Chapters
Shownotes Transcript
There's nothing worse than getting home from your trip only to find out you missed a can't-miss travel experience. That's why you need Viator. Book guided tours, excursions, and more in one place to make your trip truly unregrettable. There are over 300,000 travel experiences to choose from so you can find something for everyone. And Viator offers free cancellation and 24-7 customer service. So you always have support around the clock.
Download the Viator app now to use code Viator10 for 10% off your first booking in the app. Regret less. Do more with Viator. Hey, everyone. Ellie here wishing you a very happy Friday morning. I wonder if you all maybe like this podcast a little more because it comes out on Friday morning when you're inherently in a good mood. We're definitely not going to shift this over to Monday or anything. I don't want to jeopardize our approval ratings.
Anyway, this week I talk about a favorite subject of mine, maybe even a muse of mine. I don't know. That's a little bit of a strange way to put it. But this column is about Bill Barr, a guy who I've written about. My first book is about him and about his recent effort to rehabilitate his image.
and about this notion that maybe he's going to be this star witness in the prosecutions of Donald Trump. Take a listen to see what I think of it. And as always, love to hear your thoughts, questions, or comments. Send them to letters at cafe.com.
I have a complicated relationship with Bill Barr. On one hand, in 2021, I wrote a book about him called Hatchet Man, how Bill Barr broke the prosecutor's code and corrupted the Justice Department. The title leaves little to the imagination, wherein I argue that as attorney general, he was a liar and a political goon.
On the other hand, as Barr continues his public image rehab tour on the cable networks, I find myself agreeing with much, but certainly not all, but much of his legal commentary about the various prosecutions of Donald Trump. Barr is a far better legal analyst than attorney general, it turns out.
Perhaps it's not quite right for me to call this a relationship because this is decidedly a one-way affair. I've never met or communicated with Bill Barr, though I offered to interview him many times during his tenure as AG and afterwards. He and his people never responded, not even a courtesy, no thank you. I'm certain he knows of me and my book. That's been confirmed to me by more than one person who knows him, and I assume he can't possibly be fond of either. Hey, I get it.
It didn't have to be this way, by the way. In the book, I quote myself from a fateful day in December 2018 when I happened to be on set at CNN at the moment Barr's name first surfaced as Trump's likely AG nominee. Here's what I said, quoting myself.
What you want is somebody who's qualified, who's serious and who's respected. And by all accounts, William Barr is all of those things, end quote. So you see, I didn't have it out for Barr from the get go. To the contrary, I endorsed him and I gave him the benefit of the doubt. But he quickly and decisively proved himself unworthy.
Barr has spent the past year or so trying to recast himself as a hero who stood up to Trump in December 2020, weeks after the election, importantly, by telling the public that DOJ had found no evidence of widespread election fraud and by telling Trump directly that his claims of such fraud were, and I quote Bill Barr here, bullshit.
Accordingly, it's been widely suggested that Barr might be some kind of star witness for Jack Smith or Fannie Willis in their prosecutions of Trump for his effort to steal the 2020 election. But in fact, Barr would be a disaster on the witness stand to call him would, if anything, tee up the case beautifully for Trump's defense.
Yes, it is easy to see the allure of Barr as a prosecution witness. Members of the jury, behold, Trump's own chosen attorney general, the guy who would know the best, told Trump to his face that there was no evidence of election fraud. Hence, Trump knew he lost or reasonably should have known. Hence, he had criminal intent when he tried to get the election results overturned. Hence, he's guilty. Done and done.
Oh, if only things were so simple for prosecutors in real life. Because Barr's viability as a witness stands on the same bogus foundation as his current campaign to cast himself as a truth-telling hero. The crucial part that Barr always leaves out and hopes to erase from history is this. He spent the better part of a year
during the crucial run-up to the 2020 election, publicly supporting Donald Trump's claims of impending, unstoppable, unpoliceable 2020 election fraud, fanning the flames that would ultimately explode on January 6th.
Let's run through some examples. First, in a June 2020 interview with NPR, Barr declared that mail-in ballots present, quote, so many occasions for fraud there that cannot be policed. I think it would be very bad, end quote.
He also raised, quote, the possibility of counterfeiting, end quote. NPR later ran an article titled NPR Let the U.S. Attorney General Tell a Falsehood on the Air, quoting experts who labeled Barr's claims, quote, nuts, preposterous and false.
Second, in July 2020 congressional testimony, Barr warned that foreign countries could generate countless fraudulent mail-in ballots. Representative Mary Gay Scanlon asked Barr, but in fact, you have no evidence that foreign countries can successfully sway our elections with counterfeit ballots, do you? Barr responded, and I quote, no, I don't, but I have common sense, end quote.
And third, in a September 2020 interview with Wolf Blitzer on CNN, where, of course, I'm a contributor, Barr cited as evidence of large scale election fraud. For example, we indicted someone in Texas, 1700 ballots collected from people who could vote. He made them out and voted for the person he wanted to. OK.
In fact, first, that was not a DOJ case. It was a state case, but that's the less important point. Second, more importantly, it involved one single fraudulent ballot, not 1700, one. After the interview, DOJ issued a retraction, which surely was seen by a minuscule fraction of the people who viewed Barr's dire claim in the original CNN interview.
So what happens at Donald Trump's trial after Barr delivers his heroic direct testimony about how he called out Trump's election fraud lie in December 2020? Well, he gets cross-examined by Donald Trump's lawyers, and they make Barr admit that he spent months
publicly endorsing and bolstering Trump's election fraud claims to Congress and in the national media. And if Barr hems and haws and busts out his characteristic jumbled legalese that marked his term as AG, Trump's lawyers can just play the clips of what Barr actually said at the time for the jury. Barr's testimony then walks right into this line of defense.
Members of the jury, let's look at Bill Barr, the prosecution's star witness. He's the guy who knows best, right? He was the attorney general of the United States, right? Well, guess what? He admitted on cross-exam. He had no choice that he spent months before the election telling the public and Congress and Donald Trump himself that there would be massive election fraud and that that fraud could not possibly be prevented or policed.
Sure, Barr did a belated last second turnabout after the fact on his way out the door. But was it crazy for Donald Trump to go with what Barr had spent the prior year saying? What if you had a trusted advisor who told you and everyone else, yes, yes, yes, for many months, but then suddenly turned around and said, actually, no.
Would it be wrong for you to go with yes? Would it be criminal for you to credit his original word? Should Donald Trump go to prison because he believed what he was originally told many times over by Bill Barr, the very same man the prosecution wants you to believe now? OK, out of trial mode here. I get it. There's a natural tendency to look for that star witness, the next John Dean and whatnot.
But the problem is that trial testimony is not the same as a self-aggrandizing book tour Barr wrote his own to about his own tenure or a six minute cable TV segment. On cross-examination, Barr won't be able to run away from his own words and conduct. He spent far too long as a Trump sycophant and lackey, and it's too late now to whitewash that history.
Bill Barr is not Jack Smith's savior, folks. To the contrary, he could tank the case. Smith still may well be able to prove his charges, but if he thinks he's going to do it on the back of Bill Barr, he's in for a brutal surprise. Thanks for listening, everyone. As always, stay safe and stay informed.
On September 28th, the Global Citizen Festival will gather thousands of people who took action to end extreme poverty. Watch Post Malone, Doja Cat, Lisa, Jelly Roll, and Raul Alejandro as they take the stage with world leaders and activists to defeat poverty, defend the planet, and demand equity. Download the Global Citizen app to watch live. Learn more at globalcitizen.org.com.
