William Barr is refusing to comply with a Congressional subpoena to turn over the unredacted Mueller report by claiming he would be breaking the law. The DOJ is refusing to comply as well, saying the request does not derive from legitimate oversight.
However, Atty. Gen. Barr already gave access to Rep. Doug Collins, the ranking Republican on the committee, which negates his claim that he is violating the law by giving it to all the members of the House committee.
California Congressman Ted Lieu is exposing his hypocrisy.
Lieu got into a Twitter debate with Jonah Goldberg over an article he wrote for the LA Times, in which he claims the Democrats overreacted to William Barr's objections by holding him in contempt:
"It’s a wild overreaction given that Barr’s decision to release the Mueller report almost in its entirety was entirely discretionary. By law, and by custom, he was under no obligation to release anything since the norm is for the Department of Justice to stay silent if it fails to find prosecutable crimes. His only objectional transgression against traditional norms was offering a Trump-friendly memo accurately, if tendentiously, summarizing its conclusions."
Ted Lieu responded:
And then he tweeted this to AG William Barr:
I asked for further comment from Rep. Lieu and the California Congressman replied to Crooksandliars:
"The idea that Democrats are asking the Attorney General to break the law is not supported by the facts. What members of the House Judiciary Committee are asking for in these negotiations is access to the complete, un-redacted Mueller Report. The Justice Department made the un-redacted report available to the Chairman and Ranking Member. Representative Collins went and read the un-redacted report. So clearly the Attorney General believes that he can provide that report to some Members of the committee without breaking the law. What the majority is requesting is that the Department expand who is able to view the un-redacted report to all Members of the appropriate committees of jurisdiction. This is not too much to ask as we seek to fulfill our constitutional responsibility to provide oversight of the Executive Branch."
The Trump administration has violated all norms in our political history in dealings with Congress and has attempted to create an Imperial presidency with no checks and balances on their power. Trump's attempts at stonewalling mimic Richard Nixon's actions before he was impeached by Congress.
Since William Barr gave access to the full report to Republican Rep Collins, the ranking Republican on the House Committee then there is no justification to hide the report from the rest of the committee members.
That is, unless there is information the Attorney General wishes to hide from the American people.
What are you afraid of Mr. Attorney General?
