A headline at TPM’s Editor’s Blog asks, “A Barr Reappraisal?” and suggests an affirmative response from a reader, based on the recent report that the investigation of Hunter Biden, begun in 2018, was kept secret (from the press and the President). Reader JG suggests, since the investigation (if made public) “would have been weaponized in the campaign,” we must give Barr credit for keeping it under wraps. JG offers the view that Barr has used “DoJ as a shield for Trump, not a sword to go after political enemies.”
Josh Marshall is skeptical, “I need to see a lot more to convince me we’re getting the full or true story here. As it is the facts just run too counter to Barr’s tenure and that of the DOJ for the last four years. Something does not add up.”
I agree and suggest an alternative to JG’s view: Just because something could be “weaponized,” it doesn’t follow that it would be effective politically to weaponize it (as the Trump campaign certainly would have done). Bill Barr has reason to regard himself as a savvier operator than most of the sycophants surrounding Trump. It is hardly a stretch to believe that in his judgment revealing the indictment would have generated as many votes for Biden as for Trump. (Furthermore, Barr stayed out of the line of fire — from Democrats, the press, Trump, and Trump’s accolytes — by keeping the report quiet. There is little reason to think that any flak from a leak would have “effected a different outcome in the election,” to borrow a phrase.) And so Barr didn’t leak the report before the election.
Whether this pragmatic judgment is right or wrong, it’s defensible; and furthermore, given the evidence of the past year and a half, it’s a more plausible account of Barr’s motivation than the idea that he kept the indictment secret because ethical or professional or reputational constraints held him back.
It is far more likely that he saw no point in releasing the information, no clear advantage to the Trump campaign. It’s laughable, after all we’ve seen since Barr came on board, to think that leaking an investigation of Joe Biden’s son was a bridge too far for the A.G.
Last week, Bill Barr said, “To date, we have not seen fraud on a scale that could have effected a different outcome in the election,” separating himself from Trump. While this is striking, in the sense that Barr has acted, at times, like another Trump sycophant. He is not and never was simply a Trump flunky.
Instead, he has been a devoted partisan of the Republican Party. That partisanship led to his defenses of the Republican president — when the the party’s and Trump’s interests coincided (fortifying a strong executive, undermining the Mueller investigation, pushing back against Nancy Pelosi’s House, and so on).
As I posted earlier, “Bill Barr is carrying water for the Republican Party ….” Trump’s interests (to salve his wounded ego and pump up his brand) and the GOP’s interests (winning two senate seats) diverged in a way that frightened the Republican Congressional leadership. So — placing party first, as he has always done — Barr separated himself from Trump.
There’s no paradox, no change of heart, no signs of “Barr’s limits” (in Marshall’s words). There’s an unflagging allegiance to the Grand Old Party. Same as it ever was for Bill Barr — going back decades.
(Image: Bill Barr and Donald Trump at the 38th Annual National Peace Officers’ Memorial Service via Wikimedia Commons.)
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