Barr invited to meet DoJ officials on day he submitted memo critical of Mueller
Source: The Guardian
William Barr was invited to meet justice department officials last summer, on the same day he submitted an “unsolicited” memo that heavily criticized special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into obstruction of justice by Donald Trump.
Barr, who was a private attorney at the time, met the officials for lunch three weeks later and was then nominated to serve as Trump’s attorney general about six months later.
The revelation about the meeting, which was arranged by Steve Engel, the head of the Office of Legal Counsel at the Department of Justice, and which has not previously been publicly disclosed, raises new questions about whether the White House’s decision to hire Barr was influenced by private discussions he had about his legal views on Mueller’s investigation.
Barr announced last month he had concluded there was “not sufficient” evidence found in the special counsel’s investigation to establish that Trump had committed obstruction of justice. He made the decision, he wrote in a letter to Congress, after consulting with Engel – who is a legal adviser to the White House – and Rod Rosenstein, the deputy attorney general.
Barr’s decision is controversial because, months before he was hired, he sent a 20-page memo to two top officials at the DoJ – Engel and Rosenstein – that called Mueller’s obstruction theory “fatally misconceived” and “legally insupportable”. Barr, who served as attorney general under George HW Bush, said he had written the memo in order to “make sure that all of the lawyers involved carefully considered the potential implications of the theory” that Mueller appeared to be pursuing.
Read more: https://amp.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/apr/05/william-barr-memo-meeting-justice-department-steve-engel
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