{"id":401393,"date":"2019-03-26T08:37:27","date_gmt":"2019-03-26T07:37:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/trump-and-barr-could-stretch-executive-privilege-and-grand-jury-secrecy-claims\/"},"modified":"2019-03-26T08:37:27","modified_gmt":"2019-03-26T07:37:27","slug":"trump-and-barr-could-stretch-executive-privilege-and-grand-jury-secrecy-claims","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/trump-and-barr-could-stretch-executive-privilege-and-grand-jury-secrecy-claims\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump and Barr Could Stretch Executive Privilege and Grand Jury Secrecy Claims"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<p>Attorney General <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/context\/read-attorney-general-barr-s-principal-conclusions-of-the-mueller-report\/?noteId=9048a12b-2332-4645-a1be-d645db216eb5&amp;questionId=218b8095-c5e3-4eab-9135-4170f5b3e87f&amp;utm_term=.3eaad741bdb1\">William Barr\u2019s letter<span> <\/span><\/a>to Congress, delivered Sunday, purports to brief lawmakers about the Mueller report.<\/p>\n<p>What it really does is set the stage for a battle royale with Trump and Barr doing everything in their power to keep secret the full report and, equally important, the materials underlying the report. They\u2019re likely to fight Democrats in Congress, if not both parties, over the materials\u2019 release. And while they\u2019ll probably cite a range of reasons for their objections to revealing the report, they also share an expansive view of a president\u2019s right to keep his discussions secret.<\/p>\n<p>The public and Congress are unable to judge whether Barr\u2019s conclusions are justified because Barr\u2019s letter is mostly silent about the underlying Mueller report conclusions and evidence. This would be remedied in time if Barr were required to provide the full report and its supporting witness and documentary evidence.<\/p>\n<div class=\"truth-post-content-high  inline-callout-container\" id=\"255792\">\n<div class=\"truth-post-content-high\" id=\"truth-877560437\">\n<aside class=\" inline-callout inline-callout--subscribe inline-callout--dark\" id=\"255394\">\n<div class=\"inner-wrapper\">\n<h2>Stay in the loop<\/h2>\n<p>Never miss the news and analysis you care about.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/aside>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>But Trump and Barr each have tools to minimize the access of House investigations to the report and evidence. Despite the end of Mueller\u2019s probe, those investigations continue: Democrat Jerrold Nadler, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, made it clear on Sunday<span> <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2019\/03\/24\/us\/politics\/trump-impeachment-democrats.html\">that he plans to \u201cmove forward\u201d with his committee\u2019s investigations<\/a>, \u201cinto obstruction of justice, abuses of power, corruption, to defend the rule of law, which is our job.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The key grounds for Barr and Trump to justify withholding of evidence are<span> <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.law.cornell.edu\/rules\/frcrmp\/rule_6\">grand jury secrecy<\/a><span> <\/span>and<span> <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.lawfareblog.com\/primer-executive-privilege-and-executive-branch-approach-congressional-oversight\">executive privilege<\/a>.<\/p>\n<h2>It\u2019s Been Done Before<\/h2>\n<p>To be sure, these grounds for withholding, properly and narrowly applied,<span> <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.justice.gov\/file\/23246\/download\">have support in precedent<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>But I believe that Trump and Barr can be counted on to use every means available to overstate and exaggerate the degree to which these doctrines justify withholding this information from justifiable, duly-authorized House investigations.<\/p>\n<p>I was<span> <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.judiciary.senate.gov\/imo\/media\/doc\/07-11-17%20Tiefer%20Testimony.pdf\">special deputy chief counsel of the House Iran-contra&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/truthout.org\/articles\/trump-and-barr-could-stretch-executive-privilege-and-grand-jury-secrecy-claims\/\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Attorney General William Barr\u2019s letter to Congress, delivered Sunday, purports to brief lawmakers about the Mueller report. What it really does is set the stage for a battle royale with Trump and Barr doing everything in their power to keep secret the full report and, equally important, the materials underlying the report. They\u2019re likely to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[519],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-401393","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-newswire"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/401393","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=401393"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/401393\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=401393"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=401393"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=401393"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}