William Barr, President Trump’s attorney general nominee, pledged during Tuesday’s confirmation hearing to not interfere with Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation, while saying the country “needs a credible resolution of these issues.”
“I will follow the Special Counsel regulations scrupulously and in good faith, and on my watch, Bob will be allowed to complete his work,” Barr told the Senate Judiciary Committee.
Under questioning, Barr said he doesn’t believe “Mueller would be involved in a witch hunt.” The nominee said he has known Mueller “personally and professionally for 30 years,” having worked together at the Justice Department.
He also said former Attorney General Jeff Sessions was right to recuse himself from the Russia investigation because of his role in the 2016 campaign, something that infuriated the president and led to Sessions’ removal. He said believes Russia attempted to interfere with the election and said he support an investigation “to get to bottom of it.”
But Barr also said he would look into anti-Trump bias at the FBI during the 2016 campaign, saying he was “shocked” by the anti-Trump texts that were famously sent between FBI employees Peter Strzok and Lisa Page.
Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham kicked off Tuesday’s confirmation hearing for Barr by saying the Justice Department needs a new leader to “right the ship over there.”
“We’ve got a lot of problems at the Department of Justice,” Graham said. “Morale is low and we need to change that. I look forward to this hearing. You will be challenged. You should be challenged.”
Barr, 68, was nominated by the president to lead the Justice Department in December, after Sessions resigned at Trump’s request in November.
Barr previously served as attorney general from 1991 to 1993, and his confirmation hearings nearly 30 years ago went off largely without incident.
“I want to thank the president for nominating somebody who is worthy of the job and who will understand on day one what the job is about – who can right the ship over there,” Graham said.
During the hearing, Barr’s past comments about the Mueller investigation attracted scrutiny, including an unsolicited memo he sent the Justice Department last year criticizing the special counsel’s inquiry into whether Trump had sought to obstruct justice. Barr, as head of the Justice Department, would take over from acting attorney general Matthew Whitaker and oversee Mueller’s work.
“The memo, there will be a lot of talk about it, as there should be,” Graham said.
BARR SLAMMED MUELLER’S ‘OBSTRUCTION THEORY’ AS ‘LEGALLY INSUPPORTABLE’
Ranking member Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., said the memo raises questions about Barr’s approach to the Russia probe.
“Importantly, the attorney general must be willing to resist political pressure and be committed to protecting this investigation,” Feinstein said.
Barr sought to explain the memo, telling lawmakers he distributed it so “other lawyers would have the benefit of my views.”
“The memo did not address – or in any way question – the special counsel’s core investigation into Russian interfere in the 2016 election,” Barr said. “Nor did it address other potential obstruction-of-justice theories or argue, as some have erroneously suggested, that a president can never obstruct justice.”
Barr was introduced Tuesday by former Utah Sen. Orrin Hatch, a former longtime member of the committee who retired and was replaced by Sen. Mitt Romney this year.
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It’s the first major Judiciary Committee hearing since the dramatic testimony last year during the confirmation of Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh.
Several Democratic senators thought to be potential presidential contenders in 2020 — including Kamala Harris, Cory Booker, and Amy Klobuchar — are among those set to question Barr.
Barr on Tuesday must also convince Republicans he’s sufficiently supportive of Trump’s tough-on-crime and hardline immigration agenda, although there are no serious concerns he will have difficulty garnering the simple majority of votes necessary to win confirmation. Republicans currently hold 53 of the Senate’s 100 seats.
Democrats also grilled Barr on the expansive view of presidential power he’s displayed at the Justice Department and in the years since.
BARR TO FACE QUESTIONS FROM SEVERAL DEMS WITH EYES ON WHITE HOUSE
As deputy attorney general, Barr advised then-President George H.W. Bush that he did not need congressional approval to attack Iraq. Earlier, when he led the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, he wrote opinions that allowed the U.S. government to invade Panama and arrest its dictator, Manuel Noriega, as well as to capture suspects without the consent of their host nations.
As attorney general in 1992, he endorsed Bush’s pardons of Reagan administration officials in the Iran-Contra scandal.
Fox News’ Gregg Re and The Associated Press contributed to this report
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