Nine Democratic senators called on Attorney General Bill Barr to resign on Friday over his intervention in ex-Trump adviser Roger Stone’s criminal case to water down federal prosecutors’ recommended prison sentence after President Donald Trump complained about it.
Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), Edward Markey (D-MA), Patty Murray (D-WA), Jeff Merkley (D-OR), Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), Ron Wyden (D-OR) and Mazie Hirono (D-HI) sent Barr a scathing letter ripping the Justice Department’s “unethical political intervention” in the case.
“The interference in this case by you or other senior DOJ officials working under you is a clear violation of your duty to defend fair, impartial, and equal justice for all Americans,” they wrote. “As a result, we call on you to resign immediately.”
The Democrats accused Barr of meddling “in a clearly political fashion” to shield Stone on Trump’s behalf after the political adviser was found guilty of obstructing Congress and witness tampering in Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia probe.
“The shocking actions taken by you or your senior staff to seek special protections for Mr. Stone make a mockery of your responsibilities to seek equal justice under the law and reveal that you are unfit to head the DOJ,” the senators wrote. “A DOJ that abandons the rule of law in order to give sweetheart deals to criminals acting on behalf of the President of the United States is as corrupt as it is unacceptable.”
Shortly after the Democratic lawmakers sent the letter, news broke that Barr currently has prosecutors questioning the federal lawyers involved in former Trump campaign adviser Michael Flynn’s criminal case, another case Trump has repeatedly disparaged.
Read the letter below:
Absurd that this wasn’t signed by 100 senators.
Trump, Barr, McConnell, and 51 anti American Senators say Fuck You!
Here’s the thing: Michael Flynn pleaded guilty.
One of the items a defendant has to affirm in his felony waiver of rights when pleading guilty is the statement, “I am pleading guilty because I am guilty.”
It makes me wonder how the validity of that statement is questionable.
NAL or a Government Official.
But this does not seem the kind of thing which will move Barr.
So, unfortunately, we are left with the inattentive, the bored, the apathetic, the cynical, the hopeless, the negative, the ignorant.
To get interested enough to poll negatively for Trump…and Barr…and for Barr to get the Infamy he manifestly deserves.
Because it would be the first time.
Since the time he came to America’s consciousness, Barr has been taking a Blowtorch to the Constitution and the Rule of Law…with little negative press and even less attention from everyone else.
I really don’t care about Barr so much as the tepid response to him. We still have, at our disposal, people and institutions which have been operating like a baseball catcher with one arm tied behind his back.
What Barr is doing has never been done in the United States on the scale he is doing it.
So we are going to have some production from these institutions, their spokespeople and all of us who are not Trumpers (who are too far gone)…
In the universe of Trump, all laws are infinitely flexible: if you are a Democrat, they apply to you; if a Republican, they are merely a suggestion, not to be taken too seriously.