Step one in holding Bill Barr accountable; Trump claims executive privilege

The House Judiciary Committee voted Wednesday to recommend the House hold Attorney General William P. Barr in contempt of Congress for failing to turn over Robert S. Mueller III’s unredacted report, hours after President Trump asserted executive privilege to shield the full report and underlying evidence from public view.

  NYT

He doesn't want you to see the report that fully exonerates him.

The Justice Department decried it as an unnecessary and overwrought reaction designed to stoke a fight.

Refusing to cooperate with Congress might have been the initial blow in that fight.

Kerri Kupec, a spokeswoman for the Justice Department, responded, “The accommodation process between coequal branches of government is supposed to be a two-way street. Unfortunately, the only side who has made accommodations is the attorney general, who made extraordinary efforts to provide Congress and the public with information about the Special Counsel’s work.”

Yes, Kerri, we all - including Rober Mueller - saw how extraordinary his efforts were.

The executive privilege assertion was Mr. Trump’s first use of the secrecy powers as president. The Justice Department described it as “protective” to allow Mr. Trump time to fully review the materials to make a final privilege determination. But the [...] the White House press secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, indicated that no change of heart was coming.

[...]

“Neither the White House nor Attorney General Barr will comply with Chairman Nadler’s unlawful and reckless demands.”

She added that “faced with Chairman Nadler’s blatant abuse of power, and at the attorney general’s request, the president has no other option than to make a protective assertion of executive privilege.”

Another stalling tactic.

Mr. Trump’s invoking of privilege for the first time as president could tie up the material in court and significantly complicate Democrats’ efforts to call other witnesses. Mr. Nadler said Wednesday it could delay a potential hearing with Mr. Mueller himself in the Judiciary Committee.

And it could also limit testimony by Donald F. McGahn II, a former White House counsel and key witness in the special counsel’s investigation, scheduled under subpoena for May 21.

[...]

Complying with the subpoena, Mr. Boyd wrote, would require the department to violate “the law, court rules, and court orders” as well as grand jury secrecy rules. Republicans in the Judiciary Committee hearing room returned to that point again and again as they accused Democrats of putting Mr. Barr in an untenable situation of choosing between their subpoena and the law.

Democrats said they did not expect Mr. Barr to break the law and unilaterally release grand jury secrets. Rather, they said they had repeatedly asked him to join the committee in petitioning a judge to unseal material for the grand jury for committee use. He refused.

[...]

If the full House follows the committee’s recommendation, it would be only the second time in American history that the nation’s top law enforcement official is found to be in contempt of Congress.

[...]

House Republicans did it for the first time in 2012, when they held Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. in contempt in connection with requests for information about the botched “Fast and Furious” gun trafficking investigation. Republicans frequently cited that case on Wednesday in an effort to paint Democrats as unreasonable and impatient. They had waited hundreds of days before escalating their fight over documents to a contempt citation, they said. Democrats waited just a few weeks in the case of Mr. Barr.

[...]

The example is a potentially cautionary one for both sides. Despite President Barack Obama’s assertion of executive privilege over the material in questions, House lawmakers ultimately prevailed in court, forcing the administration to hand over the evidence. But the process took years to play out and could have taken longer if the Obama administration had appealed a court’s decision.

[...]

While defying a congressional subpoena is technically a misdemeanor crime, it is up to the Justice Department to decide whether or not to prosecute.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE:



The latter, I'm sure.