Blog No. 216. What On Earth was Bill Barr Thinking Of?

Attorney General William Barr testified before the Senate Appropriations Committee in the Dirksen Senate Office Building on April 10 in Washington. Mark Wilson/Getty Images

Attorney General William Barr made headlines with his explosive testimony last week that there had been “spying” on the Trump campaign by the government. For many who had given Barr the “benefit of the doubt” when he was appointed, he had now thrown away that benefit—and received nothing in return. As one observer, Harry Litman, put it succinctly in the Washington Post, it was “a self-inflicted wound.” Indeed it was. And wounded only  Barr and the Justice Department, but  Trump himself, though the latter would doubtless be the last to recognize that fact.

Barr’s allegation of spying on the Trump campaign came only hours after Trump had carried on in typical fashion:

This was an attempted coup. This was an attempted take-down of a president. And we beat them. We beat them. So the Mueller report, when they talk about obstruction we fight back. And do you know why we fight back? Because I knew how illegal this whole thing was. It was a scam. What I’m most interested in is getting started, hopefully the attorney general, he mentioned it yesterday. He’s doing a great job, getting started on going back to the origins of exactly where this all started. Because this was an illegal witch hunt, and everybody knew it. And they knew it too. And they got caught. And what they did was treason.”

In giving apparent support to Trump’s rant, Barr sacrificed whatever measure of credibility he had enjoyed as a respected professional, an “institutionalist” seen devoted to the values and traditions of the Justice Department. An April 11 letter from Democratic leaders to Barr focused mainly on the issue of anticipated redactions but made the point:

Finally, we would be remiss not to express profound concern about your comments before the Senate Appropriations Committee regarding your apparent review of the investigation into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election. Your testimony raises questions about your independence, appears to perpetuate a partisan narrative designed to undermine the work of the Special Counsel, and serves to legitimize President Trump’s dangerous attacks on the Department of Justice and the FBI.

Barr’s assertion wounded the Justice Department as it besmirched the reputations of high officials in the Department and the FBI without a scintilla of evidence—or at least any that Barr was willing to cite or disclose. To be sure, Barr did attempt to hedge his allegation by acknowledging that he was not suggesting that the so-called spying was illegal because it lacked an “adequate predicate.” But, as an experienced Washington hand, he must have known that the charged term of spying would get everyone’s attention while his hedge was left in the dust. And that is precisely what happened. Indeed, Aaron Blake and Phillip Bump reported in separate columns in the Washington Post that Trump had not only seized on Barr’s testimony as confirmation of his own conspiracy theory but has put it to work as a fundraiser. Two separate appeals conspicuously but predictably distorted Barr’s testimony by not only ignoring his qualification but misquoting what he did say. A text message on Friday claimed that “AG Barr believes the Obama Admin illegally spied on Pres Trump.” Then in a fundraising email over the weekend, the campaign wrote, “Just this week, Attorney General William Barr said what the President has thought all along, he believes ‘unlawful spying did occur’ against Donald J. Trump’s presidential campaign …”

Ironically, Barr’s ill-conceived testimony was also a wound to Trump because the latter has a desperate need for the support of an Attorney General with an unimpaired reputation for integrity and independence. That need has been painfully evident in the way Trump has clung to Barr’s four-page summary of (or prelude to) the Mueller report: Barr’s letter has been the linchpin of Trump’s claim to have been “exonerated” by the report. And Trump’s need will become even more acute when the redacted Mueller report is released on tomorrow and Democrats in Congress begin to battle in earnest over its omissions.

That is not to say that Barr is without his supporters and even cheerleaders. Notable among them are Kimberly Strassel and Holman Jenkins in the Wall Street Journal with the rest of the Editorial Board of that publication not far behind. Ms. Strassel, Mr. Jenkins and the WSJ have long been in the Devin Nunes claque clamoring for an investigation of the FBI. Now, in an April 11 column, “Barr Brings Accountability,” Ms. Strassel exulted that:

No doubt a lot of former Obama administration and Hillary Clinton campaign officials, opposition guns for hire, and media members are stunned and scared that the Justice Department finally has a leader willing to address the FBI’s behavior in 2016.

Strassel conveniently ignored the fact, acknowledged by Barr, that the origins and the conduct of the FBI investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election, and possible involvement of the Trump campaign, have already been under investigation by the Inspector General of the Department of Justice. Moreover, Attorney General Jeff Sessions had commissioned a separate investigation on the same subject by the United States Attorney for Utah, John Huber, that is ongoing.

What Barr could and should have said and done was merely to advise that investigations were in progress and that he would review their findings and take any further action that he deemed necessary. Instead, however, he apparently felt compelled to confirm his intention to appoint a new “team” to consider the matter, an action smacking of investigating the investigators investigating the investigators. A French farce could hardly do better. If Barr’s intended action and his reckless allegation had any purpose, beyond attempting to dignify Trump’s unhinged narrative, it is not obvious to the naked eye.

Strassel echoed Barr by asserting that “the FBI had spied on the Trump team.” But just what was that spying? Barr had offered no evidence at all and Strassel cited only the stale complaint by Nunes et al. that the FISA warrant for surveillance on Carter Page, a low-level former associate of the Trump campaign was somehow tainted by the fact that it relied in part on information from the controversial Steele Dossier. This canard was exploded by Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee as well as by numerous outside observers including, for example, national security expert David Kris in a July 21, 2018 essay in Lawfare. Moreover, even if the warrant had been deficient, there is no evidence that the surveillance of Page had any effect on the considerable accomplishments of the Mueller probe (indictments or guilty pleas from 34 people including 26 Russian nationals, three Russian companies, Trump’s Campaign Chair, Deputy campaign Chair, National Security Adviser and personal lawyer). Finally, because the surveillance of Page began only after he had left the Trump campaign, it cannot credibly be described as surveillance of (or “spying” on) the campaign.

Did Barr have anything in mind other than the surveillance of Carter Page? In one comment, little noted by the media, he observed darkly “I’m not talking about the FBI necessarily, but intelligence agencies more broadly.” Really? What does that mean? Perhaps we will know in due course, and perhaps we will not. In any case, the damage from Barr’s unsupported allegation of spying on the Trump campaign is likely to remain.

Finally, Strassel also echoed Barr’s question as to why the FBI had not told the Trump campaign of its concerns about the Russian contacts of Carter Page and another campaign aide, George Papadopoulos. Comey will perhaps respond to that question at some point, but it does not seem terribly surprising. Given the effusive praise that Trump repeatedly showered on Vladimir Putin and Trump’s endorsement of Wikileaks publication of hacked Democratic emails, it might not have seemed a prudent step. (After all, in Rudy Giuliani’s law enforcement days, he would probably not have called John Gotti to warn him that some of Gotti’s fellow members of the Ravenite Social Club appeared to be engaging in illegal activity.) In any case, it is no basis whatever for discrediting the appointment of Robert Mueller many months later or the investigation Mueller conducted.

The redacted Mueller report will be released tomorrow and Barr will begin the unenviable task of defending his handling of the report. It should be interesting.