William Barr Slams Claims Trump Impeachment Violates First Amendment

former attorney general William Barr on Wednesday rejected the arguments that donald trumpAttempts to quash the 2020 presidential election amounted to free speech, saying the government had a “legitimate” case following Tuesday’s impeachment of the former president.

trump was impeached by a federal grand jury in connection with his attempts to remain in power after losing the election to Joe Biden. he faces four felony counts alleging multiple conspiracies to defraud the United States, obstruct an official proceeding, and deprive Americans of their right to vote and have that vote counted.

Lawyers for the former president responded with fury, accusing the Justice Department of attacking free speech and undermining Trump’s First Amendment rights. But Barr, who served under Trump until December 23, 2020, said CNN those claims were wrong.

“As the prosecution says, they are not attacking his First Amendment right. He can say what he wants. He can even lie,” Barr told CNN’s Kaitlan Collins on Wednesday. “You can even tell people that the election was stolen when you knew better. But that doesn’t protect you from getting into a conspiracy. All conspiracies involve speech, and all fraud involves speech.”

“As a legal matter, I don’t see any problem with the prosecution,” he added. “I think it is not an abuse. The Department of Justice is not acting to arm the department by proceeding against the president for a conspiracy to subvert the electoral process.”

Barr went on to confirm key points in the indictment, saying that Trump was repeatedly told there was no evidence of voter fraud.

“As far as the people who had any knowledge of whether or not there was fraud, they were all telling him that the election was not stolen by fraud,” he said, adding that Trump would “seek a lawyer who would give him the advice he wanted.” .”

“He wouldn’t listen to all the lawyers in various departments or the White House.”

The impeachment is Trump’s third in four months. Special counsel Jack Smith accused the former president of 40 felonies related to your handling of classified documents. Trump has also been defendant in New York on charges related to hush money payments made to porn star Stormy Daniels in the final days of the 2016 presidential campaign.

Barr added Wednesday that his former boss had caught many former aides and sympathizers in his misdeeds, and warned that he would continue to do the same in the future.

“He leaves ruined lives like this in his wake. The people who went up to the Capitol, these individuals (in the case of the documents), many of the people who served it…. He just leaves all this carnage in his wake. … Loyalty is a one-way street for him.”