Skip to main content

U.S. Attorney General Garland weighs release of Trump-era obstruction memo


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland faces a Monday deadline to decide whether to appeal a court order criticizing his predecessor William Barr, an early test of his willingness to defend the Justice Department’s acts during Donald Trump’s presidency.

FILE PHOTO: Attorney General Merrick Garland speaks during a hearing on "Domestic Violent Extremism in America." before the Senate Appropriations Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S., May 12, 2021. Bill O'Leary/Pool via REUTERS

U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson gave the Justice Department until May 24 to appeal a decision she issued earlier this month that faulted Barr for how he publicly summarized Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s 2019 report and ordered the release of a related internal memo.

A group of U.S. Senate Democrats on May 14 urged Garland not to appeal Jackson’s decision, saying in a letter that Barr’s actions need to be exposed quickly.

“To be clear, these misrepresentations preceded your confirmation as Attorney General, but the Department you now lead bears responsibility for redressing them,” the letter stated.

There are competing interests that Garland must balance in making his decision even if he may personally disapprove of Barr’s conduct, said Bradley Moss, a national security lawyer in Washington who has been following the litigation.

An appeal would signal to civil servants in the Justice Department that Garland will back them in court when they come under fire, Moss said.

“For Garland, one interest here is the need to defend the honor and integrity of the department,” Moss said. “The competing interest, of course, is the desire for some transparency.”

Mueller investigated Russia’s role in the 2016 U.S. election, as well as whether Trump tried to impede his probe.

The special counsel’s April 2019 report outlined 10 episodes in which Trump tried to get the special counsel fired, limit the scope of his investigation, or otherwise interfere with the probe.

Mueller stopped short of concluding that Trump had committed the crime of obstruction of justice, but did not exonerate him of wrongdoing either, leaving Barr or Congress the option to take action against the Republican president.

Before publicly releasing Mueller’s report, Barr sent a letter to congressional leaders and held a news conference that summarized Mueller’s findings. Many Democrats have accused Barr of misrepresenting Mueller’s findings in order to change the public narrative at the time.

Jackson validated this view in her stinging May 3 decision. She said Barr misrepresented the Mueller report in his letter to Congress, and ordered the release of a 2019 legal memorandum to a government accountability group.

The judge said the memorandum, prepared for Barr as he considered his decision, did not qualify as a protected attorney-client communication.

In her decision, Jackson characterized the memo as a “strategic” document, concluding that Barr had come to a predetermined conclusion not to charge Trump with obstruction of justice.

Her ruling came in a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit brought by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a liberal watchdog group.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Biden says K-12 education isn't working — calls for free pre-K to "grade 14"

President Joe Biden on Wednesday praised the nation's K-12 education system for fueling America's economic growth for almost a century. But, he stressed, that system may no longer be sufficient as the foundation for future prosperity. Mr. Biden's American Families Plan is taking aim at an issue that has bedeviled economists as well as millions of families struggling to stay afloat financially: A high school diploma is no longer enough to secure a middle-class life. Under the White House proposal, the nation's K-12 system would be expanded on both ends — from free pre-kindergarten education through a "grade 14," funding two years of schooling before kindergarten and two years of post-high school education through free community college. There's plenty of economic research that links rising high school graduation rates throughout the 20th century to faster U.S. economic growth. For example, broadening education help women enter the workforce and enabled men ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Wray: FBI deemed Jan. 6 attack domestic terrorism

FBI Director Christopher Wray said Tuesday that officials have classified the deadly Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol by former President Trump Donald TrumpProsecutors focus Trump Organization probe on company's financial officer: report WHO official says it's 'premature' to think pandemic will be over by end of year Romney released from hospital after fall over the weekend MORE's supporters as domestic terrorism. "That attack, that siege, was criminal behavior, plain and simple, and it’s behavior that we, the FBI, view as domestic terrorism," Wray told lawmakers on the Senate Judiciary Committee. Wray said the FBI has received more than 270,000 tips from Americans that have helped the bureau identify the numerous people who allegedly participated in the attack. ADVERTISEMENT "Citizens from around the country have sent us more than 270,000 digital media tips. Some have even taken the painful step of turning in their friends or their family members,” ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Matt Gaetz's ex-girlfriend to cooperate with federal authorities in sex trafficking investigation

Washington (CNN) Federal authorities investigating alleged sex trafficking by GOP Rep. Matt Gaetz have secured the cooperation of the congressman's ex-girlfriend, according to people familiar with the matter. The woman, a former Capitol Hill staffer, is seen as a critical witness, as she has been linked to Gaetz as far back as the summer of 2017, a period of time that has emerged as a key window of scrutiny for investigators. She can also help investigators understand the relevance of hundreds of transactions they have obtained records of, including those involving alleged payments for sex, the sources said. News of the woman's willingness to talk, which has not been previously reported, comes just days after the Justice Department formally entered into a plea agreement with Joel Greenberg, a one-time close friend of Gaetz whose entanglement with young women first drew the congressman onto investigators' radar. CNN reported last week that investigators were pressing for the...
Post a Comment
Read more