In his 22 months during his second tenure as Attorney General of the United States, Bill Barr did things for the President he served that his predecessor Jeff Sessions would not do. Come to think of it, I'm not sure John Mitchell would have gone as far on behalf of Richard Nixon as Barr did on behalf of Donald Trump.
Barr will be remembered for claiming the Mueller Report had exonerated Trump, appointing U.S. Attorney John Durham to "investigate the investigators", helping Roger Stone and Michael Flynn evade justice, stopped Geoffrey Berman from pursuing justice against Halkbank, oversaw a violent police response against peaceful protesters in Lafayette Square, declared New York City, Seattle and Portland, Oregon to be "anarchist jurisdictions" (whatever that means) and questioned the integrity of mail in voting. For bad measure, Barr intervened in a rape allegation against President Trump.
This should have been sufficient for President Trump. How much lower could Barr lower the bar? But nothing is ever enough for Donald J. Trump. Barr had the temerity to publicly state there was insufficient evidence of voter fraud necessary to overturn the election. In TrumpWorld, no dissent can be brooked. Trump's right-wing allies hung Barr out to dry.
Then in a rare exercise of discretion, Barr saw fit not to reveal the DOJ probe against Hunter Biden during the election campaign. That was two strikes against Barr. The knives came out from White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany, The third strike came about when the Electoral College confirmed today last month's election of Joe Biden as the next President of the United States. A tweet from President Trump soon followed. It was polite in tone, but Trump has more than five weeks left in the White House. There is plenty of time for the gloves to come off.
Twenty-two months ago Bill Barr was a widely respected establishment figure. Now he is reviled by both anti-Trump forces for acting as President Trump's personal attorney. He is also reviled by the MAGA crowd for not acting on behalf of President Trump with sufficient zeal.
I don't feel sorry for Bill Barr. He made his bed and now must sleep in it. Unless you are Chris Krebs, if you go to work for Donald Trump you will come away with a stain which you cannot remove for lowering oneself to his level. You would be hard pressed to find anyone in the Trump Administration how lowered themselves more than Bill Barr. As it wasn't good enough.
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