Posted on 05/02/2019 8:53:41 AM PDT by Red Badger
Key Points
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi says Attorney General William Barr “lied to Congress.”
She says misleading lawmakers would be a “crime” if anyone else did so.
A Justice Department spokeswoman calls Pelosi’s comments “reckless, irresponsible and false.”
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House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Thursday accused Attorney General William Barr of committing a crime by lying to Congress about special counsel Robert Mueller’s report and Mueller’s issues with how Barr has characterized its findings.
“What is deadly serious about it is the attorney general of the United States of America is not telling the truth to the Congress of the United States. That’s a crime,” the California Democrat told reporters.
Pressed again about the accusation, Pelosi said, “He lied to Congress. If anybody else did that, it would be considered a crime. Nobody is above the law.” Asked whether Barr should go to jail, the speaker responded that “there’s a process involved here.”
In a statement in response, Justice Department spokeswoman Kerri Kupec said “the baseless attack on the Attorney General is reckless, irresponsible and false.”
Pelosi’s comments appeared to reference answers Barr gave during House testimony last month when asked about reported frustrations Mueller’s team had with a summary the attorney general wrote about the special counsel’s report. The attorney general said he was not aware of concerns the Mueller team had about his summary. But it was revealed this week that Mueller wrote a letter to Barr expressing concerns about how the attorney general depicted the “substance” of the report — written before the attorney general testified.
Here is the exchange from an April 9 hearing that apparently sparked Pelosi’s accusation.
Rep. Charlie Crist, D-Fla.: Reports have emerged recently, general, that members of the Special Counsel’s team are frustrated at some level with the limited information included in your March 24th letter ... Do you know what they are referencing with that?
Barr: “No, I don’t. I think I think, I suspect that they probably wanted more put out, but in my view I was not interested in putting out summaries.”
The comment from the highest-ranking Democrat in the country intensifies the party’s criticism of the top U.S. law enforcement official. While Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer have accused Barr of protecting Trump and having a conflict of interest, neither lawmaker has previously gone as far as alleging a crime.
Pelosi has so far resisted calls to impeach the president, which have intensified following the release of Mueller’s redacted report.
Democrats have questioned why the Justice Department decided not to charge the president with obstructing justice by trying to influence Mueller’s investigation. While Mueller declined to say whether Trump obstructed justice, he also noted that the report did not “exonerate” Trump and set out a detailed case for Congress to potentially investigate the president for obstruction.
Pelosi’s remarks Thursday follow a House Judiciary Committee hearing that Barr decided not to attend. The panel’s chairman, Democratic Rep. Jerry Nadler of New York, threatened to hold the attorney general in contempt of Congress if he does not give access to Mueller’s full, unredacted report on the Russia probe.
Barr repeatedly defended Trump during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Wednesday. The president has contended Mueller’s investigation fully exonerates him on both questions of whether he obstructed justice and whether his campaign coordinated with Russian efforts to influence the 2016 election.
He repeatedly described the investigation as a “witch hunt” and has since falsely called the probe a “coup.”
— CNBC’s Kevin Breuninger and Dan Mangan contributed to this report
Purposefully mislead people for political purposes, should be considered fraud.
“Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.” John Adams
What did he say to make it a lie?
Do you happen to know?
I consider it a patriotic duty to lie to congress.
There’s a collective insanity sweeping through Washington, and it’s terribly unfunny. Scary as hell actually.
God protect President Trump, AG Barr, and the rest of the patriots in the administration.
It ought to be a law....................
Exactly
AMEN.
It appears those nuts are itching for maximum civil unrest.
Put them on some Valium or something to chill out.
Except that Barr’s comment was true. But so what?
There was no lie at all. She just made that up. Soon they will accuse him of armed robbery of a convenience store. Very stupid people of terribly low IQ will believe her like maxine waters and there is nothing you can do about it.
Wasn't this felonious dips#!t the Speaker when Eric "the Red" Holder was held in contempt of Congress and she did NOTHING!?
Exactly! The process of speeding up this exposure of the truth needs to be swift and complete. Hearing some say it could be June, then a year out for indictments will not work. This is war. A war for the truth.
please watch chuck grassley answer some clown reporter’s question here...this is a great response:
https://twitter.com/FaithandFootbal/status/1123702064520073217
That was excellent. Grassley makes his statement and immediately turns and walks away. Mic drop!
Ha ha ha ha! True!
Yes, but it is all part of the Kabuki Theater. Starr was cast in the role of Bad Guy. Starr was and is Swamp.
The UniParty picked him because they trusted him to restrict the trial to “just sex.”
Starr protected the Clintons in 1994 by blocking Miguel Rodriguez from investigating the death of Vince Foster as a homicide tied to the Clintins. Rodriguez resigned in disgust, outlining his reasons in his letter of resignation.
The UniParty knew they could trust Starr to put on a show for the so-called social conservatives while guaranteeing that Clintin would not be removed.
Henry Hyde similarly blocked David Schippers in 1998, the day after midterms, from investigating multiple deaths, including Foster’s, as homicides linked to the Clintons.
The District of Corruption is run by the UniParty. Most of the public animus between RINOpublicans and DemoKKKrats is for public consumption, to make us think we have a say in what they do.
Did they repeal Obamacare? Have they built the Wall? A plurality wanted both done by their elected (so-called) representatives.
Case closed.
What exactly was his lie Nancy Pelosi? Show us he lied to Congress. There is no lie that the public can see. You are the liar saying that he lied. Unfortunately, there is no punishment for making a false accusation by the Speaker of the House. There should be, and she would not be so fast to pull this nonsense.
After Japan lost 4 carriers in the battle of Midway, their rulers and media claimed they won the battle. That is what the Dems and media are doing, and unfortunately many cable news viewers will believe it, at least for now.
That has always been the definition of "lying" to leftists.
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