A top Democratic lawmaker said on Saturday that the handling of the Mueller report by attorney general William Barr is making impeachment more likely.
In an interview with MSNBC’s Joy Reid, Rep. Jim Clyburn of South Carolina said he had previously been one of the Democrats who didn’t want the party to go full-speed ahead on impeachment.
But that was before Donald Trump’s attorney general released his four-page summary and set off what appears to be a massive cover-up of the Mueller report.
“All of a sudden, we’ve got an attorney general who forecast what he was going to do,” Clyburn said. “He is undermining the process that we all thought would be fair and impartial.”
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The Democratic congressman added, “The only thing left is for Congress to get the documents and see whether or not [Trump is] deserving of impeachment.”
Video:
Rep. Jim Clyburn says William Barr is “undermining” the rule of law. #ctl #p2 #amjoy pic.twitter.com/TJhfncjkQj
— PoliticusUSA (@politicususa) April 6, 2019
Rep Clyburn said:
The founding fathers did anticipate that we could have somebody like this. That’s why they lay it out why we ought to consider impeachment when it needs to be considered. I have been a big supporter of our party’s position that impeachment should be something in the background not to be dealt with at this particular juncture. But all of a sudden now, we’ve got an attorney general who forecast what he was going to do. He’s now doing exactly what he said he was going to do. And he is undermining the process of what we all thought would be fair and impartial and we thought the American people would be able to share in the results. It is now clear that his summary, his four-page summary of two years of work, I understand 300 to 400-page document, is of such that we may need to see the whole document or subpoena the people who can speak to it. And then, if the document is made the way it is because of the Justice Department’s procedure or policy on not indicting a sitting president, then the only thing left is for Congress to get the documents and see whether or not he’s deserving of impeachment.
Trump’s cover-up is backfiring
The strategy by Donald Trump and his hand-picked attorney general to first fudge the facts laid out in Mueller’s report, and then conceal the full report, has quickly backfired.
Not only haven’t the American people bought the claims that Trump is fully exonerated, but they want to see the full report.
The longer this cover-up continues, the more guilty Trump appears and the more hollow his post-Barr summary celebrations look. With each passing day, it seems more and more likely that there is something damaging in the Mueller report that this president and his allies don’t want the public to see.
Donald Trump thought this cover-up was a smart way to convince the public of his innocence, but it has done just the opposite, and it has the potential to make impeachment more likely.
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Sean Colarossi currently resides in Cleveland, Ohio. He earned his Bachelor of Arts degree in Journalism from the University of Massachusetts Amherst and was an organizing fellow for both of President Obama’s presidential campaigns. He also worked with Planned Parenthood as an Affordable Care Act Outreach Organizer in 2014, helping northeast Ohio residents obtain health insurance coverage.
