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Barr’s opening statement, published Monday evening by multiple outlets, did not directly address Berman’s ouster. Rather, Barr accused Democrats on the panel of using the hearing to further their attempts “to discredit me by conjuring up a narrative that I am simply the President’s factotum who disposes of criminal cases according to his instructions.”

He said Trump “has not attempted to interfere” in criminal matters under the attorney general’s purview. “From my experience, the President has played a role properly and traditionally played by Presidents,” he said.

Barr’s statement focused in large part on Floyd, a Black man whose death while unarmed at the hands of a white police officer in Minneapolis sparked a massive wave of protests across the U.S.

Floyd’s killing “understandably jarred the whole country and forced us to reflect on longstanding issues in our nation,” Barr’s statement said. “Given our history it is understandable that, among black Americans, there is at least some ambivalence, and often distrust, toward the police.”

But events like Floyd’s death are “fortunately quite rare” nowadays, Barr said. He warned that the “demonization” of police, and the “grossly irresponsible proposals” to defund them, are “gravely injurious to our inner city communities.”

Barr defended the deployment of federal law enforcement officers to cities like Portland, Oregon, where clashes between police and demonstrators have become increasingly violent.

“What unfolds nightly around the courthouse cannot reasonably be called a protest; it is, by any objective measure, an assault on the Government of the United States,” Barr said.

“To state what should be obvious, peaceful protesters do not throw explosives into federal courthouses, tear down plywood with crowbars, or launch fecal matter at federal officers. Such acts are in fact federal crimes under statutes enacted by this Congress.”

Barr’s statement urged all members of the House Judiciary Committee to “condemn violence against federal officers and destruction of federal property.”

“To tacitly condone destruction and anarchy is to abandon the basic rule-of-law principles that should unite us even in a politically divisive time,” he said.