Barr won’t show for House testimony on Thursday
The Justice Department said the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee is trying to place “unprecedented and unnecessary” conditions on the attorney general. William Barr was scheduled to appear before the committee on Thursday but will not show up.
The attorney general was asked to testify before the committee about special counsel Robert Mueller’s report on the Russia investigation.
Justice Department spokeswoman Kerri Kupec said committee chairman Jerry Nadler’s insistence that congressional staffers be allowed to question Barr is “inappropriate.”
Kupec said the attorney general “remains happy to engage directly” with members of the committee to answer their questions.
Nadler accused Barr of canceling his appearance because he’s “terrified” of facing questioning from the panel.
The attorney general said he rushed to release a quick summary immediately after the Mueller report was given to the Justice Department.
“The body politic was in a high state of agitation,” Barr said.
But Mueller’s letter complained about the conclusions in a subsequent summary by Barr that was released with the redacted special counsel report.
Mueller wrote that because of the Justice Department’s summation, the public is confused about “critical aspects of the results.”
Barr said he had offered Mueller the opportunity to review the letter before it was sent, and he declined.
Following conversations, Barr said Mueller “was clear we had not misrepresented his report.” Barr said Mueller was concerned about news media interpretation.
Democrats on the Senate panel have asked the Justice Department Inspector General to investigate Barr’s handling of the report and his summation to Congress.
The Mueller letter became the focus of the hearing, overshadowing some of the more damaging details of the report and evidence of misconduct by the president, who actively sought to interfere and obstruct the investigation.
No crime to ask staffer to lie
Barr was quizzed by Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-calif., the ranking Democrat on the panel, about Trump’s order to former White House counsel Don Mcgahn to fire Mueller. When he did not, Trump ordered Mcgahn to write a press release to say the president never ordered the firing.
Barr sought to draw a legal distinction between firing, and “having someone removed.” It was reasoning that drew more questions from Democrats. Barr also said it was not a crime for the president to ask a staff member to lie for him.
The report also found that Trump offered future pardons to witnesses to keep those talking to Mueller “on message.”
“This committee needs to hear directly from special counsel Mueller,” Feinstein said.
Mueller found 10 instances where Trump tried to interfere or stop the investigation, yet he left the decision up to Congress whether to pursue further investigation and prosecution.
Barr said despite the findings, he determined that there was no evidence of criminality to support a charge of obstruction of justice.
Defending the president
Republicans, meanwhile, defended the president and Barr.
“The president never did anything to keep Mueller from doing his job,” Graham said.
Graham underscored that no charges were brought against the president after $25 million was spent on the investigation where 500 search warrants were issued and 500 witnesses were interviewed.
The White House submitted 1.4 million documents to the special counsel, and made 20 staffers available for questioning.
“So what did we find out?” Graham asked. “There was no collusion.”
Graham suggested the Justice Department continue an investigation into the FBI probe of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and her use of private email servers, and alleged attempts to erase and destroy emails on those servers.
Republicans also want answers on the issuance of special warrants from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court on a U.S. citizen who worked for the Trump campaign and was exonerated of any wrongdoing.
“We’re going to look,” Graham threatened.
Contact Gary Martin at gmartin@ reviewjournal.com or 202-662-7390. Follow @garymartindc on Twitter.