William Barr is relatively qualified, especially for a Trump nominee. In fact, he held the office he has been nominated for, attorney general, under President George H. W. Bush from 1991 to 1993. One would assume that prior experience would have prepared him for a strong showing in his confirmation hearing this week before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Unfortunately, Barr fell short — specifically in his commentary and commitments with regard to Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation.
For one, Barr refused to recuse himself from overseeing the ongoing investigation into possible collusion between Russia and the Trump orbit to influence our 2016 election. In fact, he wouldn’t even promise to follow the advice of ethics officials of the Justice Department on whether or not he should do so.
Barr also declined to promise to make the results of the Mueller investigation public, despite the fact that the American people clearly deserve to see any and all conclusions about how our democracy was influenced by a foreign power. He wouldn’t agree to any stringent protections for the special counsel either, offering only his word that he wouldn’t fire Mueller without cause. (These assurances are a necessity, as Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is still blocking bipartisan legislation meant to prohibit the president from a politically-motivated firing of one of his favorite angry tweet targets.)
