Former Vice President Joe Biden demanded Attorney General William Barr resign for intervening in the criminal case of GOP operative Roger Stone.
Biden appeared on MSNBC on Monday to talk about the Democratic presidential primary and reacted to recent updates in Stone’s case. Biden said he agrees with the more than 1,100 former Justice Department officials in calling for Barr’s resignation in a letter that accuses the attorney general of doing President Trump’s “personal bidding” in intervening in the case.
“This has been the most — the greatest abuse of power I have ever seen at the hands of this president who has no, no sense of decency or understanding of the Constitution, and Barr facilitating it is beyond my comprehension,” Biden said.
“No president, no president, no president has ever intimidated an attorney general into abusing power as much as this man has,” Biden added.
Last week, the DOJ intervened in the case of Stone, scrapping the sentencing recommendation of the case’s prosecutors to recommend a lighter sentence. The move appeared to come after Trump tweeted his displeasure with the original penalty. Barr said the decision to scale it back was made before the president criticized the guidance.
Trump praised Barr for “taking charge” of the case on Twitter, riling Democrats on Capitol Hill, who alleged that Trump might have ordered the intervention as a political favor for Stone, his longtime friend.
Barr told ABC News on Thursday that Trump’s constant Twitter commentary on DOJ investigations makes “it impossible for me to do my job” and claimed that his work would remain independent from the president’s political desires.
Biden previously called for Barr’s resignation in May, claiming the attorney general mishandled former special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election. At the time, Biden said Barr had “lost the confidence of the American people.”
