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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsBarr's Hearing Was A Sneak Peek At The Next Few Months In Washington
On Wednesday, Attorney General William Barr made his first appearance on Capitol Hill since the release of special counsel Robert Muellers report into Russian interference in the 2016 election. And it took place only hours after the revelation that Mueller had sent Barr a letter that expressed his displeasure with the attorney generals initial four-page summary of the investigations findings, which quoted Muellers report selectively and implied that Mueller hadnt found sufficient evidence that Trump had illegally obstructed justice. In his report, by contrast, Mueller said he hadnt evaluated whether Trump had criminally obstructed justice because of a Justice Department policy against indicting the president but explicitly said he could not exonerate Trump.
Barr spent much of his testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee justifying his decision to release the summary. But he also continued to staunchly defend the president, telling senators that he did not believe Trump criminally obstructed justice and even suggesting that Mueller shouldnt have been investigating possible obstruction of justice if he felt the president couldnt ultimately be charged. During the hearing, two distinct tracks emerged, giving us a preview of what to expect from both parties as the debate over the Mueller report unfolds: Democrats line of inquiry set the stage for a continued focus on whether Trump and his administration improperly intervened in an investigation that was supposed to be independent. The Republicans, meanwhile, doubled down on questions about whether the investigation was fair to begin with.
In their questioning, the Democrats accused Barr of purposely misleading Congress and the broader public about Muellers findings. They also criticized him both for his rollout of the report and his conclusion that the evidence against Mueller didnt warrant obstruction of justice charges. Sen. Chris Coons, for example, suggested that Barrs primary motivation was to protect Trump by allowing him to say he had been exonerated when in reality, Muellers findings on the question of whether Trump had obstructed justice were much less clear. Early in the hearing, Sen. Patrick Leahy asked Barr why he had previously testified before Congress that he didnt know about the Mueller teams concerns about his summary of the report. Later, Sen. Mazie Hirono told Barr that he should resign (a call that was echoed by multiple Democrats outside the hearing, including several 2020 candidates) and accused him of lying in his previous congressional testimony and siding with Trump over the interests of the American people.
Meanwhile, Republicans questions focused very little on Trump or Mueller instead, they largely ran with the presidents contention that the investigation was biased against him. In his opening statement, Sen. Lindsey Graham read a series of anti-Trump text messages from FBI agents who had helped investigate whether Trumps 2016 campaign had coordinated with Russia. We know that the person in charge of investigating hated Trumps guts, he said. Sen. Josh Hawley also focused on the text messages, suggesting that the investigation began with unelected bureaucrats trying to overturn a democratic election. Barr noted that there is an ongoing investigation by the Justice Department into whether anti-Trump bias affected the decision to launch a probe into possible ties between Russia and the Trump campaign and said that he might testify on these issues before Congress at a later date.
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/barrs-hearing-was-a-sneak-peek-at-the-next-few-months-in-washington/
uponit7771
(90,335 posts)Baitball Blogger
(46,700 posts)empedocles
(15,751 posts)Dem side is less predictable - perhaps, given the diverse Dem forces; very unpredictable.