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Barr skips House hearing; Pelosi accuses him of lying

Published:Friday | May 3, 2019 | 12:00 AM
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The Associated Press
Rep. Steve Cohen, D-Tenn., placed a prop chicken on the witness desk for Attorney General William Barr after he does not appear before a House Judiciary Committee hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, May 2, 2019.
The Associated Press
Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y. (left) laughs with Representative Steve Cohen, D-Tenn, after Cohen arrived with a bucket of fried chicken and a prop chicken as Attorney General William Barr will not appear before a House Judiciary Committee hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, May 2, 2019.
The Associated Press
Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., speaks to the media at a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, May 2, 2019.
The Associated Press
Ranking Member Rep. Doug Collins, R-Ga., right, accompanied by Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., left, speaks as Attorney General William Barr does not appear before a House Judiciary Committee hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, May 2, 2019. Barr, who informed the Democrat-controlled panel he will skip a scheduled hearing on special counsel Robert Mueller's report, escalating an already acrimonious battle between Democrats and the Justice Department.
The Associated Press
The House Judiciary Committee witness chair will be without its witness this morning, Attorney General William Barr, who informed the Democrat-controlled panel he will skip a scheduled hearing on special counsel Robert Mueller's report, escalating an already acrimonious battle between Democrats and the Justice Department, on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, May 2, 2019.
The Associated Press
Attorney General William Barr testifies during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, Wednesday, May 1, 2019, on the Mueller report.
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WASHINGTON (AP):

Attorney General William Barr skipped a House hearing on Thursday on special counsel Robert Mueller’s Trump-Russia report, escalating an already acrimonious battle between Democrats and President Donald Trump’s Justice Department.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi suggested that Barr had already lied to Congress in other testimony and called that a “crime”.

Barr’s decision to avoid the hearing, made after a disagreement with the House Judiciary Committee over questioning, came the day after the department also missed the committee’s deadline to provide it with a full, unredacted version of Mueller’s report and its underlying evidence. In all, it is likely to prompt a vote on holding Barr in contempt and possibly the issuance of subpoenas, bringing House Democrats and the Trump administration closer to a prolonged battle in court.

Empty Chair

Democrats convened a short hearing that included an empty chair with a place card set for Barr. Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler of New York said that if the attorney general doesn’t provide the committee “with the information it demands and the respect that it deserves, Mr Barr’s moment of accountability will come soon enough”.

Shortly afterward, Pelosi increased the tensions further. In a reference to the attorney general’s testimony last month, Pelosi said Barr “was not telling the truth to the Congress of the United States – that’s a crime”.

At a hearing on April 9, Florida Representative Charlie Crist asked Barr about reports that members of Mueller’s team believed that he had failed to adequately portray their findings in a four-page memo that was released before the full report.

Crist asked at the hearing, “Do you know what they are referencing with that?” Barr responded, “No, I don’t,” and went on to say that Mueller’s team probably wanted “more put out” about what they had found.

Democrats have raised questions about that testimony since it was revealed this week that Mueller had written Barr two weeks earlier, on March 27, complaining that the attorney general’s memo “did not fully capture the context, nature and substance” of his work.

Barr said on Wednesday that his answer was not misleading because he had been in touch with Mueller, rather than members of his team, and that the concerns were mostly about process and not substance. Within minutes of Pelosi’s comments, Justice Department Spokeswoman Kerri Kupec called her words “reckless, irresponsible and false”.