Tuesday, April 4, 2023

Did Bill Barr obstruct justice on behalf of Trump?


Bragg's predecessor, Cyrus Vance Jr., investigated Trump's role in the hush-money payments but didn't file state charges before leaving office at the end of 2021.

Some analysts and Trump supporters have argued that Vance declining to prosecute Trump on this count means Bragg's revived case must be weak or politically motivated. Vance said Sunday that he simply ran out of time, thanks to delays tied to the COVID-19 pandemic, Trump's long but unsuccessful fight to stop Vance from obtaining his tax records — and a request by federal prosecutors in Manhattan.

"I was asked by the U.S. attorney's office in the Southern District to stand down on our investigation," Vance told Chuck Todd on NBC's Meet the Press, "and as someone who respects that office a great deal and believing that they might perhaps have the best laws to investigate, I did so."

[...]

Renato Mariotti, a legal analyst and former federal prosecutor, wondered about the federal request to halt Vance's hush-money investigation. "Did then–Attorney General Barr play any role in that request?" he asked. "Did Trump?"

  Yahoo
This goes a long way to explaining Bragg's backing off the case and then coming back with it.  He didn't really back off.  He just took up where Vance left off after Barr was no longer in office.  I take back all the nasty things I said about Bragg.

I'm also counting Barr's lies about Robert Mueller's report as obstruction of justice, although, unlike the above, that probably wouldn't reach the technical definition of obstruction of justice.  More broadly though, Barr's entire stint as AG during Trump's term was obstruction of justice.

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

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