White House frustration with Garland grows

[Polybius]

Source: Politico

Joe Biden has told aides and outside advisers that Attorney General Merrick Garland did not do enough to rein in a special counsel report stating that the president had diminished mental faculties, according to two people close to the president, as White House frustration with the head of the Justice Department grows.

The report from special counsel Robert Hur ultimately cleared Biden of any charges stemming from his handling of classified documents that were found at Biden’s think tank and his home. But Hur’s explanation for not bringing charges — that Biden would have persuaded the jury that he was a forgetful old man — upended the presidential campaign and infuriated the White House.

Biden and his closest advisers believe Hur went well beyond his purview and was gratuitous and misleading in his descriptions, according to those two people, who were granted anonymity to speak freely. And they put part of the blame on Garland, who they say should have demanded edits to Hur’s report, including around the descriptions of Biden’s faltering memory.

In White House meetings, aides have questioned why Garland felt the need to appoint a special counsel in the first place, though Biden has publicly said he supported the decision.

Read more: https://www.politico.com/news/2024/02/09/white-house-frustration-with-garland-grows-00140813

[Bayard]

1. I'm thinking Garland will be retiring,

After President Biden is re-elected.

[comradebillyboy]

2. The sooner the better.

[OnDoutside]

4. Amen. And if the election falls right for Biden, there's

zero reason not to cut loose and bring profound changes in the following 2 years (my gut feeling is the House is heading back blue, and I remain stubbornly hopeful to get at least 50-50 in the Senate).

[et tu]

12. yes please nt

[onetexan]

20. 2 words: Sally Yates

[Silent Type]

29. Don't really want to throw her to wolves.

[Mr.Bee]

14. How about a promotion for Jack Smith

to Attorney General?

[Hekate]

19. There is no "DU nannybot." None. There are only DU members and 2 owners/Admins...

So what happened was that someone took exception to whatever it was you said and Alerted on it. Then it went to a Jury, composed of a random selection of DU members, who decided whether you had violated Terms of Service.

No nannybots. Just members.

[DURHAM D]

3. The quotable quote from the article -

“What Democrats do is they bend over backwards not to look partisan, and then they end up hiring people that are partisan but in the other direction,” said a Biden donor, granted anonymity to speak freely about the top law enforcement official in the country. “There’s no question in my mind that the villain here is Merrick Garland.”

[OnDoutside]

5. Hard to argue with that.

[The Unmitigated Gall]

7. Why we've had nothing but repuke independent counsels

For more than 40 goddamn years.

[OrlandoDem2]

9. Exactly. It's time for Democrats to go scorched earth total war and no holds barred!

We’ve gotta win this election and we will need to get down and dirty to do it.

[hadEnuf]

10. Absolutely.

It's way past time to stop kissing the asses of these GOP MAGAT seditionists.

[AloeVera]

31. Amen to that. Don't always bring a knife.. N/T

[Rebl2]

13. Was Biden

able to just appoint Garland or did he have to be approved by the Senate.

[Novara]

6. I've always said Garland is the wrong man for the job.

Been saying it for years. He made me think twice for a little while when he appointed Jack Smith, but this bending over backwards to appear fair means he's doing the GOP's work for them.

We all knew Hur was a really shitty choice for this.

[Barry Markson]

8. Thank the gods the republicans held up his nomination to the Supreme Court!

I can only imagine how he'd rule.

[ShazzieB]

24. I doubt he'd be worse than Neil Gorsuch.

That's who got the seat that should have gone to Garland. And TSF would have only gotten to appoint 2 justices, not 3. (Still 2 too many, but still.) We might have ended up with Garland, Gorsuch and Beer Boy but not gotten stuck with the Handmaid. Maybe not tons better, but not worse, either, imo.

Reading this article was an eye opener for me. I have not been happy with some of Garland's decisions, but reading this article has made me see things in an even more negative light. I am still hopeful there will be a trial in time for the American people to know that one of the candidates for potus is a convicted felon, but it's turning out to be more of a nail biter than it needs to be.

Biden picked Garland as his attorney general with the stated desire to restore a semblance of independence at the Department of Justice that he and others believed was lost under Donald Trump.

*snip*

“Your loyalty is not to me,” Biden said. “You won’t work for me. You are not the president or the vice president’s lawyer.”

Democrats close to Biden fear Garland has become too consumed by that instruction to appear impartial.

It does sound like he's been trying so hard not to look biased in Biden's favor that he's ended up going too far on the other direcction. Le sigh.

[Mme. Defarge]

11. Too late to

put the toothpaste back in the tube.

[PSPS]

16. What? Does this mean it is now allowed on DU to criticize Garland without alerts and vitriolic replies?

I've never understood the veneration and bestowing of sainthood upon garland here.

[Ponietz]

17. Doh!

[hueymahl]

22. Curious, isn't it?

[question everything]

18. I wish they did not. Yes, we Democrats bend backwards but we should be proud that we

did not politicize the issue. Biden will have plenty of opportunities to show that he is alert and knows what he is doing and saying, with the occasional senior moment that many have.

Garland could not, should not have told Hur how to conduct the investigation. And had he told him to leave the comments about Biden’s memory, it would have backfired and magnified.

[Novara]

23. In his attempt to appear fair, he picked a GOP tool

Bent over backwards so far that he ended up on the other side.

Of course he was hands-off. I have to give him credit for that. But time and time again he makes poor choices. I can't remember without looking it up, but one of his first decisions was to shield the felony factory from accountability on something - maybe it was immunity from the E. Jean Carroll issue? Too lazy to look it up.

Maybe when Biden appointed him he told him to make sure he doesn't ever appear partisan. But that backfired.

I guess we should feel lucky that he didn't pick a GOP tool instead of Jack Smith.

[agingdem]

28. Correct...

Garland (the AG) is not the president's lawyer...and regardless of the Garland rage machine, he had no choice but to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate Biden, the sitting president..and unlike Bill Barr's cover Trump's ass "nothing to see here" Mueller Report, he could not edit Hur's final report without the screaming monkeys loosing their shit...

I personally think Robert Hur committed professional suicide, his reputation in the crapper...(however, I do suspect Hur is now on the MAGA short list for lead speaker at their next KKK get-together) ...if Hur was not well known before, he sure as hell is now but not in a good way, forever tied to Trump...

[KPN]

21. As it should.

[Martin68]

25. It makes me wonder what kind of Supreme Court Justice Garland would have been...

[Polybius]

26. Well, better than Gorsuch

That's who wound up getting the job, so the bar is low.

[LiberalLovinLug]

27. Always been weak sauce

Just the fact that he didn't even want to investigate Jan 6th until compelled to by a Republican, Liz Cheney, and her House investigation and hearings.

[Silent Type]

30. Soon, we need to quit bashing Garland and Hur (though deserved) and start concentrating on winning 2024.

[SWBTATTReg]

32. Garland is too conservative, still thinks that he should be a member of the US Supreme Court or that he's

been slighted in some manner. How does one go stabbing his own party in the back and not covering his Boss' back from Hur's comments, that were really not needed in the report. They didn't do this w/ tRUMP's thousands of secret documents in his resort, so why the difference in treatment between tRUMP and Pres. Biden? Why?

[PlutosHeart]

33. Right wing want this. So I must ask

WHO okayed this report to go out" Did Garland even see it? All of it?
We know there is much sloppiness in government and for a moment to slip this through in its form would not surprise me.
It is Garland who went to get Jack. I suspect for the complicated international issues involved as well as the political pressures.
Media and the public have failed in not asking this questions and to go to the complete dissection of this.

[Cha]

34. I'm guessing PJB "supported the decision" Not having a clue at the

time that Fucking Hur would be a GD Magat Asshole in his "report".