Barr’s Testimony, In Context
In testifying about the special counsel’s report on the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential campaign, Attorney General William Barr made statements that lacked context or didn’t tell the whole story:
- Barr said there was a “very plausible alternative explanation” to White House counsel Don McGahn’s claim that the president asked him to have Robert Mueller removed as special counsel. But Mueller’s report makes clear that his office believed McGahn’s version, and laid out several reasons for its conclusion.
- Barr said special counsel Mueller “never pushed” to have investigators interview President Donald Trump, even after finding the president’s written responses were inadequate. Mueller did not attempt to subpoena Trump, but he made multiple attempts to obtain a sit-down interview, including once in a letter after Trump submitted his written responses.
On May 1, Barr took questions for nearly four hours from the Senate Judiciary Committee about the Mueller report. The redacted report, which was released April 18, found that the “Russian government interfered in the 2016 presidential election in sweeping and systematic fashion.” It did so through “a social media campaign that favored presidential candidate Donald J. Trump and disparaged presidential candidate Hillary Clinton,” and “computer-intrusion operations” against Clinton and Democratic committees that were designed to “undermine the Clinton Campaign.”
Nonetheless, the committee spent
