Barr, Trump's own former attorney general, began by calling the Trump team’s request for a special master to review the documents seized by the FBI a “waste of time” and a “red herring.”
“What people are missing,” Barr said, is that almost all the documents, classified or privileged, belong to the government. The other documents, like news clippings, that were held in the same boxes as the classified material were “seizeable under the warrant because they show the conditions under which the classified documents were held.”
Also, the FBI has already gone through the documents, Barr noted.
Co-anchor John Roberts asked, “Is there any legitimate reason for those materials to be in the former president’s possession?”
That's the cue to put the ketchup bottles out of Trump’s reach.
BARR: Uh, no. I can’t think of a legitimate reason why [those documents] should have been, could be taken out of the government, away from the government if they’re classified.
I, frankly, am skeptical of this claim that “I declassified everything,” you know, because frankly, I think it’s highly improbable. And second, if, in fact, he sort of stood over scores of boxes, not really knowing what was in them and said, “I hereby declassify everything in here,” that would be such an abuse, that shows such recklessness that it’s almost worse than taking the documents.
Barr smiled a bit ruefully.
Co-anchor Sandra Smith asked if there was “more room” to obtain the material without “raiding” Trump’s home. “The FBI could have just asked” is another MAGA talking point. It was also another one Barr wasn’t buying.
Barr said he thought the answer depended on two questions: “the character of those top secret documents and secret documents, how sensitive were they” and “how raw is the evidence of deceit and obstruction.”
When asked what he thought the answer might be, Barr said, “I personally think for [the FBI] to have taken things to the current point, they probably have pretty good evidence.” But that’s speculation, he quickly noted.
Then he added:
BARR: Let me just say, I think the driver on this from the beginning was loads of classified information sitting in Mar-a-Lago. People say this was unprecedented, well it’s also unprecedented for a president to take all this classified information and put ‘em in a country club, OK?
And how long is the government gonna try to get that back? You know, they jawboned for a year. They were deceived on the voluntary actions taken. They then went and got a subpoena, they were deceived on that, they feel, and the facts are starting to show that they were being jerked around and so how long do they wait?
The one thing nobody mentioned are the serious concerns that Trump may have deliberately or inadvertently given the classified material to U.S. adversaries.
(Crossposted, with permission, from NewsHounds.us)
