Continue reading.

Barr tells Republicans Durham report won’t be ready by election

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Attorney General Bill Barr has begun telling top Republicans that the Justice Department’s sweeping review into the origins of the Russia investigation will not be released before the election, a senior White House official and a congressional aide briefed on the conversations tell Axios.

Why it matters: Republicans had long hoped the report, led by U.S. Attorney John Durham, would be a bombshell containing revelations about what they allege were serious abuses by the Obama administration and intelligence community probing for connections between President Trump and Russia.

  • “This is the nightmare scenario. Essentially, the year and a half of arguably the number one issue for the Republican base is virtually meaningless if this doesn’t happen before the election,” a GOP congressional aide told Axios. Continue reading.

Blistering report to warn of the ‘grave danger’ posed by Bill Barr and his attempts to get Trump re-elected

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Critics of President Donald Trump have been arguing that one of the main reasons to vote him out of office in November is removing William Barr from his position as U.S. attorney general. And the Trump loyalist’s opponents, according to Washington Post reporter James Hohmann, will have some more material to work with: a forthcoming 277-page report from the Center for Ethics and the Rule of Law at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia and the watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington.

Due out next week, the Center/CREW report, Hohmann stresses, is “sharply critical” of Barr — and it’s also quite comprehensive.

The report, according to Hohmann, “focuses on nine areas, including the misleading summary Barr initially offered of Special Counsel Bob Mueller’s conclusions; the Justice Department’s handling of the whistleblower complaint related to President Trump’s infamous call with Ukraine’s president; his intervention in politically sensitive prosecutions, such as the cases of former Trump advisers Roger Stone and Michael Flynn; the deployment of federal agents and troops against protestors, including the order to clear Lafayette Square; the firing or reassignment of U.S. attorneys, especially in the Southern District of New York; his role in trying to block the publication of material unflattering to the president, such as former National Security Adviser John Bolton’s memoir; the politicization of several offices within the department, in particular the Office of Legal Counsel; and his resistance to congressional oversight, including subpoenas.” Continue reading.

The Justice Department may have violated Attorney General Barr’s own policy memo

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When the Justice Department recently publicized an ongoing investigation into potentially improperly discarded Trump ballots, critics accused it of violating long-standing agency policy against interfering in an election.

But the unusual decision to publicly detail the Pennsylvania case may also have run afoul of guidelines that Attorney General William Barr himself issued to federal prosecutors this year, according to a memo obtained by ProPublica.

In May, Barr wrote a directive to all Justice Department employees imploring them to be “particularly sensitive to safeguarding the Department’s reputation for fairness, neutrality, and non-partisanship” when it comes to election-related crimes. Continue reading.

Judge rules federal law enforcement commission violates law, orders work stopped as attorney general prepares to issue report

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Presidential Commission on Law Enforcement is not diverse, doesn’t hold public meetings as law requires

A national commission on policing launched earlier this year by President Trump and Attorney General William P. Barr has violated federal law by seating only people in law enforcement and failing to include members with different perspectives such as civil rights activists, defense attorneys or mental health professionals, a federal judge ruled Thursday as he halted the group’s work. The commission also did not file a charter, post public notice of its meetings or open them to the public, so even though it has already sent its draft report and recommendations to Barr for release later this month, the judge prohibited Barr from publishing a final report.

The ruling by Senior U.S. District Judge John D. Bates in Washington came in response to a lawsuit from the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund, which sought an injunction against the Presidential Commission on Law Enforcement and the Administration of Justice for violating laws on how federal advisory committees must work. Bates did not issue an injunction yet, but asked both sides to file briefs on what should be included in an injunction, said he would order the commission to change its membership and comply with other aspects of the law, and that it could not issue a report until it had done so.

“Especially in 2020,” Bates wrote, “when racial justice and civil rights issues involving law enforcement have erupted across the nation, one may legitimately question whether it is sound policy to have a group with little diversity of experience examine, behind closed doors, the sensitive issues facing law enforcement and the criminal justice system in America today.” Continue reading.

Sitting federal prosecutor says AG Barr has ‘brought shame’ and ‘unprecedented politicization’ to DOJ

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Assistant U.S. Attorney for the District of Massachusetts James D. Herbert on Thursday slammed Attorney General William Barr for his “unprecedented politicization” of the Department of Justice, marking the first time a sitting U.S. attorney has publicly rebuked the head of the DOJ.

Herbert made the remarks in a letter published by the Boston Globe, arguing the attorney general’s efforts to serve President Donald Trump are “a dangerous abuse of power.”

“While I am a federal prosecutor, I am writing to express my own views, clearly not those of the department, on a matter that should concern all citizens: the unprecedented politicization of the office of the attorney general,” Herbert wrote. “The attorney general acts as though his job is to serve only the political interests of Donald J. Trump. This is a dangerous abuse of power.” Continue reading.

Barr’s Approach Closes Gap Between Justice Dept. and White House

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The attorney general has brought the department closer to the White House than it has been in a half-century, historians said.

WASHINGTON — When the top federal prosecutor in Washington recently accused the local police of arresting protesters without probable cause, Attorney General William P. Barr stepped in.

Mr. Barr, who has frequently voiced his support for police officers, brought in the U.S. attorney, Michael Sherwin, to meet with the chief of the Washington police and other top law enforcement officials, escalating the local dispute to the top of the Justice Department.

The meeting grew heated, but ultimately, Mr. Sherwin backed down, according to three people familiar with the encounter. Mr. Barr told Mr. Sherwin to write a letter that said he had not meant to imply that the police had acted unlawfully. In a nod to Mr. Sherwin’s original objection, the Washington police are working with prosecutors to identify video and other evidence to back up the arrests. Continue reading.

Justice Dept. statement on mail-in ballot investigation appalls election law experts

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The Justice Department alarmed voting-law experts Thursday by announcing an investigation into nine discarded ballots found in northeastern Pennsylvania, a case immediately seized upon by the Trump campaign as evidence of a dark Democratic conspiracy to tamper with the presidential election.

President Trump also appeared to cite the case, telling reporters at the White House that ballots had been found “in a wastepaper basket in some location. . . . We want to make sure that the election is honest, and I’m not sure that it can be.”

The president’s comments marked his latest attempt to stoke uncertainty and alarm about the legitimacy of the upcoming election. Continue reading.

We now know the reason for Mueller’s biggest mistake

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After Special Counsel Robert Mueller concluded his investigation into ties between the Russian government and the Trump campaign, the big question still loomed: Was the president guilty of a serious crime?

Attorney General Bill Barr quickly took it upon himself to answer the question, explaining that the special counsel’s work had failed to accuse Donald Trump of criminal acts, and he personally concluded that insufficient evidence existed for any charge. This announcement stunned and perplexed many observers while cheering the president’s allies. The truth only became clear weeks later when the Mueller report was finally released: It laid out substantial evidence that Trump was guilty of many instances of obstruction of justice, but the report was written so as to avoid making this conclusion explicit. (Mueller also sent a letter to Barr arguing that his initial statements about the resolution of the case had been misleading.)

Now, new revelations from one of Mueller’s top deputies, Andrew Weissmann, reveal the context of Mueller’s peculiar choice — one that I’ve argued was a colossal mistake. Continue reading.