Bill Barr's Departure Reveals the Hollowness of Trumpism
In most ways, it would be hard to find two men much more different
than Jeff Sessions and Bill Barr: One is a slow-drawling
anti-immigration fanatic from Alabama; the other a dry, intellectually
engaged bagpiper from New York. One spent his career on the fringes of
conservatism before a sudden late-career elevation to the Cabinet; the
other is a consummate establishment figure who led the Justice
Department twice, three decades apart.
But both men ended up serving as attorney general to President Donald
Trump. They were perhaps the two most effective implementers of
Trump’s agenda, driven by their own ideological sympathies with the
president. And yet, both departed their jobs abruptly after clashing
with him.
Trump announced via tweet tonight that Barr would be stepping down
effective December 23. The details of Barr’s exit remain hazy. The
president then tweeted a warm resignation letter from Barr,
light-years from the terse missive that Defense Secretary James Mattis
sent two Decembers ago when he resigned (only for Trump to insist
he’d been fired). The president also praised Barr: “Our
relationship has been a very good one, he has done an outstanding
job!”
This is far from what Trump has been saying about the attorney general
recently, and the timing of the departure is strange, given that the
administration will end (despite what Trump says) in barely more than
a month.
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