Commentary: I won't work in Attorney General William Barr's Justice Department any longer
https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/opinion/commentary/story/2020-10-14/william-barr-department-of-justice-dojBy PHILLIP HALPERN
OCT. 14, 20205:46 PM
After 36 years, I’m fleeing what was the U.S. Department of Justice — where I proudly served 19 different attorneys general and six different presidents. For the last three-plus decades, I have respected our leadership regardless of whether we were led by a Republican or a Democrat. I always believed the department’s past leaders were dedicated to the rule of law and the guiding principle that justice is blind. That is a bygone era, but it should not be forgotten.
Maybe I should’ve seen this coming, but like many of my colleagues, I fervently hoped that Attorney General William Barr’s preemptive misrepresentation of special counsel Robert Mueller’s report was an honest mistake or a solitary misstep — rather than a deliberate attempt to conceal potential presidential misconduct. After all, Barr has never actually investigated, charged or tried a case. He’s a well-trained bureaucrat but has no actual experience as a prosecutor.
Unfortunately, over the last year, Barr’s resentment toward rule-of-law prosecutors became increasingly difficult to ignore, as did his slavish obedience to Donald Trump’s will in his selective meddling with the criminal justice system in the Paul Manafort, Michael Flynn and Roger Stone cases. In each of these cases, Barr overruled career prosecutors in order to assist the president’s associates and/or friends, who potentially harbor incriminating information. This career bureaucrat seems determined to turn our democracy into an autocracy.
There is no other honest explanation for Barr’s parroting of the president’s wild and unsupported conspiracy theories regarding mail-in ballots (which have been contradicted by the president’s handpicked FBI director) and his support for the president’s sacking of the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, whose office used the thinnest of veils to postpone charging the president in a criminal investigation along with Michael Cohen (who pled guilty and directly implicated the president). It took federal Judge Alvin Hellerstein to stop Barr’s unprecedented “retaliatory” demands to silence the president’s former lawyer as a condition for staying out of jail.
= new reply since forum marked as read
I hope it's near the top of his very long list.
Bill Barr belongs in prison, but I doubt they'll prosecute him. They'll just get rid of him as soon as possible. That's how these Repukes just keep getting bolder - nobody ever faces the consequences of their illegal actions.
whether that requires prosecutions of former actors in Justice -- I think is a rather more problematic. If clear violations of law can be established for Barr (and others) that's one thing. But -- rank political partisanship (while clearly having no place in the department) belongs in a different category. My most important priority in 2021 is reassuring the people that work (by and large with integrity) at DOJ -- that they no longer work and reside in a banana republic. Whether prosecutions would serve that goal is the larger question.
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(for the record: I am not trying to predict what Joe Biden will do in advance. I really have no idea. But I do think that his character and political instincts might be a good thing for the country at this particular point in our history. IMO he was absolutely the right choice for 2021 -- and I'm more than willing to push back against elements that think he needs "backbone" and a push get him moving in the right -- i.e., 'their' -- direction.)
shady doings, what happened with the Mueller Report NEEDS to be investigated.
WE NEED full disclosure - then action following the complete report and its findings.
LOCK THEM UP!
LOCK THEM UP!
LOCK THEM UP!
LOCK THEM UP!
LOCK THEM UP!
LOCK THEM UP!
LOCK THEM UP!
LOCK THEM UP!
