US Attorney General’s William Barr’s summary of Robert Mueller’s Report was not written and released on March 24, 2019, as the White House wants us to believe. It was argued, written and pre-tested on June 8, 2018, in an unsolicited application for the job of US Attorney General that “Bill” Barr wrote to Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and Assistant AG Steve Engel, but clearly meant for the eyes of “Individual One,” Donald Trump.
If you carefully read Barr’s bombastic love-letter to Trump last June — headlined “Mueller’s “Obstruction” Theory” (“obstruction” in quotes, put there by Barr), Barr has already prejudged obstruction of justice and is very clear where he will come down on any “obstruction” question:
“Mueller should not be permitted to demand that the President submit to interrogation about alleged obstruction. Apart from whether Mueller has a strong enough factual basis for doing so, Mueller’s obstruction theory is fatally misconceived.” (Bill Barr job-application letter to Rod Rosenstein & Steve Engle, June 8, 2018)
Before the ink was barely dry on the Mueller Report — the result of a 22-month investigation — Barr gave his opinion in a little more than 22 hours, that Mueller, who clearly did not “exonerate” Trump from “obstruction” but left the question open, and, according to the deeply-conflicted Barr, in the hands of Trump’s hand-picked Attorney General, William Barr. Barr’s bastardization of Mueller’s careful examination of the facts on obstruction became a bald power grab on behalf of the President who hired the Attorney General: “ The Special Counsel’s decision to describe the facts of his obstruction investigation without reaching any legal conclusions leaves it to the Attorney General to determine whether the conduct described in the report constitutes a crime.”
But Barr had already determined in June, 2018, that a President could not be found guilty of “obstruction:
“I know you ( Rosenstein, Engel & Trump ) will agree that, if a DOJ investigation is going to take down a democratically-elected President, it is imperative to the health of our system and to our national cohesion that any claim of wrongdoing is solidly based on evidence of a real crime — not a debatable one….and not to indulge the fancies of overly-zealous prosecutors.”
Hiding behind the bendable Rod Rosenstein, Barr’s sinister and self-serving summary of Mueller’s Report states that : “Deputy AG Rod Rosenstein and I have concluded that the evidence developed during the Special Counsel’s investigation is not sufficient to establish that…the Report identifies no actions that, in our judgement, constitute obstructive conduct.” It was the same thing Barr wrote nine months earlier in his job application to be Trump’s Attorney General, and it should have disqualified him from rendering any judgement on the subject of “obstruction.”
Yet, despite Barr’s barely concealed and contemptible attempt to use Rod Rosenstein as a human shield to veil his previously expressed opinion on “obstruction” in his June 8, 2018, letter, the original language of Barr’s bias is there for every member of Congress and every American citizen to see: “ Mueller’s core premise — that the President acts “corruptly” if he attempts to influence a proceeding in which his own conduct is being scrutinized — is untenable.” (Bob Barr’s AG job application letter, June 8, 2018).
Barr raised the evidentiary bar on the issue of “obstruction” to an unattainable height, despite Mueller clearly stating that “ while this report does not conclude that the President committed a crime, it also does not exonerate him.”
But, Bill Barr did. First, he pre-emptively exonerated Trump on June 8, 2018, in his application letter to Trump for the job of Attorney General. Then, Barr did it again in his shady summary of Robert Mueller’s meticulously compiled report which included the issuing of 2800 subpoenas, 500 search warrants and the interviewing of 500 witnesses — and resulted in 199 criminal charges, 37 indictments or guilty pleas and five prison sentences. Barr exonerated Trump and discarded all of Mueller’s hard work before the Special Counsel’s task was complete and before he even read Mueller’s final report.
The fix was in when Barr stated his overwhelming opposition to any “obstruction” charges, a postion which prompted Trump to nominate him for Attorney General. Barr was able to write his fast, furious and suspicious crib-sheet of the Mueller Report because he had already written it last June, when he applied for the job of Attorney General. All he did was change the names, the dates, and his own title.
Now, it’s time for Congress to investigate the process involved in assembling and delivering the Mueller Report, the evidence contained in the Report itself, and the facts behind Bill Barr’s jettisoning of justice in order to please the man who hired him, and sabotage a crucial counter-intelligence investigation into a foreign power’s illegal interference in a US Presidential election.
In fact, it is Barr himself — in his obsequious July 8, 2018, job application to be the Trump’s new AG — who spelled out the necessity for Congress to do its’ job immediately, and for each citizen to do ours between now and 2020:
“Thus, under the Framers’ plan, the determination whether the President is making decisions based on “improper” motives or whether he is “faithfully” discharging his responsibilities, is left to the the People, through the election process, and the Congress, through the Impeachment Process.”
Barr did the job he groveled for, and was hired to roll-over for, on cue. Congress, and each of us, must be relentless in doing ours.