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Bill Barr says he would not bring Donald Trump to trial for the January 6 riot. However, he believes the former president was ‘responsible’ and part of an effort to undermine the 2020 elections certification.
He stated in addition that, were he still attorney general, he would probably let him off the hook for taking classified documents to Mar-a-Lago.
On Sunday night, Lester Holt interviewed Barr for NBC News about Trump’s final days as president. During the interview, Barr elaborated on claims that the presidential election was rigged.
‘I do think he was responsible in the broad sense of that word, in that it appears that part of the plan was to send this group up to the Hill,’ Barr said during the interview promoting his new book. ‘I think the whole idea was to intimidate Congress. And I think that that was wrong.’
Even if Barr were still the nation’s top law enforcement official, he would not prosecute Trump.
‘I haven’t seen anything to say he was legally responsible for it in terms of incitement,’ he said.
According to the National Archives and Records Administration, Trump took home 15 boxes of classified documents, and Barr did not suggest that he would prosecute him for the act.
‘To tell you the truth, I probably wouldn’t,’ Barr responded. ‘The whole classification system is done under executive order. It’s the president. The president decides everything.’
The former Attorney General has been making the rounds in the media lately promoting his new memoir, ‘One Damn Thing After Another: Memoirs of an Attorney General.’
The article also discusses how he told the president to move past the conspiracy theory that the 2020 election was stolen.
The Wall Street Journal published an excerpt of Barr’s new book in which he recalls the tense moment when former Trump slammed his hand on his desk and demanded he go home immediately after he disputed election fraud claims.
A highly charged meeting between Barr and Trump in the White House ended with Barr telling the president: ‘Our mission is to investigate and prosecute actual fraud. The fact is, we have looked at the major claims your people are making, and they are bullsh***.’
In an interview with The Associated Press, Barr said the Justice Department had investigated the claims but could not find any substantial facts to overturn the outcome of the election.
‘But you did not have to say that!’ Trump snapped, says Barr. ‘You could have just said, ”No comment.” This is killing me – killing me. This is pulling the rug out from under me.”’
Trump then spoke in the third person, ‘You must hate Trump. You would only do this if you hate Trump.’
Trump’s effort to push through his fraud claims after they were thrown out of court by successive courts led to Barr’s resignation just weeks before Christmas in 2020, a move that has since been revealed to be a sign of inner White House turmoil.
‘And, you know, it was wrong to be shoveling it out the way his team was. And he started asking me about different theories. And I had the answers. I was able to tell him, ‘This is wrong because of this,’ Barr recalled.
The president became increasingly angry as he spoke.
‘I said, Okay, well, look, I understand you’re upset with me. And I’m perfectly happy to tender my resignation,’ Barr said to the former president.
Trump reacted furiously to that, Barr said to Holt.
‘And then, boom! He slapped the desk, and he said, “Accepted!” Accepted!”‘
‘And then, boom! He slapped it again,’ said Barr, slapping his own hand to emphasize the point. ‘Accepted! Go home. Don’t go back to your office. Go home. You’re done.,’ Trump allegedly told him.
In an interview with NBC News, Donald Trump said he fired AG Barr for not doing his job properly and called him ‘lazy’ and a ‘coward.’
Trump issued a statement on Friday saying that, ‘Former Attorney General Bill Barr wouldn’t know voter fraud if it was staring him in the face – and it was.’
‘The fact is, he was weak, ineffective, and totally scared of being impeached, which the Democrats were constantly threatening to do. They ”broke” him.’
During the interview with Holt, Barr spent a good deal of time defending his record as attorney general.
The former president was often said to have been protected by Barr from political enemies due to Barr’s statements about the investigation into Russia’s influence on the 2016 presidential election.
A four-page summary of Robert Mueller’s report addressing election interference was released by Attorney General Barr, which was called misleading by two federal judges.
‘This was not a summary of the report,’ Barr explained. ‘It was a description of his bottom-line conclusions. I stuck with the bottom line. You say guilty or not guilty.’
Source: The Republic Brief