Day 795: Why do Republicans suddenly want ‘exonerating’ Mueller report hidden?
The Robert Mueller report did not exonerate Donald Trump of crimes, according to Trump’s handpicked attorney general William Barr in his letter briefing Congressional leaders of Mueller’s findings.
Nevertheless, Trump, his children and the White House falsely announced that Mueller’s report — which, apparently, no one outside Barr and deputy attorney general Rod Rosenstein have read — is fully exonerating of anything and everything Trump has been accused of.
Despite the fact that there previously seemed to be bipartisan agreement that the Mueller report should be released in full — the House voted 420–0 to release it as is — Republicans now seem to be having second thoughts.
The GOP plan here seems to be to take a political appointee and lifetime Republican operative in Barr, and allow him to spin the narrative without the American people being able to see the entirety of the evidence and decide for themselves.
And he’s already doing that.
As we wrote on Day 794 yesterday, Barr and Rosenstein essentially took a task exclusively for Congress (per the DOJ’s own precedent) and are trying to usurp that power via narrative. Congress should get to decide if Trump obstructed justice, but the office of the attorney general is weighing in on an issue they shouldn’t be going near.
What’s curious about Barr and Rosenstein’s finding is that there is a DOJ memorandum indicating that a sitting president can’t be indicted, only impeached. While the matter is not settled law, the DOJ seems to be operating with the memo as an operating guideline. Yet Barr and Rosenstein are essentially making a finding of law that they shouldn’t even be weighing in on, per that DOJ memo. For example, if they found that Trump did commit obstruction, they still wouldn’t be able to indict per the memo.
Before the report was completed, Donald Trump said the report should be released in full. So too did Donald Trump Jr. So did a litany of Republicans, elected and not.
All of the sudden, Republicans are trying to obstruct the American people from seeing the report in full and want an alleged synopsis from a lifetime Republican to suffice.
795 days in, 667 to go
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