Justice Dept. Is Said to Open Criminal Inquiry Into Its Own Russia Investigation
Source: NYT
The move is likely to open the attorney general to accusations that he is trying to deliver a political victory for President Trump.
By Katie Benner and Adam Goldman
Oct. 24, 2019, 7:54 p.m. ET
WASHINGTON For more than two years, President Trump has repeatedly attacked the Russia investigation, portraying it as a hoax and illegal even months after the special counsel closed it. Now, Mr. Trumps own Justice Department has opened a criminal investigation into how it all began.
Justice Department officials have shifted an administrative review of the Russia investigation closely overseen by Attorney General William P. Barr to a criminal inquiry, according to two people familiar with the matter. The move gives the prosecutor running it, John H. Durham, the power to subpoena for witness testimony and documents, to impanel a grand jury and to file criminal charges.
The opening of a criminal investigation is likely to raise alarms that Mr. Trump is using the Justice Department to go after his perceived enemies. Mr. Trump fired James B. Comey, the F.B.I. director under whose watch agents opened the Russia inquiry, and has long assailed other top former law enforcement and intelligence officials as partisans who sought to block his election.
Mr. Trump has made clear that he sees the typically independent Justice Department as a tool to be wielded against his political enemies. That view factors into the impeachment investigation against him, as does his long obsession with the origins of the Russia inquiry. House Democrats are examining in part whether his pressure on Ukraine to open investigations into theories about the 2016 election constituted an abuse of power.
The move also creates an unusual situation in which the Justice Department is conducting a criminal investigation into itself.
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Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/24/us/politics/john-durham-criminal-investigation.html
Iliyah
(25,111 posts)Plus the Muller report is still valid.
oasis
(49,381 posts)Republican Sen. Burr should be investigated too.
Progressive Jones
(6,011 posts)TreasonousBastard
(43,049 posts)OliverQ
(3,363 posts)This is Bill Barr using the DoJ to enact revenge on people who investigated Trump for Russian collusion.
TreasonousBastard
(43,049 posts)stopbush
(24,396 posts)bucolic_frolic
(43,146 posts)they tried to do with the Zelensky Ukraine government.
THEY ARE MAKING IT UP AS THEY GO ALONG!
Bernardo de La Paz
(49,001 posts)Dennis Donovan
(18,770 posts)StevieM
(10,500 posts)riversedge
(70,204 posts)DENVERPOPS
(8,817 posts)If anyone thinks that the Republicans have come all this way to install a Fascist Tyranny and are going to give up easily, you are mistaken. It is an all out assault by the Republicans to successfully complete their COUP.
Barr investigating the intelligence community conspiracy against this administration is preposterous.
There used to be a saying:
If you can't dazzle them with brilliance, then baffle them with Bullshit. this appears to be this administrations all out Mantra at this point.
His written resume to Trump outlined his ability to completely blow away the Iran Contra Affair under Reagan/Bush..........
BlueIdaho
(13,582 posts)Any resemblance between the criminal Bill Barr and any functioning member of the Justice Department - living or dead - is purely coincidental.
riversedge
(70,204 posts)investigated whether Russia interfered in our election.
She listed most all the folks in gov who Trump has demeaned and pushed out of the gov.
iluvtennis
(19,852 posts)report is invalid.
salin
(48,955 posts)A very dangerous chapter has just been opened.
bucolic_frolic
(43,146 posts)if they successfully eviscerate the justice and intelligence community's right, duty, and ability to investigate foreign influence in elections, and criminality in investigations, they will effectively legitimize the manufacture of fake news internally and as a tool of political control, as well as decriminalize mobsters. No?
Evolve Dammit
(16,725 posts)Blaming everything for the "decline" in white America. And you don't get the nickname "Fixer" for nothin'. Dangerous times are here and evil is afoot. Barr needs to be called out for his globe-trotting to dig up whatever crap he can get a foreign government to endorse. Italy snubbed him. Hey MSM. Hello?? He's the GD AG. Maybe that's newsworthy?? Pounding head now.
rockfordfile
(8,702 posts)Evolve Dammit
(16,725 posts)All Bat shit crazy in my estimation. But "in case of rapture, can I have your car"?
SergeStorms
(19,200 posts)to taking total control of our government. The executive branch and the leadership of the judicial branch seem to be fully in the bag for the fascists. It's only a split legislative branch that's slowing down their seemingly inexorable march toward installing a reich-wing fascist government.
Excuse me while I start to pack a few things.
Bradical79
(4,490 posts)But if they aren't crushed into irrelevence in the near future, we're in deep trouble. There's no compromise to be had, no returning to "normal" as a lot of people want.
Retrograde
(10,136 posts)olddad65
(599 posts)sinkingfeeling
(51,454 posts)off the 'Deep State'.
VarryOn
(2,343 posts)The DOJ needs to be stopped. Nothing short of a Democratic president will stop this. Some good people are about to have their lives ruined!
greyl
(22,990 posts)This might be propaganda more than it is a formalized legal procedure.
bluestarone
(16,926 posts)tRUMP has to be stopped. The senate will get involved also.