William Barr Trump would not have nominated William Barr to be Attorney General without some assurance that Barr would protect him. Considering the angst Jefferson Session’s recusal from the Mueller investigation caused Trump, it is far-fetched to believe that someone did not assure Trump that the fix was in with Barr. Barr testified that he did not give Trump any commitments about the Mueller investigation. If Barr is to be believed, then who convinced Trump that Barr would be in his pocket?
Conceivably, someone in Trump’s orbit may have read some of Barr’s articles or other writings, and informed Trump that Barr’s legal philosophy pretty much guaranteed that Barr would protect Trump. Barr wrote a memo in which he argued that Trump, as President, could not be guilty of obstruction by firing the Director of the FBI. In other writings he argued that because the Constitution gives the President executive power, the only limitations to his power are those explicitly stated in the Constitution.
This legal philosophy that Barr and most conservatives subscribe to (like Justice Brett Kavanaugh), the unitary executive, makes it virtually impossible for there to be any limits on what the President can do. The truly frightening thing is not that Barr is in the bag for Trump. It is that the Republican Party, by its philosophical beliefs, hold that Trump is, in effect, above the law while President.
As a result, Barr’s integrity may be beyond reproach. Nonetheless, Trump can be sure that Barr will neither seek his indictment for a crime nor release any part of Mueller’s report alleging that a crime has been committed.
Conceivably, someone in Trump’s orbit may have read some of Barr’s articles or other writings, and informed Trump that Barr’s legal philosophy pretty much guaranteed that Barr would protect Trump. Barr wrote a memo in which he argued that Trump, as President, could not be guilty of obstruction by firing the Director of the FBI. In other writings he argued that because the Constitution gives the President executive power, the only limitations to his power are those explicitly stated in the Constitution.
This legal philosophy that Barr and most conservatives subscribe to (like Justice Brett Kavanaugh), the unitary executive, makes it virtually impossible for there to be any limits on what the President can do. The truly frightening thing is not that Barr is in the bag for Trump. It is that the Republican Party, by its philosophical beliefs, hold that Trump is, in effect, above the law while President.
As a result, Barr’s integrity may be beyond reproach. Nonetheless, Trump can be sure that Barr will neither seek his indictment for a crime nor release any part of Mueller’s report alleging that a crime has been committed.
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