by Daveda Gruber:
Late Thursday morning, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi D-Calif., went on the record during a public press conference and said that Attorney General William Barr “lied to Congress.”
In a closed-door meeting Pelosi also allegedly told her colleagues that Barr committed a crime. She allegedly told Rep. Charlie Crist, D-Fla., “We saw [Barr] commit a crime when he answered your question.”
Pelosi was referring to a hearing on April 9. Crist had asked whether Barr knew what prompted reports that prosecutors on the special counsel team were frustrated with his initial summary.
Barr denied the allegation by saying that he did not.
This week “The Washington Post” reported that Special Counsel Robert Mueller contacted Barr, both in a letter and in a phone call, to express concerns. This came after Barr released his four-page summary of Mueller’s findings in March.
Mueller wanted Barr to release the executive summaries written by the special counsel’s office which stated that a four-page memo to Congress that described the principal conclusions of the investigation into President Trump “did not fully capture the context, nature, and substance” of Mueller’s work.
Mueller made it clear that he did not feel that Barr’s summary was inaccurate. Instead, Mueller told Barr that media coverage of the letter had “misinterpreted” the results of the probe concerning obstruction of justice.
Pelosi, said publicly, “He lied to Congress. And if anybody else did that, it would be considered a crime,” she told reporters. “Nobody is above the law. Not the president of the United States. Not the attorney general.”
Pelosi was then asked if Barr should go to jail for the alleged crime.
Pelosi replied, “There is a process involved here and as I said, I’ll say it again, the committee will have to come to how we will proceed.”
You can see and hear the comments by Pelosi here:
The Justice Department did not take the comments by Pelosi lightly.
Justice Department spokeswoman Kerri Kupec said, “Speaker Pelosi’s baseless attacks on the Attorney General is reckless, irresponsible and false.”
