The former attorney general Bill Barr was personally involved in a decision to release an unusual and misleading justice department statement on the eve of the 2020 election suggesting there may have been voter fraud in Pennsylvania, according to a new inspector general’s report that was released on Thursday.
The 76-page report from the justice department’s Office of the Inspector General focused on the department’s handling of an investigation into nine military ballots that were found discarded in the trash in Luzerne county, Pennsylvania. Barr briefed Trump on the ballot issue before it was public and the president subsequently disclosed it in a radio interview. David Freed, the US attorney overseeing the matter, also released a statement and letter detailing the investigation.
The announcement was highly charged because it came at a time when Trump was warning the election would be rigged because of mail-in ballots. It was also highly unusual – justice department policy does not allow employees to comment on ongoing investigations before charges are filed, except in limited circumstances. Separate guidance instructs department employees that they should be “particularly sensitive to safeguarding the Department’s reputation for fairness, neutrality, and nonpartisanship”.
Federal law enforcement officials were notified of the discarded ballots on 18 September 2020 and investigators quickly became aware that evidence might not exist to support criminal charges. The seasonal employee who discarded the ballots appeared to have a mental disability, FBI agents noted on 22 September, and was “remorseful”, “felt horrible” and “never voted/doesn’t vote/didn’t pay attention to it”. The suspect, who was quickly fired, reportedly believed incorrectly the military ballots were fraudulent and discarded them without telling anyone.
Nonetheless, Barr briefed Trump on the matter and later called Freed to discuss releasing a public statement.
“Nearly every DOJ lawyer we interviewed – both career employees and Trump Administration political appointees – emphasized how ‘unusual’ it would be for the department to issue a public statement containing details about an ongoing criminal investigation, particularly before any charges are filed,” the inspector general report said. “As one then US Attorney told us: ‘If [we] don’t have a charge, we don’t say anything about an investigation; we just don’t do that.’”
Barr’s behavior “was certainly not consistent” with that guidance, the report said. Barr did not agree to a voluntary interview and the inspector general does not have the power to subpoena testimony from former justice department employees.
“Providing this information to the President, who was not bound by the Department’s policies prohibiting comment on ongoing investigations and who had a political interest in publicizing the investigation, created the risk that the President would use the Department’s non-public investigative information to advance his own political aims,” the report said. “A risk that was in fact realized when President Trump referenced the ballots on a national radio show the next morning.”
Freed and other justice department employees considered releasing a statement in late October 2020 when they decided to close the investigation without charges. The department’s public integrity section had wanted to issue a press release to correct the false public impression about the possibility of fraud, but ultimately the department did not. It was not until 15 January 2021 – well after election day – that the Department of Justice released a statement saying it was closing the investigation.
Freed, who was the US attorney for the middle district of Pennsylvania at the time, violated justice department policies on not commenting on ongoing investigations and a requirement to consult with the department’s public integrity section before making a statement.
“I handled this investigation properly from start to finish and my public statements were explicitly approved by the AG or his senior staff,” Freed said in a statement to CNN.
While highly critical of their conduct, the inspector general said it could not conclude either had committed misconduct “because of ambiguity as to the applicability of Barr’s authority to approve the release of the statement”. It also said that justice department policy did not specifically proscribe what Barr could tell the president.
The inspector general’s report details how other senior justice department employees were horrified when they saw that Freed had released information. “It’s appalling. We don’t do this,” the director of the department’s election crimes branch told investigators. “There wasn’t even a charging document. I mean, they ended up declining it. There’s no – I’ve never seen anything like this … I’m appalled. This is crazy.”
Source: US Politics - theguardian.com
