Why stop at impeaching Trump? What about Barr?
William Barr, you’re no
William Ruckelshaus.
One of the few Watergate heroes, Ruckelshaus died two weeks ago. As deputy attorney general in October 1973, Ruckelshaus refused President Richard Nixon’s order to fire Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox, who was seeking key White House tapes. Attorney General Elliot Richardson first had refused.
Both then resigned.
Contrast their principled behavior with that of the current attorney general. This week, Barr savaged the report by Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz that bias against President Trump did not prompt the FBI investigation into Russian election interference and that the investigation — which produced five convictions or guilty pleas of Trump campaign operatives and outlined in detail the Russian involvement — was justified.
Though the report debunked every conspiracy theory Trump and his allies have thrown against the wall, Barr saw something else. “The FBI,” Barr said, “launched an intrusive investigation of a U.S. presidential campaign on the thinnest of suspicions that were insufficient to justify the steps taken.”
Barr pushed that version even as FBI Director Christopher Wray — whom Trump appointed — backed up the report. As he announced changes to address mistakes that the report identified, Wray performed another public service by advising Americans “be thoughtful consumers of information and to think about the sources of it and to think about the support and predication for what they hear.”
In other words, don’t listen to the Ukraine conspiracy theories coming from Trump and his proxies. Such as Barr.
Horowitz demolished all of them. The FBI didn’t send spies to the Trump campaign. The Christopher Steele dossier did not play a role in starting the investigation. Though former FBI lawyer Linda Page and FBI Agent Peter Strzok texted each other about their dislike for Trump, neither was part of opening the investigation. Former President Barack Obama did not wiretap Trump Tower.
That last item underscores Wray’s warning about “fake news” in its actual form. Trump fired that decoy flare in early March 2017 as the Russia controversy rose. By the end of the month, one poll found that 75 percent of Republicans believed it.
Barr is this scandal’s Robert Bork. As solicitor general during Watergate, Bork finally fired Cox. One month later, a federal judge ruled that Bork had acted illegally.
Barr shows no remorse in acting as Trump’s lawyer. To help the president, Barr sanitized Special Prosecutor Robert Mueller’s report. Barr now is ready to keep “investigating” until he can taint Mueller’s probe and confirm Trump’s bogus claim that Ukraine interfered in the 2016 election to help Hillary Clinton.
Like his predecessors, Barr took an oath to “support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic.” Last February, responding to a Gallup poll, a majority of Americans said they consider Russia a “critical threat to the United States.”
By indulging Trump’s unwillingness to acknowledge the real interference in the 2016 election, Barr enables Russian President Vladimir Putin’s campaigns to divide Americans and weaken the West. Barr shouldn’t be globetrotting to confirm conspiracy theories. He should be protecting the 2020 election.
Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., is Barr’s wingman. He wants the Senate to investigate Joe Biden and thus pursue another GOP conspiracy theory: Biden urged the firing of a Ukrainian prosecutor to protect Hunter Biden, who was on the board of a Ukrainian natural gas company.
Graham defended his stunt by saying, “I’m not going to create a country where only Republicans get investigated.” Perhaps he has forgotten the six GOP-led investigations that found no wrongdoing by Hillary Clinton in the 2012 deaths of four Americans in Libya.
A credible investigation might conclude that Barr has violated his oath of office. The same goes for Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who has tolerated Trump’s outsourcing of foreign policy to Rudy Giuliani and also refuses to knock down the Ukraine myths.
As Nixon’s attorney general, John Mitchell ordered the Watergate break-in and other illegal activities aimed at Nixon’s critics. Mitchell claimed that he needed to secure Nixon a second term for the country’s benefit.
Similarly, Barr will do anything to help Trump win next year. That may happen. If it means trampling the rule of law, John Mitchell would understand. And approve.