Book to use his own words against him
and others who worked on the FBI’s initial investigation into Russian election interference, which paved the way for Mueller’s special counsel probe.
House Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), who leads the current rendition of the impeachment inquiry, said the escalation raises “profound new concerns” that Barr’s Justice Department “has lost its independence and become a vehicle for President Trump’s political revenge.”
“If the Department of Justice may be used as a tool of political retribution, or to help the president with a political narrative for the next election, the rule of law will suffer new and irreparable damage,” Schiff said in a statement.
Virginia Sen. Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, said his panel has already covered the ground Barr is now moving in on.
“We’ve found nothing remotely justifying this,” Warner tweeted. “He needs to come before Congress and explain himself.”
Warner’s Democratic colleague from Oregon, Sen. Jeff Merkley, was floored.
“Barr’s job is attorney general of the United States. The UNITED STATES. He’s not Donald Trump’s PR flunky. Is this really happening or is this just the latest episode in some bizarre TV series?” Merkley tweeted.
Republicans and Barr himself have long floated unsubstantiated conspiracy theories suggesting the FBI acted out of political animus against Trump when it launched its initial counterintelligence probe into whether Russia was conspiring with the president’s 2016 campaign.
Trump has claimed all aspects of the Russia investigation was part of a “witch hunt” meant to take him down.
Despite such claims, Mueller’s extensive final report makes clear the FBI launched its initial inquiry after it discovered that several Trump campaign officials had extensive ties to Russian government operatives.
One campaign aide, George Papadopoulos, was even told by a Kremlin-linked professor in a London bar in April 2016 that Russia had stolen emails from the Democratic National Committee, according to Mueller’s report.
Within months of that meeting,
Russian government operatives released those and other emails hacked from Hillary Clinton’s campaign in a deliberate effort to hurt her campaign and boost Trump’s 2016 bid, according to a unanimous assessment by the U.S. intelligence community.
After Trump fired ex-FBI Director James Comey, who supervised the first Russia probe, Mueller was appointed special counsel to pick up where the bureau had left off.
Mueller’s investigation went on to secure indictments against 34 people and three companies, including guilty pleas from Trump’s campaign manager, deputy campaign manager, campaign foreign policy adviser, first national security adviser and personal lawyer.
In another development, John Bolton, the ex-White House security chief who was fired by Trump, is reportedly set to get the last laugh by spilling the beans to the impeachment inquiry.
The walrus-mustached hawk is in talks over giving testimony to the Democratic-led investigation, CNN reported, in what would be a bombshell appearance that could be most devastating blow yet to Trump.
Anonymous is set to rock the White House again — and he or she has the papers to back it up.
The nameless senior official’s forthcoming tell-all book “A Warning” will reportedly include direct quotes from President Trump from meetings at the White House as well as notes and other documents bolstering its account of an off-the-rails commanderin-chief.
“You will hear a great deal from Donald Trump directly,” the insider writes in a blurb included on the book’s back cover. “There is no better witness to his character than his own words.”
Axios reports the unnamed official regularly participated in meetings with Trump and has notes that will be included in the book, which hits shelves next month.
Long before the impeachment probe, Anonymous rattled Trump last year with a New York Times opinion piece detailing the extraordinary steps some Trump insiders take to protect the nation from his worst impulses.