William Barr, who served as one of then-President Donald Trump’s attorneys general, opened up on Friday after his former boss was indicted the previous day by a Manhattan grand jury.
Barr suggested that Bragg indicted former President Donald Trump as it would boost his chances of securing the Republican Party’s presidential nomination, only to be defeated in the general election, according to a published report.
The reported indictment against former Trump is said to involve up to 34 counts and is related to an alleged $130,000 hush money payment to adult film actress Stormy Daniels during the 2016 presidential election.
“We haven’t seen it. We don’t know exactly what’s there,” Barr said during an event that was carried by CSPAN. “But judging from the news reports, it’s the archetypal abuse of the prosecutorial function to engage in a political hit job. And it’s a disgrace if it turns out to be what we think it is.”
“Politically, it’s gonna be damaging, I think, to the Republican Party simply because I think it’s a no-lose situation for the Democrats,” Barr continued. “I think the impetus is really to help Trump get the nomination, focus the attention on him for two years, have this thing swirling around, plus whatever else comes, which I think will be damaging to whoever gets the nomination.”
“And legally, I think it’s, from what I understand, it’s a pathetically weak case,” he noted further.
WATCH:
Former Attorney General Bill Barr on indictment of former President Trump: "It's the archetypal abuse of the prosecutorial function to engage in a political hit job, and it’s a disgrace…Politically, it's going to be damaging I think to the Republican party…" pic.twitter.com/2aNz5dBSFR
— CSPAN (@cspan) March 31, 2023
Other legal experts have expressed doubts about Bragg’s case.
“The question to ask yourself in a case like this [is], ‘Would a case like this be brought against anybody else, whether he or she be president, former president or a regular citizen?’ The answer is… no,” former Whitewater deputy counsel Sol Wisenberg told the New York Post.
“You can debate all day long whether or not… Trump should be indicted related to the records at Mar-a-Lago, whether or not he should be indicted with respect to Jan. 6 incitement of lawless activity… Those are real crimes if they occurred, and he committed them,” he said. “This is preposterous.”
George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley said in an interview with Fox News he thinks the case is “outrageous.”
“[Bragg] is attempting to bootstrap [a] federal crime into a state case. And if that is the basis for the indictment, I think it’s rather outrageous,” he said
“I think it’s illegally pathetic,” he said. “There’s a good reason why the Department of Justice did not prosecute this case: Because it’s been down this road before. It tried a case against former Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards arguing that hush money paid to another woman, who bore a child out of that relationship, was a campaign violation. That was a much stronger case, but they lost,” Turley added.
