2019年9月9日，美国总统唐纳德·特朗普(左)和司法部长威廉·巴尔抵达DC首都华盛顿白宫东厅，向应对俄亥俄州代顿和得克萨斯州埃尔帕索大规模枪击事件的官员和平民颁发英勇勋章。
尼古拉斯·卡姆/法新社通过盖蒂图片/盖蒂
司法部的规范受到了围攻。
周二，在司法部长威廉·巴尔出面要求后，四名职业检察官辞职给罗杰·斯通减刑唐纳德·特朗普总统的长期助手。然后，在星期五，纽约时报报道称，本月初，巴尔悄悄地“召集了一群外部律师，重新审查国家安全案件，有可能推翻职业检察官。”这些案件包括特朗普的另一名助手迈克尔·弗林，他的起诉一直受到总统的批评。
新闻周刊法律历史学家杰德·舒格曼问道专家司法部，把这些争议放在历史背景下。我们还向他询问了下个月最高法院将辩论的四个案件，这些案件实际上会进一步加强总统权力。
在这次采访中，舒格曼指责巴尔拒绝使用特别顾问，并呼吁进行结构性改革，以确保未来司法部更大的独立性。
他说，巴尔对罗杰·斯通案件的干预是“特朗普和巴尔模式中的又一次违反规范”他补充说，巴尔在巴黎圣母院和联邦主义者协会前发表的“激进党派”言论“非常不正常”，而且“影响了司法部长所做的一切的合法性”
至于巴尔最近公开抱怨特朗普的推文“让我无法工作”，舒格曼质疑巴尔认为他的工作是什么。“秉公执法？还是继续在幕后保护特朗普，而不失去更多的司法部律师来反驳辞职？”
舒格曼是福特汉姆法学院的教授，他在耶鲁大学获得了学士学位(1996年)、法律学位(2002年)和历史博士学位(2008年)。
新闻周刊:让我们谈谈巴尔建立自己的律师团队来重新评估职业检察官处理政治敏感案件的方式。我们以前在历史上见过这种情况吗？这对司法部和国家意味着什么？
杰德·舒格曼:一方面，这种从其他部门引进检察官的过程并非前所未有，事实上，DOJ应该更经常这样做。检察官通常有太多的自由裁量权和权力。在一个党派偏见、大规模监禁和检察过度的时代，我们需要更多的监督和透明度。
但这里的风险在于，尤其是巴尔有着广泛的偏见和议程记录，这种外部监督被精心挑选出来，以便在巴尔的监督和巴尔明显的党派议程下创建一个检察官团队。
这就是为什么我们有独立的特别顾问。但这也是特别法律顾问条例不充分的原因。现在是时候通过立法来重新制定一个真正独立的法律顾问，更重要的是，为DOJ的部分地区，如法律顾问办公室、监察长，或许还有整个DOJ，采用形式上独立的结构——如长期的年数、免于免职的保护以及两党委员会结构。
巴尔介入罗杰·斯通的案子有多不寻常？
我想你会说，我们看到的最接近这一点的事情是尼克松总统和周六夜大屠杀。那更严重，因为尼克松实际上解雇了一些人来阻止或阻挠调查。特朗普和巴尔本可以在陪审团回来之前终止斯通的起诉，但他们没有这么做。
另一方面，这是特朗普和巴尔模式中的又一次违反规范。尽管他们没有停止这项调查，但据报道，据称，巴尔可能已经停止了6到12项其他刑事调查。
你指的是什么？
穆勒报告所说的与其他报道的调查之间的连接点。
例如，迈克尔·科恩承认在竞选资金违规中帮助和教唆一名未被起诉的同谋。令人惊讶的是，你让教唆犯和帮助犯坐在监狱里，虽然我们知道主犯的身份，但主犯仍然没有被起诉。为什么？
答案难道不是他是总统，所以我们在等他离任吗？
那可能是真的。但在那起案件中，我们也有其他被指控或潜在的同谋，他们在起诉书或迈克尔·科恩与特朗普通话的录音中均有提及。
还有调查特朗普就职委员会是否浪费了捐款。到目前为止，许多严重犯罪的有力证据都没有带来任何结果。
去年3月，有一家未具名的外国公司秘密地向最高法院递交了穆勒传票，但没有成功。我们再也没听说过这件事。
还有埃里克·普林斯研究因为他是否对国会和其他事情撒谎。
可能会有无辜的解释。但是很多调查似乎都刚刚结束。所以，当你把罗杰·斯通的干涉排成一行时，你必须把它放在更大的背景下。
周四，在一个采访在美国广播公司新闻节目中，巴尔表面上反对特朗普，称他不会“被任何人欺负或影响”你对此有什么看法？
巴尔说特朗普的推特“让我无法完成我的工作”这就引出了巴尔认为他的工作是什么的问题。成为国家最高执法官员？公正执法？还是继续在幕后保护特朗普，而不因为辞职而失去更多的DOJ律师？他的履历是他的意思的一个线索。是的，特朗普的推特会让他的党派工作更加困难。
据报道，鲁道夫·朱利安尼正在接受调查...
这是另一个很好的例子。乌克兰阴谋，除其他外，是一个以实物形式寻求外国竞选资金捐赠的阴谋。有充分的证据表明朱利安尼是一个竞选资助重罪阴谋的一部分。
但巴尔的司法部已经表示，乌克兰事件不能作为竞选资金重罪起诉，因为乌克兰宣布调查亨特·拜登的“价值”无法量化。你觉得这不可信吗？
这正是特别顾问的职责所在。威廉·巴尔在举报人的报告中被点名，他在特朗普与[·乌克兰人通话的通话摘要中被反复点名]泽伦斯基总统。这显然表明，不仅仅朱利安尼是竞选资金和贿赂阴谋的同谋，威廉·巴尔也是同谋。这并不意味着他有罪，但这提高了他的形象。这就是为什么你有一个特别的律师。巴尔根本不应该参与。
尽管巴尔的司法部认为竞选财务费用是不合适的，但它从未提及索贿指控。你对此有什么看法？
第一步只是程序性的。这正是需要特别律师介入的时候。
联邦勒索的说法有些牵强。但是贿赂、诚实服务欺诈、竞选资金违规——这是一个更接近的问题。是否有反对将这些行为解释为犯罪的理由？没问题。但是巴尔被利益冲突感染了，这是不可信的。如果一个特别顾问提出了这些结论，至少你会有一定的可信度。
特朗普曾谈到解雇情报部门监察长，该监察长认为举报人的投诉是“可信的”和“紧急的”他有权这么做，对吗？
如何谈论这个很重要。许多人会说总统有绝对的权力解雇任何他想要的人。这太夸张了。
《宪法》从未明确提到驱逐权。这是宪法中的一个漏洞。在1789年第一届国会期间，有一场漫长的辩论。他们认为宪法含蓄地赋予了总统免职的权力。
但是宪法也说总统“应该注意法律的忠实执行。”因腐败原因被免职是不诚实的。在a纸和我的福特汉姆同事安德鲁·肯特和伊森·莱博一起，我们认为总统可以有免职的权力，但不能出于恶意和腐败的原因而使用。
有法院接受这个论点吗？
这是一项新的研究。我们一年前发表了那篇文章。
所以我们今天的观念是，检察官应该独立于政治影响——这能追溯到多远？
让我换一种说法。检察官必须平衡政治和专业精神。
我们的美国律师由总统任命，经参议院批准，然后提出从一届政府辞职到下一届政府。这是政治性的。我们50个州中的46个州的州检察官作为政党成员参加普选。这更具党派性和政治性。
但另一方面，我们也有专业标准，这对于将这些检察官与党派隔离开来更加重要。
DC，华盛顿——11月26日:(L-R)2019年11月26日，在DC首都华盛顿白宫椭圆形办公室，美国司法部长威廉·巴尔和美国总统唐纳德·特朗普出席了一项行政命令的签字仪式，该命令旨在建立失踪和被谋杀的美国印第安人和阿拉斯加土著人特别工作组。司法部长巴尔最近宣布了前往蒙大拿州的倡议，他在那里会见了联盟萨利希·库特奈部落的领导人。
从历史上来看，我们什么时候开始看到这些规范的确立？
在20世纪，我们有一套围绕利益冲突发展的准则。对于法官和检察官来说，如果出现利益冲突，他们应该回避。这是关于维护政治体系的合法性。
另一个重大变化是1870年司法部的成立。在那之前，总检察长或多或少是总统的顾问，有点像白宫的顾问。但是联邦检察官在国务院和财政部之间来回穿梭。那是因为当时主要的联邦犯罪与关税和进口税有关。
部门主管有自己的律师团队，他们会雇佣亲信。有很多腐败和赞助。
所以在1870年，他们试图创建一个更加律师化、专业化的司法部。
历史上最差的司法部长是谁？
在20世纪，有几个。伍德罗·威尔逊任期即将结束时，民主党人米切尔·帕尔默领导了帕尔默突袭行动。第一次世界大战后有一种对移民和共产主义的恐惧。帕尔默因这些旨在围捕南欧和东欧移民的排外、种族主义袭击而闻名。
跟随他的人，哈里·道戈尔蒂，沃伦·哈丁领导下的共和党人，监督了大量的腐败。
当时，在民主党总统的领导下，有很多亲信。然后约翰·肯尼迪带来了他的兄弟罗伯特·F·肯尼迪，这真是令人震惊。但是RFK后来将DOJ推向了民权和打击有组织犯罪的方向，所以现在一些人认为他是最好的。
然后你有尼克松。他有两名总检察长被判有罪。约翰·米切尔直接参与了水门事件，并因此入狱。然后是理查德·克莱因丁斯特，他承认犯有轻罪，因为他在与监管相关的政治主张上撒谎。
所以有很多不好的AGs。
比尔·巴尔在哪里？
鉴于巴尔如何干预，以尽量降低穆勒报告的重要性，有争议地歪曲穆勒报告，并可能援助和教唆国际贿赂阴谋和竞选资金违规...
但是等等，我们不知道。他否认与此事有任何牵连。
我们不知道。我们必须对列夫·帕纳斯所说的持怀疑态度。但是举报人的投诉和通话摘要本身就对巴尔的参与提出了重要的问题。
加州参议员卡马拉·哈里斯问巴尔总统是否建议对他进行调查，但他没有真正回答。我们能确定吗？
当他在三月底回来作证时，我相信民主党人会以一种精确的方式提问，让他在总统如何参与的问题上有更少的回旋余地。
巴尔在司法部网站上发表了一些非常好斗的演讲。10月，他给出了一个在圣母院，攻击“世俗主义者和他们在‘进步主义者’中的盟友”，他给出了一个演讲在11月联邦主义者协会攻击“左派”之前，指的是民主党。这正常吗？
这显然不正常。他使用的语言是故意煽动性的。这些话影响了司法部长所做的一切的合法性。当他攻击左翼并把左翼描绘成对美国人的威胁时，它就破坏了...
他说，“在对本届政府发动一场焦土、毫无保留的‘抵抗’战争时，是左派在系统地破坏准则和法治。”
不仅如此。他说“抵抗”的语言是革命的语言。
是的，他说:“‘抵抗’是用来描述反对占领军事力量强加的统治的叛乱的语言。...他们认为自己卷入了一场战争，以任何必要的手段削弱一个合法选举的政府。”
他以明示或暗示的方式描述了左派的行为，暗示他们卷入了潜在的暴力。
人们不禁要问，为什么他会站在联邦主义者协会或圣母大学门前，发表充满激情、咄咄逼人的党派演讲。我不知道他是否想把自己塑造成英雄和烈士。这是奇怪的行为。这是前所未有的，似乎是深思熟虑的和战略性的。司法部长发表这样的党派演讲几乎没有先例。
让我们转向最高法院。下个月将有四起案件被讨论，可能会扩大或限制总统权力。3月3日听到的第一条消息是塞拉法律诉消费者金融保护局。它探讨了国会在多大程度上可以将它在行政部门内部创建的独立机构的领导人与总统随意罢免隔离开来。
因此，我们在过去130多年里达成的妥协是，国会可以依据宪法建立独立的行政部门机构——比如联邦储备委员会、证券交易委员会、联邦贸易委员会——领导人不受总统随意罢免。然而，它只能在某些情况下这样做。
几乎所有这些独立机构都是作为委员会成立的。有时他们明显是两党的。他们通常任期交错，持续时间比总统任期还要长。没有人能控制这些机构行使的行政、准立法和准司法权力的混合。
消费者金融保护局是伊丽莎白·沃伦的主意。她说，就像我们保护消费者免受烤箱爆炸的伤害一样，我们也想保护消费者免受金融产品爆炸的伤害。所以在奥巴马政府早期，在金融崩溃的余波中，这个监察组织成立了。
但它不是由一个委员会领导，而是由一个人领导，除非有正当理由，否则总统不能罢免这个人。
这是一个突出的问题。这给了来自一个政党的一个人很大的权力。
如果我不得不预测的话，我认为最高法院将会发布一个狭隘的裁决，称这种结构——一个只有一个董事的独立机构，只有正当理由才能被撤销——是违反宪法的。
听起来总统不会从这样的裁决中获得巨大的权力。
如果像那样窄就不会了。但是特朗普司法部——副检察长——已经要求法院驳回所有案件——回到汉弗莱遗嘱执行人诉美国1935年——允许像美联储这样的独立机构不受总统随意罢免，并推翻它们。
甚至佣金？
甚至佣金。所以，说清楚一点，如果发生这种情况，美联储董事会不会消失，但是对董事会成员的工作保护会消失。
那么，如果法院接受了特朗普司法部的论点，未来的总统可以在他上任的第一天就解雇所有联邦储备委员会成员？
是的。或者在第一千天。所以，当你进入选举年，总统想通过选举降低利率来支撑经济，而他们不会这么做，他可以解雇他们所有人，联邦储备委员会的成员，而不需要任何通知或理由。
但更有可能的是，本法院将根据单一董事的情况对该案做出狭义的裁决。
另外三起案件是传票案件，将于3月31日审理。在特朗普诉万斯特朗普辩称，他绝对不受纽约州大陪审团传票的影响，该传票要求他提交与刑事调查有关的纳税申报单。在特朗普诉马扎斯和特朗普诉德意志银行他正在挑战国会对他的会计师事务所和银行发出的监督传票的广度，这些传票要求他、他的家人和他的企业的财务记录。
在特朗普诉万斯没有宪法论据表明总统凌驾于法律之上。亚历山大·汉密尔顿或詹姆斯·麦迪逊或一些联邦党人的报纸都没有提到总统不能被调查。
另一方面，你必须认识到实际问题。国家刑事调查是一种干扰，可以用于党派目的。如果情况正好相反，我们有奥巴马总统，可能会有关于出生证明的调查，州检察官要求出生证明，可能会有关于出生证明欺诈的起诉，等等。
我认为特朗普的律师说得对，联邦法院必须有审查州刑事传票的管辖权，以确保州检察官没有滥用权力。另一方面，一旦联邦法院发挥了这一作用，他们就可以检查检察官的动机以及请求的侵扰程度，以确保这不是一次试探而不是骚扰。然后，他们可以决定，在这种情况下，由于提出的具体问题和指控，大陪审团审查纳税申报表是否相关。
同样，许多人认为国会自动有权要求特朗普的财务记录。但我认为这是短视的。人们可以想象各种情况，一个不守信用的国会说，“我们有权要求财务记录，而且这是自动的，我们想要他们的人是伊丽莎白·沃伦、艾米·克洛布查尔和伯尼·桑德斯。”或者，另一方面，从马尔科·卢比奥和杰布布什，等等。
所以我们必须小心党派的恶意传票。
ATTORNEY GENERAL WILLIAM BARR'S ACTIONS ARE 'REMARKABLY NOT NORMAL,' SAYS LEGAL HISTORIAN
US President Donald Trump (L) and Attorney General William Barr arrive to present the Medal of Valor and Heroic Commendations to officers and civilians who responded to mass shootings in Dayton, Ohio and El Paso, Texas, in the East Room of the White House in Washington, DC on September 9, 2019.
Justice Department norms are under siege.
On Tuesday, four career prosecutors quit a case after Attorney General William Barr intervened to demand a lighter sentence for Roger Stone, a longtime associate of President Donald Trump. Then, on Friday, The New York Times reported that, early this month, Barr quietly "installed a phalanx of outside lawyers to re-examine national security cases with the possibility of overruling career prosecutors." The cases include that of Michael Flynn, another Trump associate whose prosecution the president has long criticized.
Newsweek asked legal historian Jed Shugerman, an expert on the Justice Department, to put these controversies in historical context. We also asked him about four Supreme Court cases being argued next month that could actually further beef up presidential power.
In this interview, Shugerman faults Barr for refusing to use special counsels, and calls for structural reforms to ensure greater Justice Department independence in the future.
Barr's intervention in Roger Stone's case, he says, was "yet another breach of norms in a pattern with Trump and Barr." He adds that Barr's "aggressively partisan" speeches at Notre Dame and before the Federalist Society, which Barr has posted on the Justice Department website, are "remarkably not normal" and "affect the legitimacy of everything the attorney general does."
As for Barr's recent public complaint that Trump's tweets "make it impossible for me to do my job," Shugerman questions what Barr thinks his job is. "To do justice impartially? Or to keep protecting Trump behind the scenes without losing more Justice Department lawyers to rebuking resignations?"
A professor at Fordham Law School, Shugerman obtained his B.A. (1996), law degree (2002), and Ph.D. in history (2008) from Yale.
Newsweek: Let's talk about Barr installing his own team of lawyers to reevaluate the way career prosecutors have handled politically sensitive cases. Have we seen this before in history, and what does it mean for the Justice Department and the country?
Jed Shugerman: On the one hand, this process of bringing in prosecutors from other offices is not unprecedented, and in fact, the DOJ should be doing this more often. Prosecutors generally have too much discretion and power. We need more supervision and transparency in an era of partisanship, mass incarceration and prosecutorial overreach.
But the risk here, especially with Barr's extensive track record of bias and an agenda, is that this outside supervision is being cherry-picked to create a team of prosecutors under Barr's supervision and Barr's obvious partisan agenda.
This is precisely why we have independent special counsels. But this is also why the special counsel regulations are insufficient. It is time to pass legislation to re-enact a truly independent counsel and, even more importantly, to adopt structures of formal independence—like a long term of years, protections from removal, and a bipartisan commission structure—for parts of the DOJ like the Office of Legal Counsel, the Inspector General, and perhaps the DOJ overall.
How unusual was Barr's intervention in Roger Stone's case?
I think you'd have to say that the closest thing we have seen to this was President Nixon and the Saturday Night Massacre. That was more severe, because Nixon actually fired people to stop or obstruct an investigation. Trump and Barr could've shut down the Stone prosecution before the jury came back, and they didn't do it.
On the other hand, it is yet another breach of norms in a pattern with Trump and Barr. And even though they didn't shut down this investigation, we now have, reportedly and allegedly, somewhere between a half dozen to a dozen other criminal investigations that Barr may have shut down.
What are you referring to?
Connecting dots between what the Mueller Report said it was spinning off and other reported investigations.
For example, Michael Cohen pleads guilty to aiding and abetting an unindicted co-conspirator in campaign finance violations. It's kind of surprising that you have the aider and abetter sitting in jail, and while we know the identity of the principal, that principal has still not been indicted. Why is that?
Isn't the answer that he's president and so we're waiting till he leaves office?
That might be true. But we also had other alleged or potential co-conspirators in that case, who were mentioned in either the indictment or in Michael Cohen's recordings of his calls with Trump.
Then there's the investigation of whether the Trump inaugural committee misspent money from donations. A lot of strong evidence of felonies has led nowhere so far.
There was an unnamed foreign corporation that unsuccessfully fought a Mueller subpoena, behind closed doors, all the way to the Supreme Court last March. We've heard no more about it.
There's also Erik Prince, being investigated for whether he lied to Congress and other matters.
There may be innocent explanations. But it's a lot of investigations that seem to have just gone dark. So when you line up this Roger Stone interference, you have to put that in the larger context.
On Thursday, in an interview with ABC News, Barr ostensibly pushed back against Trump, saying he would not be "bullied or influenced by anybody." What do you make of that?
Barr said Trump's tweets "make it impossible for me to do my job." That begs the question of what Barr thinks his job is. To be the nation's top law enforcement official? To do justice impartially? Or to keep protecting Trump behind the scenes without losing more DOJ lawyers to resignations? His track record is a clue as to which he means. Yes, Trump's tweets would make his partisan work more difficult.
Rudolph Giuliani is reportedly under investigation...
So that's another great example. The Ukraine conspiracy was, among other things, a conspiracy to solicit a foreign campaign finance donation, in kind. There's ample evidence that Giuliani was part of a campaign finance felony conspiracy.
But Barr's Justice Department has already said the Ukraine affair couldn't be prosecuted as a campaign finance felony, because the "value" of Ukraine's announcing an investigation of Hunter Biden wasn't quantifiable. Do you find that implausible?
This is exactly what the special counsel is for. William Barr is named in the whistleblower's report, and he's named repeatedly in the call summary of Trump's call with [Ukrainian] President Zelensky. It raises an obvious appearance that it's not just Giuliani who's a co-conspirator in a campaign finance and bribery conspiracy, but William Barr who is a co-conspirator. It doesn't mean he's guilty, but it raises that appearance. That's why you have a special counsel. Barr should not be involved at all.
Although Barr's Justice Department decided that campaign finance charge was inappropriate, it never addressed a solicitation of bribery charge. What do you make of that?
The first step is just procedural. This is exactly when a special counsel needs to be involved.
The claim of federal extortion is a stretch. But bribery, honest services fraud, campaign finance violations—that's a closer question. Are there arguments against the interpretation of these acts as crimes? Sure. But Barr's so infected with conflict of interest, it's not credible. If a special counsel came up with those conclusions, at least you'd have some degree of credibility.
Trump has talked about firing the intelligence community inspector general who found the whistleblower's complaint to be "credible" and "urgent." He has the right to do that, right?
It's important how to talk about this. Many people will say the president has absolute power to fire anyone he wants. That's exaggerated.
The Constitution never mentions explicitly the removal power. It was a gap in the Constitution. There was this long debate during the first Congress in 1789. They decided that the Constitution implicitly gave the president a removal power.
But the Constitution also says that the president "shall take care that the laws are faithfully executed." Removal for corrupt reasons is in bad faith. In a paper with my Fordham colleagues Andrew Kent and Ethan Leib, we argue that the president can have a removal power, but it can't be used in bad faith and for corrupt reasons.
Has any court accepted that argument?
This is new research. We published that article a year ago.
So this notion we have today, that prosecutors are supposed to be independent of political influence—how far does that go back?
Let me put that differently. Prosecutors have to balance politics with professionalism.
Our U.S. attorneys are appointed by presidents and confirmed by the Senate and then offer to resign from one administration to the next. So that's political. Our state prosecutors, in 46 out of our 50 states, run for popular votes as members of political parties. That is even more partisan and political.
But the flip side is that we also have norms of professionalism that are all the more important to insulate those prosecutors from partisanship
WASHINGTON, DC - NOVEMBER 26: (L-R) U.S. Attorney General William Barr and U.S. President Donald Trump attend a signing ceremony for an executive order establishing the Task Force on Missing and Murdered American Indians and Alaska Natives, in the Oval Office of the White House on November 26, 2019 in Washington, DC. Attorney General Barr recently announced the initiative on a trip to Montana where he met with Confederated Salish Kootenai Tribe leaders.
When, historically, do we start seeing those norms set in?
We have a set of norms over the 20th century that evolve around conflicts of interest. For both judges and prosecutors, they're supposed to recuse if there's an appearance of a conflict of interest. It's about preserving legitimacy in a political system.
Another major change was the creation of the Department of Justice in 1870. Up until then, you had an attorney general who was more or less counsel to the president, a little like White House counsel. But federal prosecutors bounced back and forth between being housed under the State Department and the Treasury Department. That's because the main federal crimes at the time related to customs and import taxes and duties.
Department heads had their own sets of lawyers, and they'd hire cronies. There was a lot of corruption and patronage.
So in 1870 they tried to create this more lawyerly, professionalized Department of Justice.
Who was the worst attorney general in history?
In the 20th century, there were several. A. Mitchell Palmer, a Democrat, toward the end of Woodrow Wilson's term, led the Palmer Raids. There was this post-World War I fear of immigrants and communism. Palmer was famous for these xenophobic, racist raids to roundup southern and eastern European immigrants.
The one that followed him, Harry Daugherty, a Republican under Warren Harding, oversaw a tremendous amount of corruption.
Then, under Democratic presidents, there were a lot of cronies. Then John F. Kennedy brought in Robert F. Kennedy, his brother, which was pretty stunning. But RFK later wound up moving the DOJ in the direction of civil rights and fighting organized crime, so some now consider him among the best.
Then you have Nixon. He had two attorneys general who were convicted of crimes. You have John Mitchell, who was directly involved with Watergate, and went to jail. And then Richard Kleindienst, who pled guilty to a misdemeanor for lying about political favors relating to regulation.
So there are a lot of bad AGs.
And where does Bill Barr fit in?
Given how Barr has intervened to minimize the significance of the Mueller Report, to arguably misrepresent the Mueller Report, and to perhaps aid and abet an international bribery conspiracy and campaign finance violation...
But wait, we don't know that. He denies any involvement.
We don't know. And we do have to be skeptical of what Lev Parnas says. But the whistleblower's complaint and the call summary itself raise significant questions about Barr's involvement.
California Senator Kamala Harris asked Barr if the president had suggested investigations to him, and he didn't really answer. Do we know yet for sure?
When he comes back to testify in late March, I'm sure Democrats will ask questions in a precise way to give him less wiggle room about how the president has been involved.
Barr has posted some very combative speeches on the Justice Department website. In October he gave one at Notre Dame, attacking "secularists and their allies among the 'progressives,'" and he gave a speech before the Federalist Society in November attacking "the Left," meaning Democrats. Is that normal?
It's remarkably not normal. The language he's used was deliberately inflammatory. Those words affect the legitimacy of everything the attorney general does. When he attacks the Left and portrays the Left as being a threat to Americans, it then undermines ...
He said, "In waging a scorched earth, no-holds-barred war of 'Resistance' against this Administration, it is the Left that is engaged in the systematic shredding of norms and the undermining of the rule of law."
And there's more than that. He said the language of "resistance" is the language of revolution.
Yes, he said: "'Resistance' is the language used to describe insurgency against rule imposed by an occupying military power. ... They see themselves as engaged in a war to cripple, by any means necessary, a duly elected government."
He frames the Left's behavior in ways that, explicitly or implicitly, suggests that they're involved with potential violence.
One has to ask why he would get up in front of the Federalist Society or at Notre Dame and give fire-and-brimstone, aggressively partisan speeches. I wonder if he wants to frame himself as both hero and martyr. It's bizarre behavior. It's so unprecedented that it seems to be deliberate and strategic. There is almost no precedent for an attorney general to give such partisan speeches.
Let's turn to the Supreme Court. There are four cases being argued next month that could either expand or constrain presidential powers. The first, being heard March 3, is Seila Law v. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. It explores the degree to which Congress can insulate leaders of the independent agencies it creates within the executive branch from removal at will by the president.
So the compromise we've reached over the last 130-ish years is that Congress can constitutionally create executive branch agencies that are independent—like the Federal Reserve Board, Securities and Exchange Commission, the Federal Trade Commission—with leaders who are protected from at-will removal by the president. It can only do so under certain circumstances, though.
Almost all of these independent agencies have been set up as commissions. Sometimes they are explicitly bipartisan. They usually have staggered terms that last longer than a presidency. No one person controls the mix of executive, quasi-legislative and quasi-judicial power that these agencies wield.
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau was the brainchild of Elizabeth Warren. Just as we protect consumers from toaster ovens that blow up, she said, we also want to protect consumers from financial products that blow up. So early in the Obama administration, in the aftermath of the financial collapse, this watchdog group was created.
But instead of being led by a commission, it's led by a single person whom the president can't remove except for good cause.
This is the salient problem. That gives a lot of power to a single person who comes from a single party.
If I had to predict, I think the Supreme Court will issue a narrow ruling that says that this structure—an independent agency with a single director, removable only for good cause—is unconstitutional.
It doesn't sound like the president would gain an enormous amount of power from such a ruling.
Not if it's narrow, like that. But the Trump Department of Justice—the solicitor general—has asked the Court to strike down the entire set of cases—going back to Humphrey's Executor v. United States in 1935—that allow for independent agencies like the Federal Reserve to be insulated from at-will removal by the president, and to overturn them.
Even the commissions?
Even the commissions. So, to be clear, if that were to happen, it's not like the Federal Reserve Board would disappear, but the job protections for board members would disappear.
So if the Court accepted the Trump Justice Department's argument, a future president could fire all Federal Reserve Board members on day one of his presidency?
Yes. Or on day 1,000. So, as you're entering into an election year and the president wants to lower interest rates to prop up the economy through the election, and they wouldn't do it, he could fire them all, the Federal Reserve Board members, without any notice or cause.
But it's more likely that this Court will narrowly decide the case, based on the single director.
The other three cases are subpoena cases, which will be heard March 31. In Trump v. Vance, Trump argues that he's absolutely immune from a New York State grand jury subpoena seeking his tax returns in connection with a criminal inquiry. In Trump v. Mazars and Trump v. Deutsche Bank, he is challenging the breadth of Congressional oversight subpoenas issued to his accounting firm and banks, which seek financial records of him, his family, and his businesses.
In Trump v. Vance, there's no constitutional argument that the president is above the law. There's no letter by Alexander Hamilton or James Madison or some Federalist Paper that says the president can't be investigated.
On the other hand, you have to recognize the practical problem. State criminal investigations are a distraction and can be used for partisan purposes. If the shoe were on the other foot, and we had President Obama, there might be investigations about birth certificates, and state prosecutors demanding birth certificates, and potentially indictments for fraud about birth certificates and so on.
I think the Trump lawyers were right to say that federal courts must have jurisdiction to review state criminal subpoenas to ensure that a state prosecutor isn't abusing his power. On the other hand, once federal courts play that role, then they can examine the prosecutor's motives and how intrusive the requests are, to make sure it's not a fishing expedition and not harassment. Then they can decide whether, in this case, it's relevant for the grand jury to look at the tax returns because of specific questions raised and allegations.
Similarly, many people assume Congress automatically had the right to demand Trump's financial records. But I think that's myopic. One could imagine all kinds of scenarios where a bad-faith Congress says, "We have power to request financial records, and it's automatic, and the people we want them from are Elizabeth Warren and Amy Klobuchar and Bernie Sanders." Or, on the flip side, from Marco Rubio and Jeb Bush, and so on.
So we have to be careful about partisan, bad-faith subpoenas.
