Friday, April 19, 2019

Jonathon Chait on Why "Congress Should Impeach William Barr"

“Congress Should Impeach William Barr”
By Jonathan Chait
“House Democrats are going to face a difficult decision about launching an impeachment inquiry into President Trump. Balanced against the president’s impressive array of misconduct is the fact that several more criminal investigations that may add to the indictment are already underway, and that impeaching the president might jeopardize the reelection of red-state Democratic members. But in the meantime, Attorney General William Barr presents them with a much easier decision. Barr has so thoroughly betrayed the values of his office that voting to impeach and remove him is almost obvious.
“…And while many members of the old Republican political Establishment had recoiled against Trump’s contempt for the rule of law, Barr has shown no signs of having joined them. He met with Trump to discuss serving as his defense lawyer, publicly attacked the Mueller investigation (which risked ‘taking on the look of an entirely political operation to overthrow the president’), called for more investigations of Hillary Clinton, and circulated a lengthy memo strongly defending Trump against obstruction charges.
The events since Barr’s letter have incinerated whatever remains of his credibility. The famously tight-lipped Mueller team told several news outlets the letter had minimized Trump’s culpability; Barr gave congressional testimony hyping up Trump’s charges of ‘spying,’ even prejudging the outcome of an investigation (‘I think there was a failure among a group of leaders [at the FBI] at the upper echelon’); evaded questions as to whether he had shared the Mueller report with the White House; and, it turns out, he’s ‘had numerous conversations with White House lawyers which aided the president’s legal team,’ the New York Times reports. Then he broke precedent by scheduling a press conference to spin the report in advance of its redacted publication.

“…Barr’s letter had made it sound as though Trump’s campaign spurned Russia’s offers of help: ‘The Special Counsel did not find that the Trump campaign, or anyone associated with it, conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in these efforts, despite multiple offers from Russian-affiliated individuals to assist the Trump campaign,’ he wrote. In fact, Mueller’s report concluded, ‘In some instances, the Campaign was receptive to the offer,’ but that the cooperation fell short of criminal conduct.
Where Mueller intended to leave the job of judging Trump’s obstructive conduct to Congress, Barr interposed his own judgment. Barr offered this incredible statement for why Trump’s behavior was excusable: ‘[T]here is substantial evidence to show that the President was frustrated and angered by a sincere belief that the investigation was undermining his presidency, propelled by his political opponents, and fueled by illegal leaks,’ Barr said. ‘Nonetheless, the White House fully cooperated with the Special Counsel’s investigation,’ and credited him further with taking ‘no act that in fact deprived the Special Counsel of the documents and witnesses necessary to complete his investigation.’”
“…There is no other department in government in which mere norms, not laws, are all that stand between democracy as we know it and a banana republic. Barr has revealed his complete unfitness for this awesome task. Nearly two more years of this Trumpian henchman wielding power over federal law enforcement is more weight than the rickety Constitution can bear.”
The entire article is available here.  I urge you to read it.  

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