Attorney General William Barr said in an interview aired Friday the Justice Department did not agree with the legal analysis in special counsel Robert Mueller’s report.
“In other words, we didn’t agree with the legal analysis — a lot of the legal analysis in the report. It did not reflect the views of the Department. It was the views of a particular lawyer or lawyers, and so we applied what we thought was the right law,” he said in an interview with “CBS This Morning” that covered a wide range of topics.
“The bottom line was Bob Mueller identified some episodes. He did not reach a conclusion. He provided both sides of the issue, and his conclusion was he wasn’t exonerating the president, but he wasn’t finding a crime either,” he said.
Mr. Barr said in a Thursday segment Mr. Mueller could have made a determination on whether the president obstructed justice despite Justice Department policy stating a sitting president cannot be indicted.
“I personally felt he could’ve reached a decision,” Mr. Barr said on “CBS This Morning.” “The opinion says you cannot indict a president while he’s in office, but he could have reached a decision. But he had his reasons for not doing it, which he explained and I’m not going to, you know, argue about those reasons.”
When asked if Mr. Mueller should testify on his report, Mr. Barr said, “It’s up to Bob, but the line he’s drawing which is that he’s going to stick with what’s in the report is the proper line for any department official.”
Mr. Mueller, in a statement to reporters Wednesday at the DOJ headquarters in Washington, said department policy precludes charging or prosecuting a president for federal crimes, so he didn’t make a determination on whether crimes were committed.
But, Mr. Mueller added, “if we had had confidence that the president clearly did not commit a crime, we would have said so.”
• Bailey Vogt can be reached at bvogt@washingtontimes.com.
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