Nadler Calls Barr to Testify Again
Chaser General William Barr listens during a Business firm Judiciary Committee hearing on the oversight of the Section of Justice on Capitol Hill, Tuesday, July 28, 2020 in Washington. Chip Somodevilla/AP hibernate caption
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Chip Somodevilla/AP
Attorney General William Barr listens during a Firm Judiciary Commission hearing on the oversight of the Department of Justice on Capitol Loma, Tuesday, July 28, 2020 in Washington.
Chip Somodevilla/AP
Updated at 4:06 p.m. ET
Attorney Full general William Barr puts the founding principles of the Justice Department "more at risk than at any time in modern history," the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee charged on Tuesday.
Rep. Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., excoriated Barr because he said the chaser full general sought conflict with Americans at an unprecedented calibration, including via federal law enforcement crackdowns, and has created what Nadler called a special reserve of justice for the well-continued.
"The bulletin these actions send is clear: In this Justice Department, the president's enemies will exist punished. His friends will exist protected — no matter the cost, no thing the cost to liberty, no affair the toll to justice," Nadler said.
Barr is a longtime political target of the panel'south majority Democrats, who censured him last year during one of a number of bitter disputes over access to data and the House of Representatives' powers of oversight.
On Tuesday, Nadler said the Justice Department had get "a shadow of its one-time self."
Democrat afterwards Democrat followed on Tuesday along a number of lines of attack, criticizing Barr for the Trump assistants's handling of the coronavirus pandemic, for his management of the Justice Department and his handling of individual cases.
Barr defended his independence vehemently, proverb the president "has not attempted to interfere" in decisions related to criminal cases.
"Indeed, it is precisely because I feel consummate liberty to do what I recall is right that induced me serve over again as attorney full general," he said.
Barr stands his ground
The attorney general has told NPR he believes the section is separated appropriately from the White Firm and that he has a responsibility to make sure cases are handled correctly.
And Barr told lawmakers on Tuesday that he had no relationship with Trump before being nominated and was prepared to "slip happily into retirement" with null more to prove in his career.
Barr rejected the characterization that he has embraced a part as the president's own man atop the federal law enforcement appliance.
Yet, Nadler'southward panel has heard from Justice Department whistleblowers and outside critics who argue that Barr's campsite leans on underlings to deliver the results that it — and the White House — want.
Democrats also pressed the chaser general on Tuesday about matters involving Trump's friends, including political adviser Roger Stone, in whose case Barr interceded; quondam national security adviser Mike Flynn, whose charges Barr dropped.
And they faulted him for deploying federal agents to suppress protesters in Washington D.C., Portland, Oregon and elsewhere.
"The protesters aren't mobs — they're mothers and veterans and mayors," Nadler said. Real leadership, the chairman said, would involve de-escalation; "instead you use pepper spray and truncheons on American citizens."
The attorney general rejected that.
Federal officers are deployed to help local agencies, he said, and, in the case of Portland, to protect the federal courthouse there against what Barr called nightly attacks. The attorney full general also cited the numbers of law officers and federal agents who have been injured in the form of carrying out their duties.
Democrats said they fright that Barr is responding to orders from Trump to create ugly scenes of violence and needlessly escalate clashes with demonstrators in order to enhance a narrative of danger that Trump wants to plan into a "law and order" re-election campaign.
Nadler asked Barr whether he and Trump take discussed the re-ballot campaign; though the attorney general said he preserves his official independence, he acknowledged that he has discussed information technology in meetings at the White House.
"I'k a member of the Cabinet and there's an ballot going on," Barr said. "The topic comes up in Chiffonier meetings — it shouldn't be surprise that it comes up."
And Barr volunteered that he thought his carry and that of the Justice Department had been advisable with respect to Trump's friends, citing Stone and Flynn in detail.
Flynn'due south case was problematic, Barr argues, which is why he supported dropping the charges even subsequently the former national security adviser's admissions of guilt.
As for Stone, Barr pointed out that he oversaw the prosecution and supported it — but what Barr said he didn't support was the prospect of an excessive sentence, which he interceded to oppose in court.
"I agree the president's friends don't deserves special breaks — but they as well don't deserve to exist treated more harshly than everyone else," Barr said.
Trump later used his clemency power to commute Stone's sentence.
Witness: Lafayette Square actions were 'disturbing'
Meanwhile on Tuesday at a parallel hearing, the Firm Natural Resources Committee heard from a Washington D.C. Regular army National Guard fellow member who testified that he was "securely disturbed" by the actions of law enforcement during last month'southward crackdown by law enforcement confronting protesters at Lafayette Square across from the White House.
Maj. Adam DeMarco told lawmakers that information technology was his observation that the demonstrators "were engaged in the peaceful expression of their First Subpoena rights, yet they were subjected to an unprovoked escalation and excessive utilize of force."
DeMarco said he was assigned to deed as a liaison between the D.C. Guard and the U.S. Park Law, and was in the square when law enforcement forced demonstrators out of the park, minutes before President Trump crossed the surface area on his way to a photo op in forepart of St. John'southward Church building.
DeMarco contradicted testimony from the Park Police's acting Main Gregory Monahan that police used a "long-range audio-visual device" to warn the protesters to get out the park that evening. DeMarco said police used a standard-outcome megaphone placed on a bench, which he said was barely aural from where he stood some 20 yards way.
DeMarco, a Due west Signal graduate and Army veteran who served in Republic of iraq, also said based on his grooming he believed Park Police fired tear gas at the demonstrators, and said that he plant spent tear gas canisters.
Monahan denied his officers used tear gas, and said the determination to clear the park was made in consultation with the U.Southward. Secret Service, only that neither White House officials nor the Section of Justice were involved.
Monahan said the action was undertaken in advance of a 7 p.m. Washington curfew and that "there is 100 percent, nil correlation betwixt our action and the president's visit to the church."
At Barr's hearing elsewhere at the Capitol, even so, the chaser general told members of Congress that he was aware throughout the day that Trump planned to go out the White House and eventually that Trump would pose for photographers — as he did after the square had been cleared.
Allies level counter-charges
The Business firm Judiciary Committee'due south Republicans, led by the console'due south ranking member, Rep. Jim Hashemite kingdom of jordan, R-Ohio, mounted a loyal defence force of Barr and Trump and also drew attention to the findings of investigations that have embarrassed the Justice Department and FBI.
Barr, in their telling, is cleaning house and getting to the bottom of what Trump's allies phone call wrongdoing.
"Spying," Jordan said on Tuesday, alluding to what he called the existent ground for the Russia investigation. "That'south why they're after you lot, Mister Attorney General."
Jordan hailed Barr'southward revelation that he has commissioned John Bash, the U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Texas, to wait into the use of national security "unmasking" authority with respect to Flynn toward the stop of President Barack Obama's administration.
"Wow — that'due south cracking," Jordan said.
Hashemite kingdom of jordan also praised what he called Barr'southward support for police as a clear alternative to what he said were proposals by Democrats to withdraw support from law enforcement.
He played a video apparently created by the committee'southward Republican staff that showed what appeared to be police videos and some news footage depicting violence directed at law enforcement officials and some injured officers.
Some activists support directing a portion of current police force budgets to other agencies, such as for mental health treatment; Trump, Hashemite kingdom of jordan and Republicans have seized on the brand "defund the police" to charge that Democrats want to disestablish police departments altogether.
Nadler said Tuesday's hearing is Barr'southward showtime time before the Firm Judiciary Committee both in his current stint as attorney general and also from the final time he served in that part, under President George H.W. Bush.
Source: https://www.npr.org/2020/07/28/894891884/watch-attorney-general-barr-set-to-testify-on-justice-department-oversight
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