finish. i would agree with that. i also think over the past 18 months you rather harshly prejudged the investigation in some of your writings. i don t see that at all, senator. when you strip away a lot of the rhetoric, the two things that have been thrown up as me sort of being antagonistic to the investigation are two things. one, a very mild comment i made that i wish the team had been more balanced. i wasn t criticizing mueller. i believe that prosecutors and i think he would agree they can handle the case professionally whatever their politics are. a good prosecutor can leave their politics at the door and do the job. i think that is what justice department prosecutors do in general. you were also very critical of the russian probe. i can t think of anything that would jump out more for this
other potential obstruction of justice theories or argued that some have strongly suggested that a president can never obstruct justice. i wrote it myself on my own initiative without any assistance and based solely on public information. i would like to comment very briefly on my priorities if confirmed as attorney general. first, we must continue the progress we ve made on violent crime while at the same time recognizing the changes that have occurred since i last served as attorney general. the recently passed first step act which i intend to diligently implement if confirmed recognizes the progress we have made over the past three decades in fighting violent crime. as attorney general, i will ensure that we will continue our efforts to combat violent crime. in the past, i was focussed on
i think the integrity of our institutions is just as much at risk today. president trump views the justice department as an extension of his political power. he is calling on it to target opponents. he ubseszs over the russia investigation. he attacks the special counsel almost daily. he fired both previous fbi director and attorney general for not handling the investigation as he pleased. that tells me the rule of law can no longer be taken for granted. so fif confirmed, the president will expect you to do his pitting. i can almost guarantee you, you will cross the line at some point. that is why the commitments you make here today, just like those i watched elliot richardson make years ago, matter greatly. so will you commit, if
you are going to write off members of congress. we told them all about this and the constitutional cases. we got them up. they wrote a memo two months later that said that they were going to respond to all this stuff. now you have people in the bowels of bureaucracy saying if you are not a chairman you are not going to get an answer to anything. how ridiculous. that is our constitutional responsibility. i will give you an example. i sent the justice department a classified letter regarding information acquired from the justice department inspector general report on the clinton investigation. the department ought to answer for what the attorney inspector general has found. i haven t heard a peep on that yet. on december 10 the justice department i m repeating here. the question is, do you understand that if you are confirmed, you have an
d.o.j. published a report entitled the case for more incarceration. this report declared that the problem with our criminal justice system was we were incarcrating too few criminals. you signed the letter opposing the act of 2015. this letter states clearly your opposition to sentencing reform particularly lessening of mandatory minimum sentence. the first step act was signed by president trump. as attorney general it will be your job to implement the legislation even though you are opposed criminal justice reform in the past. will you commit to fully implementing the first step act? yes, senator. in 1992, when i was attorney general, the violent crime rates were the highest in american history. the sentences were extremely short. typically in many states the time served for rape was three