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Bill Barr Twisted My Words in Dropping the Flynn Case. Here's the Truth.
The F.B.I.s interview of Mr. Flynn was constitutional, lawful and for a legitimate counterintelligence purpose.At the direction of Attorney General Bill Barr, the Justice Department last week moved to dismiss a false-statements charge against Michael Flynn, President Trumps former national security adviser. The reason stated was that the continued prosecution would not serve the interests of justice.
The motion was signed by Timothy Shea, a longtime trusted adviser of Mr. Barr and, since January, the acting U.S. attorney in Washington. In attempting to support its argument, the motion cites more than 25 times the F.B.I.s report of an interview with me in July 2017, two months after I left a decades-long career at the department (under administrations of both parties) that culminated in my role as the acting assistant attorney general for national security.
That report, commonly referred to as a 302, is an interesting read. It vividly describes disagreements between leadership of the Justice Department and the F.B.I. about how to handle the information we had learned about Mr. Flynns calls with the Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak and, more specifically, Mr. Flynns apparent lies about those calls to incoming Vice President Mike Pence.
But the report of my interview is no support for Mr. Barrs dismissal of the Flynn case. It does not suggest that the F.B.I. had no counterintelligence reason for investigating Mr. Flynn. It does not suggest that the F.B.I.s interview of Mr. Flynn which led to the false-statements charge was unlawful or unjustified. It does not support that Mr. Flynns false statements were not material. And it does not support the Justice Departments assertion that the continued prosecution of the case against Mr. Flynn, who pleaded guilty to knowingly making material false statements to the FBI, would not serve the interests of justice.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/10/opinion/bill-barr-michael-flynn.html
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Bill Barr Twisted My Words in Dropping the Flynn Case. Here's the Truth. (Original Post)
Zorro
May 2020
OP
Iliyah
(25,111 posts)1. Like he did with the Mueller report . . .
jxla
(201 posts)2. OpEd was written by Mary B. McCord
Ms. McCord was an acting assistant attorney general for national security at the Justice Department from 2016 to 2017.