This is why Barr has to (in my opinion) release Mueller’s report at least to Congress. If the DOJ is against indicting a sitting president, the only other remedy is impeachment, and the only way for Congress to have enough information to impeach Trump is to have Mueller’s report.
Barr can’t both refuse to indict a sitting president and not provide Congress with the information it needs to perform its Constitutionally mandated duties.
So, I was following the whole report situation about as well as someone with a new game to play can and I keep seeing that the only people who’ve seen the real report are the people that wrote it and like high level people in the trump admin.
Given these facts it just sorta occurred to me: Why not just edit or rewrite the report and then release it to the public or to congress?
Who would know? Mueller’s team? They run a tight ship and seem like they’re very much a stay in your lane kinda show. I don’t think they’d say anything. Everyone in trumps inner circle kinda demonstrates that they are willing to lie for him.
I kinda put it out of my mind until today where I saw a headline basically saying just that. I don’t have a great source but: Barr’s apparently gonna allow Trump to edit the report before it’s release
This just seems logical to me tbh. In fact, he probably could have edited it and not told anyone and had an even better result.
I’m not particularly worried about this scenario.
If someone were to edit the report, we would find out about it. Presumably when Robert Mueller testifies before Congress, someone will ask him if the report has been edited (if it’s been released before he testifies), and he will say yes. If the report is released after he testifies, they can always just ask him the question again.
Regardless of whether the report is edited or not, the Democrats (in the House and Senate) are going to do everything in their power to get an unedited version of it.
Also, not for nothing, but Politicususa isn’t the greatest news source out there:
“They may utilize strong loaded words (wording that attempts to influence an audience by using appeal to emotion or stereotypes), publish misleading reports and omit reporting of information that may damage liberal causes. Some sources in this category may be untrustworthy.”
I know. The reason I said anything is because I had this thought long before they said anything. The headline was just someone other than me having the thought.
I’ve seen read “300 pages” in one place but also “more than 500 and less than 1000” as well as “700 pages” in various places.
I’ve also seen two different responses to the 300 pages news. One is “ONLY 300 pages? What has Müller been doing?” and the other is “300 pages is soooo much dirt!!!”
If it’s 700 pages, that seems like an awful lot for anyone to read through in three days and write up a report. This guy Barr didn’t help anyone rushing to a conclusion. It just looks fishy. But then if he had said “Give me two weeks, as thing this is big” coming to the “no collusion” conclusion would have seemed less plausible again.
Papers like that tend to have summary paragraphs in the beginning, so I mean really, Barr just has to read the initial executive summary and then start looking at the background info after.
Additionally, it’s been reported that Mueller told Barr and other DOJ officials his conclusions over three weeks ago.
Additionally x 2, even without reading Mueller’s Report, if you go back and read Barr’s unsolicited memo to the DOJ from last June, he basically argued that it was impossible for Trump to have committed obstruction of justice.
“In his memo, Barr added that Trump asking then-FBI Director James Comey to let go of the investigation into former national security adviser Michael Flynn and later firing Comey was within his powers as head of the executive branch.”
By the way, Barr released a second letter to Congress about the Mueller report:
“I am aware of some media reports and other public statements mischaracterizing my March 24, 2019, supplemental notification as a ‘summary’ of the Special Counsel’s investigation and report,” Barr wrote. He added, “My March 24 letter was not, and did not purport to be, an exhaustive recounting of the Special Counsel’s investigation or report. As my letter made clear, my notification to Congress and the public provided, pending release of the report, a summary of its ‘principal conclusions’ – that is, its bottom line…. I do not believe it would be in the public’s interest for me to attempt to summarize the full report or to release it in serial or piecemeal fashion.”
In legal parlance, we call this second letter a “I’m Covering My Own Ass Letter Because Someone In the Justice Department Raised a Ruckus About My First Letter and I Don’t Want My Entire Reputation To Be Shat Upon When the Full Mueller Report Actually Comes Out.”
Lawyers have for years been trying to come up with a better name for this type of letter because the acronym is incredibly unwieldy.
It’s also oddly narrow. I mean, how many Mueller reports can there be, lifetime?
I’m confused, and maybe need someone with a legal mind to decipher this. So, he’s saying “my letter wasn’t intended to be a summary, just a recounting of the most important points.”
That’s literally what a summary is, though, so like, what is he saying?
Or is this really an “oh shit I goofed” moment and he’s trying to use more words to make it sound like he didn’t goof?
No one knows for sure, but the best guess is that, yeah, it’s a “Oh shit I goofed” letter, or at least "I was blatantly political and biased in favor of the president, and I know that a bunch of stuff is going to come out that’s going to make me look bad and my 4 page summary ridiculous.
Remember, Barr was biased against Mueller’s report even before he started his job as Attorney General. He literally auditioned for the role by writing an unsolicited memo to the DOJ saying that presidents aren’t capable of obstructing justice. His first letter, which is totally a “summary,” represents this long-standing view.
His second letter definitely seems like he’s walking back his first letter without actually walking it back. We have no idea what’s happening inside the DOJ, but like I wrote in my joke above, the most likely scenario is that some people in the DOJ read Mueller’s report and saw some stuff that disturbed and possibly even scared them, and sent a flag up the chain of command. In order to placate DOJ and to cover his own ass, he wrote the second letter.
Glenn Greenwald: Well, if the Muller Report didn’t Totally exonerate Trump and Russia like the Barr memo says, then one of the Muller team would leak about it, because they wouldn’t spend two years on that just to have some shitbag cover it up if they’re as upstanding as you’ve claimed they are!
Muller Team: Leaks information that Barr is strongly downplaying the contents of the report and covering for Trump
Glenn Greenwald: No not like that
Glen Greenwald appeared on Tucker Carlson. Whatever legitimacy he had with the Wikileaks stuff initially is now gone. Guy is a joke.
More than that, he’s a regular. He’s been on Tucker Carlson a bunch of times, and has more than once defended both his appearances, and Carlson.
I can’t figure out if Glenn’s just a moron, or someone who got Too Famous Too Fast.
I guess the theory is true that the fringe Left and the fringe Right meet up somewhere on the political spectrum in Crazy Town.