Attorney General William Barr resigns after clashes with Trump, still defends president
Attorney General William Barr, who served as President Donald Trump's most effective shield and advocate for broad presidential authority, will resign next week as the administration draws to a disputed close.
Trump announced the news of Barr's departure Monday evening on Twitter.
Trump lauded Barr as "a man of unbelievable credibility and courage" months ago but turned on him after the attorney general declared there was no widespread evidence of voter fraud in the presidential election and resisted Trump's public pressure to prosecute President-elect Joe Biden and other former Obama administration officials on unsubstantiated claims of corruption and the surveillance of the 2016 presidential race.
Over the weekend, Trump rebuked Barr for not revealing a recently disclosed inquiry into Hunter Biden's taxes during the presidential campaign when Trump sought to tie Joe Biden to his son's financial dealings.
Monday, there were no ugly words from Trump who said the decision on Barr's departure came after a "pleasant meeting" at the White House.
In his resignation letter, Barr thanked Trump and offered a forceful defense of his boss.
Barr praised Trump's accomplishments "in the face of relentless, implacable resistance" and singled out the Russia investigation as a partisan attack on his presidency.
"The nadir of this campaign was the effort to cripple, if not oust, your administration with frenzied and baseless accusations of collusions with Russia," Barr wrote. "Few could have weathered these attacks, much less forge ahead with a positive program for the country. You built the strongest and most resilient economy in American history – one that has brought unprecedented progress to those previously left out."
Barr is set to leave Dec. 23. Deputy Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen will be acting attorney general, Trump said.
Trump tweeted the announcement minutes after California announced it awarded its electoral votes to Biden, giving him a majority in the Electoral College that made him president-elect.
?Trump and Barr met at the White House on Monday where they reached "an amicable understanding" of how things should proceed, a senior administration official said. Barr "was not asked to resign," the official said.
Senate Judiciary Chairman Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., a vocal defender of Barr and Trump, said he was “surprised” at the timing of the attorney general’s departure.
“I thought he did a credibly good job trying to repair damage to the Department of Justice, trying to be fair, faithful to the law,” Graham said. “Think he’s got a lot to be proud of.”
Despite Trump’s expressions of displeasure, Graham said, Barr “fought for the president where he could, as every attorney general should. ... But he also didn’t cross the lines that he shouldn’t have crossed."
Graham expressed confidence in Barr's successor.
"Rosen's a good guy," Graham said.
Before Rosen's appointment at Justice, he had no experience as a federal prosecutor.
The president raised the prospect of Barr's departure openly after the attorney general broke with Trump in saying there was no widespread fraud in the election.
“To date, we have not seen fraud on a scale that could have affected a different outcome in the election,” Barr told The Associated Press on Dec. 1 as Trump pursued legal challenges to an election he has yet to concede.
The comments quickly prompted pushback from Trump's attorneys, Rudy Giuliani and Jenna Ellis, who said Barr's "opinion" was not based on "knowledge or investigation of the substantial irregularities and evidence of systemic fraud."
Although Trump and his allies have publicly made sweeping claims of widespread fraud, the campaign did not make such unfounded allegations in courtrooms as it sought to challenge election results.
Barr had few rivals in the president's inner circle where he repeatedly rose to defend the president and his political allies while drawing criticism from Democrats and scores of Justice Department alums who cast the attorney general as the president's personal lawyer.
Barr intervened this year in criminal cases involving two former Trump aides – political adviser Roger Stone and national security adviser Michael Flynn – prompting his own prosecutors to withdraw from the cases in protest. Barr recommended a lighter punishment for Stone whose sentence was commuted by Trump. The president pardoned Flynn, who pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about his contacts with a Russian ambassador.
More: DOJ drops case against former Trump adviser Michael Flynn in boldest step to undermine Mueller probe
Whatever goodwill Barr's efforts earned, it was clearly not enough, as Trump dumped his second attorney general like so many other former close aides.
Barr began his second stint as the nation's chief law enforcement officer, having served in President George H.W. Bush's administration, on Valentines Day 2019 after the equally tumultuous term of Jeff Sessions. Sessions, a former Alabama lawmaker, was the first senator to endorse Trump in the 2016 campaign, but he permanently fell from favor after he recused himself from the Russia investigation, which led to the appointment of special counsel Robert Mueller.
The nomination of Barr, whose ties to Justice predate Trump's political fortunes, buoyed a Justice Department under constant siege by the president who had fired FBI Director James Comey and lashed out almost daily at Sessions.
Weeks into his tenure, Barr startled some lawmakers when he suggested federal investigators had spied on Trump's 2016 campaign, and he announced the appointment of a Connecticut federal prosecutor, John Durham, to review the origins of the Russia investigation. The results of that inquiry, long anticipated by Trump, have been delayed in part by issues related to the coronavirus pandemic.
Barr's handling of the Russia investigation – effectively clearing the president of wrongdoing despite damning findings that Trump repeatedly sought to thwart the inquiry – raised questions about the independence of the Justice Department.
Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, castigated Barr for his handling of the Mueller report and politicization of the Justice Department.
"In 37 days, President-Elect Joe Biden will be sworn into office. Whomever Joe Biden chooses as the new Attorney General will have a tremendous amount of work to do to repair the integrity of the Department of Justice," Nadler said in a statement.
'Riding a tiger': William Barr's politically charged tenure puts DOJ on ballot with Trump
Since the Russia probe, Barr has offered vocal defenses of the president, even as Trump faced impeachment proceedings in the House of Representatives.
The attorney general accused the president's political enemies of "harassment" and "sabotage" and took a lead role in supporting Trump's "law-and-order" agenda during the 2020 campaign.
Barr backed Trump's claims that mail-in balloting was vulnerable to massive fraud that threatened the integrity of the election, despite evidence that showed otherwise. Last month, during a speech at a college, Barr defended his intervention in criminal cases, claiming his own federal prosecutors "sometimes become headhunters" when pursuing high-profile targets.
Breaks in the Trump-Barr relationship began to show this fall when the president ramped up the pressure on his attorney general, openly calling on him to use the power of his office against Biden and others.
"Unless Bill Barr indicts these people for crimes, the greatest political crime in the history of our country," Trump told Fox Business News, accusing Biden and former President Barack Obama of election interference, "then we're going to get little satisfaction unless I win."
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, D-Calif., offered a pointed commentary on Barr's tenure after Trump's announcement.
"Lied to cover for Trump," Schiff tweeted, referring to Barr's favorable spin on Trump's role in the Russia investigation. "Launched political investigations. Subverted justice and the rule of law. ... Now, the work of restoring a credible and independent justice system must begin."
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Attorney General William Barr is leaving the Trump administration