Missing some of that. And it is a very important story. But a lot of important stories get drowned out by just this craziness thats happening. This is unlike anything else that you and i have ever lived through before. Look. It crowds things out, true, sometimes its obsessive, but it matters. What we saw today theres a constipation in our democracy, a loss of direction about looking anywhere but at your own little pack. I mean, it was so obvious today. Yeah. And its really sad. I do not know the way forward. I dont. Listen, i know its frustrating for the democrats and people can say, okay, that they were being political. Its washington. Welcome to politics, right . But its just the the folks that i hear on the republican side who were usually for the rule of law, congressional oversight, subpoenas, they were mad at eric holder, right, remember eric holder got in trouble for defying a subpoena. And now theyre doing the same thing. You wonder, well, what gives . If it ever, ever, ever can be corrected, i dont know if it can. On the same day you have an a. G. Say this is a quick verdict. Quick conclusions of things but were not a judge and jury on this. A lot of i dont recall. A lot of that. Look, heres the problem for us is even if its clear that mr. Barrs doing what he can to do the best by this president , now what . Of course its clear. Even if you have mr. Mueller come in and he says yeah, i couldnt make a decision on this, but you can as a congress. Now what . Well see. Nice job. Thank you, sir. This is cnn tonight, im don lemon. Heres our breaking news tonight, the attorney general william barr is refusing to testify before the house tomorrow. And heres what the judiciary chairman jerry nadler has not ruled out issuing a subpoena saying today that barr is trying to blackmail the committee so will there be a hearing with an empty chair . Well find out in just a few hours. That comes after barrs defiant combative performance in the senate today. Republicans in the senate stepping right up to help him. Saying this, in the first minutes of the hearing about the crucial question of whether the president of the United States tried to obstruct justice. Attempted obstruction of justice of a crime never occurred, i guess is sort of the new standard around here, well see if that makes any sense. To me it doesnt. So senator graham has sure changed his tune since he said this, back in 1999, of course that was during the president president bill clintons impeachment, watch this. So very quickly, give us your reasoning why you think it would be up appropriate to proceed forward on obstruction of justice in this case. Well, generally speaking an obstruction case typically has two aspects to it. One, theres usually an underlying criminality stop right there. Yeah. Was there an underlying crime here . No. You dont have to say lets obstruct justice for it to be a crime. And if that wasnt clear enough evidence of the complete capitulation of republicans like Lindsey Graham he told us today that in spite of all the contradictions between what mueller said and what barr said, he said he wont call mueller to testify. To tell us the truth. Why not call for mueller to testify . Because im not going to do anymore enough already, its over. If theres any dispute about a conversation, then hell come. But im not going to retry the case. It is over. So many unanswered questions. Yet for senator Lindsey Graham its over. And i want you to listen to senator Richard Blumenthal taking the a. G. To task for misleading, dissembling, about that letter he got from Robert Mueller, objecting how barr characterized his findings. Youve been pretty adroit and agile in response to your questions here, but i think history will judge you harshly and maybe a bit unfairly because you seem to have been the designated fall guy for this report. And i think that conclusion is inescapable in light of the fourpage summary and then the press conference you did on the day it was released, knowing that you had in hand a letter from the special counsel saying that he felt that you mischaracterized his report. Make no mistake, Robert Mueller deliberately created a record by putting his concerns in writing in that letter. Actually, he did it twice. First in a letter on march 25th. That was the day after barrs letter summarizing what he called muellers principal conclusions and when he apparently didnt get the response he hoped for he wrote a second letter on march 27th saying this, and i quote. The summary letter the department sent to congress and released to the public late in the afternoon of march 24 did not fully capture the context, nature and substance of this offices work and conclusions and you can understand why mueller felt the need to put his objections in writing. Given the way his words have been twisted. Given the way the attorney general tried to big foot mueller today. Bob mueller is the equivalent of a u. S. Attorney. He was exercising the powers of the attorney general subject to the supervision of the attorney general. Hes part of the department of justice. His work concluded when he sent his report to the attorney general. At that point it was my baby. And i was making a decision as to whether or not to make it public and i effectively overruled the regulations, used discretion to lean as far forward as i could to make that public. And it was my decision how and when to make it public. Not bob muellers. So lets travel back in time a bit, shall we . To april 9th. And this exchange between barr and congressman charlie crist. Reports have emerged recently, general, that members of the special counsels team are frustrated at some level with the limited information included in your march 24th letter that it does not adequately or accurately necessarily portray the reports findings. Do you know what theyre referencing with that . No, i dont. Yes, he did. Of course he did. He had muellers letter for nearly two weeks when he answered that question. We know that now and he was clearly expecting to be asked about that. So he had an explanation prepared to try to convince you that what he said before, that it wasnt a lie. I dont know what members hes talking about. And i certainly am not aware of any challenge to the accuracy of the findings. Mr. Barr, you seem to have learned to filibuster, and you do it better than senators do. My question was, why did you say you were not aware of concerns when weeks before your testimony mr. Mueller had expressed concerns to you . Thats a fairly simple thing. I answered a question, and the question was relating to unidentified members who were expressing frustration over the accuracy relating to findings. I dont know what that refers to at all. I talked directly to bob mueller, not members of his team. Robert muellers not a member of his own team . That would have been my response. Are you saying that Robert Mueller is not a member of his own team . So did he convince you . This is what happens to people who make the choice to do anything, to sell their souls, just to be part of this administration. This is from a New York Times oped written today, it was by james comey whose abrupt firing by the president was the event that started the whole Mueller Investigation and heres a quote. It says mr. Trump eats your soul in small bites. It starts with your sitting silent while he lies, both in public and private, making you complicit by your silence, in meetings with him his assertions about what everyone thinks and what is obviously true, wash over you, unchallenged, as they did at our private dinner on january 27th, 2017 because hes the president and he rarely stops talking. As a result mr. Trump pulls all those present into a silent circle of assent. And then theres this chilling quote. Of course to stay you must be seen as on his team so you make further compromises. You use his language, praise his leadership, tout his commitment to values, and then you are lost. He has eaten your soul. He eats your soul one bite at a time. And we have all seen it happen time after time. Time and time again. To republicans like Lindsey Graham. To officials like william barr. To countless staffers from sean spicer to Sarah Sanders who we learn had to admit to the special counsel that she lied to the american public. I want you to listen right now. This is Kamala Harris forcing the attorney general to admit he didnt even bother to review the evidence before he decided not to charge the president with obstruction. As the attorney general of the United States you run the United States department of justice. If in any u. S. Attorneys Office Around the country the head of that office, when being asked to make a critical decision about, in this case, the person who holds the highest office in the land, and whether or not that person committed a crime, would you accept them recommending a charging decision to you, if they had not reviewed the evidence . Well, thats a question for bob mueller. Hes the u. S. Attorney. Hes the one who presents the report. But it was you who made the charging decision, sir. What you made the decision not to charge the president. In the process memo and declaration memo. You said it was your baby, what did you mean by that . It was my baby to decide whether or not to disclose it to the public. And whose decision was it who had the power to make the decision about whether or not the evidence was sufficient to make a determination of whether there had been an obstruction of justice . Prosecution memos go up to the supervisor, in this case it was you know the attorney general and the Deputy Attorney general who decide on the final decision. And that is based on the memo as presented by the u. S. Attorneys office. I think youve made it clear that youve not looked at the evidence. We can move on. I think youve made it clear, sir, that youve not looked at the evidence and we can move on. That was senator Kamala Harris, another senator mazie hirono minced no words saying barr was just another member of the administration who sacrificed his reputation for this president. Now, the American People know that you are no different from Rudy Giuliani or Kellyanne Conway or any of the other people who sacrificed their once decent reputation for the grifter and liar who sits in the oval office. You know the difference but youve chosen to be the president s lawyer and side with him over the interest of the American People. So heres what happens, okay . Barr conducts himself with a low key demeanor, mostly. But watch here as the mask slips. You know, the letters a bit snitty, and i think it was written by one of his staff people. Did you make a memorandum of your conversation . No, i didnt make a what . Did anyone, either you or anyone on your staff memorialize your conversation with Robert Mueller . Yes. Who did that . There were notes taken of the call. May we have those notes . No. Why not . Why should you have them . Why should you have them . That was the attorney general of the United States. So much for transparency. Why should you have them . But after everything that we have heard and seen today there is no denying this fact, okay, were all being gaslighted. Its gaslighting, thats all it is. There was a time when i never would have thought that id say that you cant believe the attorney general. Lets face it, there was a time where i never thought id say the president of the United States was lying or the president of the United States was this or that. So much. And we cant even believe the president of the United States. You cant believe what youre hearing from the institutions meant to serve us. We, the people. Maybe youre feeling that too. You probably are. Youre being mis led, no one cares, the republicans on that committee dont care, that the attorney general of the United States misled the public, set a narrative, did exactly what the special counsel didnt want him to do, release his own summary instead of the summary letters written by the special counsel himself. And then when confronted twice about it still refused to do it. Doesnt matter that you got the information out. What he did was set a false narrative about the information. Because most americans will not read 448 pages. They will believe sound bites. But if you read the 448 pages, which members which today some of the members of the senate admitted that they didnt even read it. Barr said he didnt even read the underlying evidence. So you can only come to one conclusion. The fact is they are lying to us. You may want to call it misstating the facts. I cant do that. Im a journalist. Ill tell you exactly what it is. You can call it misremembering, whatever you want, its a lie. We know the attorney general did not tell us the truth today. We heard it with our own ears. The fact is, they are lying to all of us, to all of you, and theyre doing it again and again and again. Are you okay with that . Theyre shamelessly doing it. The question is, what are we, what are you going to do about it . Because it is not too late. Yet. Its not too late yet. Emphasis on yet. The attorney general is refusing to testify before the House Judiciary Committee tomorrow. He says im just not going to do it. They have oversight. Hes not going to do it. So what are they going to do about it . That is a question for congressman dave cicilline. A member of that committee. Hes live here in studio with me next. Corey is living with metastatic Breast Cancer, which is Breast Cancer that has spread to other parts of her body. Shes also taking prescription ibrance with an aromatase inhibitor, which is for postmenopausal women with hormone receptorpositive her2 metastatic Breast Cancer as the first hormonal based therapy. Ibrance plus letrozole was significantly more effective at delaying disease progression versus letrozole. 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Ask if vraylar can help you get on track. Applebees bigger, bolder grill combos. Now thats eatin good in the neighborhood. The attorney general, william barr, refusing to testify tomorrow morning before the House Judiciary Committee, he is objecting to the committees decision to allow staff lawyers to question him, but chairman jerry nadler said barr is terrified of the questions he asked. Im going to bring in david cicilline. Thank you for joining us. My pleasure. Do you think hes afraid to come in as jerry nadler said, hes afraid of the questions hes going to be asked . Its pretty clear the attorney general objected to a process that we intend to follow tomorrow that the house rules permit, that the committee voted in favor of today to allow after members question the witness to allow the republicans and the democrats to have staff counsel do an additional hour of questioning. And its really because its hard to do fiveminute questions, you cant do followup. To be sure that we get at the evidence we need to collect in this hearing its a sensible thing, weve done it before but apparently mr. Mueller refused to come because he did not want to subject himself to questioning by the staff attorneys. You have to wonder, what is he afraid of, whats he trying to hide . Thats my question, if youve done everything by the book and you are the top Law Enforcement person in the country, what would you be afraid of . Why would you be afraid of some lawyer if youre telling the truth . Right. I think the chairman of our committee is right, i think mr. Barr is very afraid to come before the committee, he was willing to go in front of the committee controlled by the republicans in the senate but not willing to come before the democrats. Maybe hes afraid of moments in questions like this from senator Kamala Harris today, watch this. Has the president or anyone at the white house ever asked or suggested that you open an investigation of anyone, yes or no, please, sir. The president or anybody else. Seems youd remember Something Like that, and be able to tell us. Yeah, but im trying to grapple with the word suggest. I mean, there have been discussions of matters out there that they have not asked me to open an investigation. Perhaps theyve suggested . I dont know. I wouldnt say suggest. Hinted . I dont know. So shes a prosecutor. But my question is, and she got, you know, some of the best answers. Have you what if members of your committee asked the lawyers for pointed questions or good questions, because there was a lot of speechifying today, but the questions really did produce some good answers. I dont think theres any question we have terrific members of the committee that would ask good questions that would produce important answers but we also have staff counsel and the ability to followup rather than doing it in fiveminute increments to have a longer opportunity, hes a witness that sort of avoids stuff and being able to follow up with a pointed question is important and look the reality is, no witness, not the attorney general of the United States, not any other witness, has the right to dictate to congress how were going to conduct our work. These rules, our rules provide for this, we approved it today in the hearing and the reality is, i think mr. Barrs afraid to come before a committee because we have a lot of questions of why hes behaved more like the president s p. R. Firm rather than the lawyer swore he issued a fourpage summary which mischaracterized the findings in the report in the attempt to set the narrative and then he had this absurd press conference before the report was released, mischaracterized the report, misstated what was contained in it, again in an effort to really set the stage and then he has refused to provide the committee with the full unredacted report. This is a pattern of a person who believes hes working to protect the president rather than the American People. All that said, we both agree, so now what . I mean, if he defies if he doesnt show up, maybe do a subpoena, whatever, i mean, that happened to eric holder, eric holder if he doesnt show up, i mean, my hope is that the attorney general will sleep on this tonight and recognize that he owes the American People answers to a lot of difficult questions. What do you do if he doesnt show up . If he doesnt show up we will issue a subpoena to compel his attendance, we will also ask the chairman of the committee to issue a notice for a contempt citation because he did not comply with the subpoena that was due today. Okay, so then after that, what would happen . Then there will be litigation and a court will determine whether he is in contempt of congress and compel the production of the report. Okay. And then after that, if theres nothing . Well, the court has the ability to imprison him and fine him. If he doesnt comply. You would want to jail the attorney general . Look, our oversight responsibility is dependent on our ability to collect evidence, to compel sworn testimony under oath from witnesses. If the executive branch is allowed to just stop that process, it will eliminate congressional oversight. We have to be very clear that we will have the ability to bring before our committee any witness necessary to get to the facts to demonstrate that no one is above the law. That includes the attorney general and we are going to do it. Well, that would be interesting to see that the top Law Enforcement agency i can remind you as president nixons attorney general went to prison, so should be reminded this is Serious Business but congress has the responsibility to get this information, mr. Barr cannot prevent us from doing so and we will litigate this and we will ensure that the American People know the truth and we demonstrate no one including the president of the United States is above the law. David cicilline, always a pleasure, thank you so much. The attorney general william barr giving his side of the story today while obfuscating and evading at every turn, whatever happened to the man who bragged about being transparent . Memories. What we deliver by delivering. Guys, ive got an idea oooh, what is it . So people love iphone xr, right . Well, it does have an incredible camera. And it comes in all those amazing colors. Uh huh. 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The xfinity store is here. And its simple, easy, awesome. Attorney general barr not showing up at tomorrows House Judiciary Committee hearing. He is objecting to being questioned by the Committee Staff lawyers, that comes after his defiant testimony before the senate just today, repeatedly clashing with the democrats, lets discuss now, dana bash is here, laura coats, and jack quinn, good evening to all of you. Good to be in the same room. Welcome to washington. For a man who says hes all about transparency, why wouldnt he show up tomorrow . Theres been a lot of obfuscating and now hes saying tonight going to do it. On its face, its a fight over the process, how he will be questioned. The democrats dont want to have the members interview or interrogate him, ask him questions, they want to have a staff member do it. Staff lawyers. A staff lawyer so they argue on the democratic side so that its consistent and they have a longer, more running room in order to ask questions and they can do followup, followup, followup. The attorney general is saying, no, if you want me to come the elected officials who have the oversight, theyre the ones who are going to talk to me. So this is a process fight but its a political night. Right. Because he doesnt want to show up there. And the democrats gave him an out. Whether or not there was precedent or not, there is precedent, they give him a big out and he picked the fight because its good for him, its a fight that the president certainly wants him to fight and the Republican Base and same goes for the democrats but i think that the thing to look for, don, is maybe less about him, because the democrats have the gavel in the house, its more about when are they going to get mueller over there . Theres the question. Lets stick to barr now. Get more about this. I was just wondering if the staff attorneys can sit behind him and say or if they can wear ear pieces like we do when we scream no, do something else. That never works. That never happens. Lets talk about barrs testimony today, he seemed awfully evasive. This is some of the key moments, watch this. Polling data was shared, sir, its in the report, i can cite you the page. With who . Well, let me give you an opportunity to clarify. Have you had any conversations with anyone in the white house about those ongoing investigations that were spawned or spun off by i dont recall having any substantive discussion on the investigation. Im not in the business of determining when lies are told to the American People. I mean, the business of determining whether a crime has been committed. Would you concede that you had an opportunity to make this letter public on april 4th when representative crist asked you a very related question . I dont know what you mean by related question. It seems to me it would be a very different question. I cant even follow that down the road. That i mean, boy, thats a masterful hair splitting. Was he being truthful . No, hes being deceptive and doing it intentionally. He seems to be in the business of delay tactics that are used to try to create and cultivate a narrative that gives people, and on the one hand the assumption that most people are not going to comb through this 400plus document to figure out all the truths and to hear and rely on what he said in a fourpage summation, what he said in a conference, a press conference the day he released it, he wants to really get out in front of it and even mislead as we saw mueller wrote in a letter to him that he has not actually talked about the substantive basis of the arguments. Instead he relied on the talking points of donald trump which were essentially that mueller was either inept to investigate the investigators or he was incapable of actually accomplishing the one job he had, don, which was actually to reach a conclusion. You have him actually being a master of the art of manipulation, which and i hear people talk about lawyers and why they hate us and we split hairs, et cetera, but were talking about the attorney general of the United States, you are supposed to require and expect more from the person who was literally supposed to be the ones who are putting the blindfold or lady justice and arguing on behalf of the United States of america even when it doesnt make them look good. Today you had him serving at the pleasure of the president and serving to please the president once again. Interesting. You heard chairman nadler today saying he wants to see mueller on the 15th. Will that happen, will he see him . Will we see him . I think so. It really is going to be up to bob mueller. At that point hes you know, hes not an employee of the p. The question is, will he feel that hes duty bound not to do so without the authorization of the attorney general . Well have to see about that. I do think, by the way, that barr you know, i cant say he committed perjury today. But this was a really terrible day. I mean, he looked just awful. I cant count the number of clients to whom ive said when youre explaining, youre losing. And he was explaining all day. And its going to continue. And, you know, thats why he doesnt want to go back. Thats why he doesnt want to put himself in that room with skilled lawyers who are going to be able to ask tough questions. This is a guy who confessed today to not even having read the underlying report before coming to the most important conclusion he could come to. Absolutely. And also misconstruing what the letter said and the tone of the letter and mentioning the media and on and on. Were going to discuss that and fact check this letter coming up. But i think mueller is still an employee of the department of justice for now. But he might be leaving soon. I think hell be leaving soon and when hes not he will not be under the same limitations. Do you think that by writing the letter, by memorializing the fact that he didnt was not happy with barrs letter initially that with his Public Statement that thats an indication maybe he does want to speak out. Hold your thought. Well answer it after the break. Thats a tease. I have a thought. Yep, td ameritrades got that. Free access to every platform. Yeah, that too. I want to know what im paying upfront. Yes, absolutely. Everything you want. One low price. Td ameritrade. [spanish recording] so again, using para, youre talking about something that is for someone. Pretty good. Could listening to audible inspire you to start something new . Download audible and listen for a change. What would i say to somebody keep being you. . Keep loving. Keep aspiring. Keep striving. And ask your doctor about biktarvy. Biktarvy is a complete onepill, onceaday treatment used for hiv in certain adults. Its not a cure, but with one small pill, biktarvy fights hiv with three different medicines to help you get to undetectable. That means the amount of virus is so low it cant be measured in lab tests. So keep pushing. Keep creating. And keep pouring your soul into everything you do. Serious side effects can occur, including kidney problems, and kidney failure. Rare, lifethreatening side effects include a buildup of lactic acid and liver problems. Do not take biktarvy if you take dofetilide or rifampin. Tell your doctor about all the medicines and supplements you take, if you are pregnant or breastfeeding, or if you have kidney or liver problems, including hepatitis. If you have hepatitis b, do not stop taking biktarvy without talking to your doctor. Common side effects were diarrhea, nausea, and headache. If youre hivpositive, keep loving who you are, inside and out. Ask your doctor if biktarvy is right for you. Back now with dana, laura and jack. Dana, i was asking you before the break whether or not this letter, him wanting to memorialize it and did he want to do that, and is it an indication he wants to speak out . Yeah, i would say definitely. How many times have we seen footage of bob mueller walking down the hall ignoring questions . You know, he has just been a model of confidentiality and probity. This is not like him. And you have to wonder why now did he i think he was really irked. And i think thats probably an understatement because he must believe, i cant say what he believes. He must believe that barr misrepresented. I mean, muellers language, i mean, yeah, muellers language was very respectful, but he made very clear that he thinks that the fourpage summary that the attorney general put out was misleading and that it undermined this twoyearlong investigation. So i think hes probably pretty upset. Yeah, well he says so he says so in the letter and ive got to we learned today, just the first line of the letter, was that i previously sent you a letter dated march 25th, 2019 that includes the introduction and executive summary for each volume of the special counsels report marked with redactions, which is what he intended him to release. We learned that he wrote a this is a second letter that he wrote him. 48 hours later. Not just the first one. Thats right. And the answer that barr gave today in one of the clips you played earlier in the show is basically, you dont get to say that. Youre my subordinate. And technically he is right. But to say that hes, like, just like any other u. S. Attorney is a bit disingenuous considering the fact that he was tasked with investigating a very big thing and it was a twoyear special investigation, theres no independent counsel law so it is different. He does, you know, answer to the attorney general, but hes not just like any other u. S. Attorney. Hes a very decent in his own category. He said that at the same time that he acknowledged that he hadnt read the underlying evidence. Before he made a decision on that. We heard barr blame the media, saying its the media getting it wrong. We know that wasnt true. And the media reaction was never mentioned in this letter. But what what mueller was trying to get across is that the media was reporting and people were interpreting things perhaps in the wrong way because he put out a letter that misrepresented what he was saying and he wanted more context. I mean, naturally it was almost like a chicken versus the egg, which came first, what came first was his irritation perhaps because barr refused to put out the contextual arguments that laid out why mueller and his team failed to actually reach a conclusion. Thats extraordinarily important given the fact there was some mechanism already in place by which the American People, and he talks about the public in that letter, could have actually understood the reasoning, substantively as to why they did not reach a conclusion. And guess what they had . They had not one, but two summaries already provided and scrubbed of material that should have been redacted, and barr came out today, started out his hearing, and his opening statement, talking about well part of the delay was i had hoped that mueller would provide for me the full report in a format where i could simply pass it along but it took all this time, lo and behold the summary did not contain the material. They were given five times mueller essentially asked barr to release the summaries. To the public. To the public. He says if we look at muellers second letter to barr he says he mentioned the summaries at their march 5th meeting, the second time was early afternoon on march 24th, before barr released the letter to congress. The third time was the following morning in muellers first letter to barr, the fourth time was muellers second letter, and then today barr testified that mueller told him on the phone call that it was important to release the summaries. Five times. Letter, letter, letter, letter. What do i see there . The fact that somebody did not trust did not memorialize the conversation. The Senate Letter the department sent to congress and released late in the afternoon on march 24th did not fully capture the content, nature and subs stance of the offices work. We communicated that on the morning of the 25th, there is now public confusion. Basically saying because you did not summarize it correctly the public is confused. I think mueller is saying i think you misled the American People and i think you did a disservice by trying to control the narrative here for as long as you did. And that caused great harm to the and undermined the investigation. And bob mueller did something that bill barr never thought hed do. He bit back. Yeah. Its and that bite is going to hurt for a long time because i think the bill barr has lost all credibility with everyone except the core Republican Trump base, which is a diminishing part of the american election. I think everyone should be concerned about the attorney general of the United States misleading the American People, especially if youre a supporter of this president. Think about what happens after this administration, if it is a democratic president who comes in to office and a democratic attorney general, think about the precedent that this sets. Thank you all. Thanks, don. I appreciate your time. Thank you. Washington in complete disarray over the mueller report, lies tossed out and this countrys institutions being damaged beyond repair. Im going to ask the former director of National Intelligence james clapper, hes next. When a plan stops being a plan and gets set into motion. Todays merrill can help you get there with the people, tools, and personalized advice to help turn your ambitions into action. What would you like the power to do . Its a revolution in sleep. The sleep number 360 smart bed, from 999. Senses your movement and automatically adjusts on each side to keep you both comfortable. And snoring . How smart is that . Smarter sleep. So you can come out swinging, maintain your inner focus, and wake up rested and ready for anything. Sleep number is ranked 1 in Customer Satisfaction with mattresses by j. D. Power. Save 400 on select sleep number 360 smart beds. Only for a limited time. Menew infallible full weards concealer by loreal. 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Attorney general barr in his testimony denied Misleading Congress on the mueller report, can despite a letter from the special counsel himself saying otherwise. Thank you, director. I got to ask you. Your reaction to what you thought about todays hearing and whether you thought the attorney general was truthful. Did he tell the truth . I thought he was a master at hair splitting. If not blatantly dishonest. Great disappointment for me because i had high hopes for him. After his conformation hearing and knowing hed already served once as the attorney general and i thought he would rise above politics and do the right thing. And speak truth to power. But i and others have spoken often about our concern about the assault on truth and those endeavors in this country that defend on truth like Law Enforcement, intelligence. And journalism. Academics, science. And now we appear to have a case where the attorney general is participating in that assault on truth. Very disappointing. Is the only credible person the special counsel Robert Mueller . In this situation. It appears thats the case. I think first of all i think bobs writing those two memos was a big decision for him to make and he did it, im sure very thoughtfully. I think he wanted to make a record of it and get it out that he didnt think that the way the Investigation Report had characterized was accurate. That really bothered him. For him i think so. And the only way ahead now realistically is for him to testify directly. We have talked about barr using that word, spying. Remember he used it in his testimony before. You said to you it was stunning and scary, right . Today he said there was nothing wrong with it. Listen to this. You know my first job was in cia and i dont think the word spying has any connotation at all. The question is always whether or not its authorized and adequately predicated spying. I think spying is a good english word that doesnt have synonyms because it is the broadest word incorporating all forms of Covert Intelligence collections. Do you believe theres explanation there wasnt meant to be a just say surveillance or something. I think he understands that from his own time in cia and thats not a term of art used with the Intelligence Community and it was used in the same context, i believe, as the president used it. So for those of us in the business the way it was started. The way they got the fisa warrant. He wasnt part of the campaign yet. Its business of spying on the campaign. Is what occasion the concern in the first place was what the russians were doing who have a connection with the russian government and weve lost sight of that. And the threat the russians continue to pose and efforts to under mine us. Were losing the bubble. Which is to me, very disturb ing. I want dwrie listen to this moment from barrs testimony. Did you have a problem the way he handled the clinton email investigation . Yes, i said so at the time. As comey said at the time except barr wrote an oped for the Washington Post defending comey saying the fbi has to reopen the investigation into hillary clinton. And says james comey did the right thing. That was the title of it. And barr wrote he didnt agree with every move comey made but the fbi director had no choice but to make his announcement. Whats with the about face . Its somewhat of a rhetorical question. Where you stand depends on where you sit. I think its i mean this is another example of changing your perspective or position you occupy the person you work for. This is the former secretary of state and former president of the campaign, democratic nominee reacting to barrs testimony. That is the road to tyranny. That is what authoritarians believe and those who service them argue and as a ying lawyer on the watergate investigation back in 1974, that would have been unthinkable. Buts for either a democrat or republican to argue that. The saturday night massacre occurred because the attorney general and other highranking officials in the Justice Department would not do what president nixon wanted them to do. Do, which was basically stop investigating me. So when you hear Something Like that and i know pat lehigh well. Hes a former prosecutor. Obviously now a veteran senator. When i lacked at his face as he was asking the question, you could just see the incredulity like where does this end . Is she right . I think she has a point. I think thats a genuine concern. This trend in general towards authoritarianism is concerning. Thank you, director, as always. Well be right back. Were oscar mayer deli fresh and you may remember us from. Your very first sandwich, your moveinday. Feast. 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