AG Bill Barr Defends Rollout of Mueller’s Report – TheNigerialawyer

* The comments came during Barr’s first appearance since the
release of a redacted version of Mueller’s report.

U.S. Attorney General William Barr on Wednesday defended his
rollout of Robert Mueller III’s findings and tamped down claims
that Mueller believed Barr’s initial four-page memo outlining the
principal conclusions of the special counsel’s findings was
misleading.

Barr said he spoke with Mueller by phone in late March, and that
Mueller made “very clear” in that call he was not suggesting the
Justice Department misled the public. Instead, Barr said, Mueller
believed public reporting of the memo was inaccurate and wanted
more information to be released related to Mueller’s explanation
for why he didn’t reach a conclusion on obstruction.

Barr’s testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee on
Wednesday came moments after the public release of a March 27
letter Mueller sent to Barr complaining the attorney general’s
initial four-page statement on the special counsel’s findings “did
not fully capture the context, nature, and substance of this
office’s work and conclusions.”

“There is now public confusion about critical aspects of the
results of our investigation,” Mueller wrote. “This threatens to
undermine a central purpose for which the Department appointed the
Special Counsel: to assure full public confidence in the outcome of
the investigations.”

Barr said he told Mueller during the call that he was not
interested in putting out summaries about the report. Barr has come
under fire for the release of the memo and recalled telling Mueller
that he “wasn’t going to put out the report piecemeal.”

“I wanted to get the whole report out,” Barr said, believing the
release of summaries could set off “a series of different debates
and public discord over each tranche of information that went out,
and I wanted to get everything out at once and we should start
working on that.”

Nonetheless, Barr said he released the initial four-page memo to
Congress on March 24 because “the body politic was in a high state
of agitation.”

Barr reiterated that he offered Mueller an opportunity to review
his four-page memo, but the special counsel declined.

Mueller’s March letter makes clear the special counsel at least
twice urged the Justice Department to release his own executive
summaries of his findings. He again encouraged Barr to release
certain materials in late March, writing “release at this time
would alleviate the misunderstandings that have arisen and would
answer congressional and public questions about the nature and
outcome of our investigation.”

Barr also told lawmakers Wednesday that he was initially
surprised when he learned Mueller would not reach a conclusion on
whether to recommend obstruction charges against Trump. He said
Mueller stated three times during a March meeting “that he
emphatically was not saying that but for the (Office of Legal
Counsel) opinion he would have found obstruction.”

Mueller told him that “in the future, the facts of a case
against a president might be such that a special counsel would
recommend abandoning the OLC opinion, but this is not such a case,”
Barr said.

Barr has come under fire for his four-page memo and over how he
characterized Mueller’s views after the letter’s release. On
Wednesday, some Democratic lawmakers called on Barr to resign over
an earlier statement he gave to Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Maryland.
Van Hollen asked Barr in an April 10 hearing, “Did Bob Mueller
support your conclusion?”

Barr replied: “I don’t know whether Bob Mueller supported my
conclusion.”

Culled from law.com

Subscribe ToNairalaw News!

Kidnapping: IGP Adamu Redeploys Kaduna Police, Five
others

Charges CPs Nationwide to Re-dominate and Re-claim Public Space
from Criminals

As part of efforts aimed at rejigging the fight against armed
banditry, kidnapping and other sundry crimes across the nation,
particularly in Kaduna and other contiguous States, the Inspector
General of Police, M.A. Adamu, NPM, mni has ordered the immediate
redeployment of the Commissioner of Police Kaduna Command, CP Ahmed
Abdulrahaman from the State to the Force Intelligence Bureau, Force
Headquarters, Abuja.

CP Aji Ali Janga, who until now was the Commissioner of Police
in charge of Bauchi State, takes over as the new helmsman in Kaduna
Command.

Other Commissioners of Police affected by the recent
redeployment exercise include: CP Habu Sani Ahmadu, former CP
Intelligence, who is now posted to Bauchi Command. CP Omololu
Shamsudeen Bishi is redeployed from Benue State Police Command to
the Central Criminal Registry (CCR), Alagbon Lagos.

While CP Mukadas Mohammed Garba moves from the Office of the
National Security Adviser to Benue State Command as the new
Commissioner of Police in charge of the State, the erstwhile CP in
charge of CCR Alagbon, Lagos has now been moved to Force
Headquarters, Abuja as the CP in charge of Armament.

Meanwhile, the IGP has charged the newly posted/redeployed
Commissioners of Police and other strategic commanders nationwide
to take urgent steps towards initiating and implementing concrete
crime prevention strategies aimed at re-dominating and reclaiming
the public space under their watch from the activities of monstrous
criminal elements in society.

The postings take immediate effect.

DCP FRANK MBA
FORCE PUBLIC RELATIONS OFFICER
FORCE HEADQUARTERS
ABUJA