Former Attorney General William Barr criticized the court decision granting former President Donald Trump’s request for the appointment of a special master.
Bashing the decision as “deeply flawed,” Barr argued that the Justice Department should appeal it and that a court battle over a special master could delay the DOJ’s inquiry about Trump’s handling of classified material for several months.
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“The opinion, I think, was wrong, and I think the government should appeal it. It’s deeply flawed in a number of ways,” Barr explained in an interview with Fox News’s The Story with Martha MacCallum. “I don’t think the appointment of a special master is going to hold up — but even if it does, I don’t see it fundamentally changing the trajectory.”
On Monday, U.S. District Court Judge Aileen Cannon, who was appointed to her post by Trump, greenlit the former president’s petition for the appointment of a special master to review documents seized from Mar-a-Lago by FBI agents during the August raid for privileged material.
Cannon controversially indicated that a special master could determine whether some of the documents retrieved may be subject to executive privilege claims. In court documents, the DOJ contended executive privilege was not a factor because President Joe Biden denied the assertion of executive privilege in the past and deferred the disputes over the document matter to the archivist.
It’s hard to grasp how a special master would assess executive privilege. Any residual privilege of a former president lets him ask Biden to assert the privilege as to third parties, like Congress. Here, it’s the executive branch that wants its own documents back.
— Barb McQuade (@BarbMcQuade) September 6, 2022
“The government has very strong evidence of what it really needs to determine whether charges are appropriate — which is government documents were taken,” Barr continued. “Classified information was taken and not handled appropriately. And they are looking into, and there is some evidence to suggest that they were deceived.”
“None of that really relates to the content of documents,” he added.
Barr noted that he believed an appeal would be successful but could take months to sort out and delay the DOJ’s inquiry further. He has previously shrugged off Trump’s request for a special master as a “red herring” and argued that Trump was wrong to have stashed material with classified markings at his Palm Beach resort.
Trump has vehemently denied allegations of wrongdoing, insisting that he declassified the material seized. FBI agents reportedly took 26 boxes and over 100 documents with classified markings during the bombshell raid, according to court documents. Material seized ranged from “CONFIDENTIAL to TOP SECRET information,” per court filings.
Attorneys for Trump have conceded in court that “it would be appropriate for the special master to possess a Top Secret/SCI security clearance” to review the documents. Federal investigators are examining possible obstruction of justice and violations of the Espionage Act, according to an unsealed warrant for the August raid.
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Trump and Barr famously had a falling out during the end of Barr’s tumultuous two-year tenure atop the DOJ. He resigned from the attorney general post in December 2020 over a dispute with Trump about the former president’s claims that the election was “stolen” from him and has publicly criticized his boss in the time since his departure.
