Bill Barr Says Trump Is ‘Responsible’ for Jan. 6 … and Also That He’d Still Vote for Him in 2024
William Barr, the former attorney general who did Trump’s bidding in the Justice Department for nearly two years, has joined the cavalcade of former Trump lackeys who have determined they can cash in by writing a book trashing the man they willingly, dutifully served.
Barr’s entry into the canon, One Damn Thing After Another, is due out Tuesday, which means he has spent the past few days bashing the former president on various media channels.
On Sunday night, he sat down for an hour-long interview with Lester Hold of NBC News, criticizing Trump’s false claims of election fraud and alleging the former president was “responsible” for Jan. 6. (Barr did clarify that he doesn’t think Trump bears any legal responsibility for the attack on the Capitol.)
On Monday morning, he stopped by the Today show, where despite again bashing Trump’s efforts to, again, overthrow democracy, Barr said he’d still vote for any Republican nominee — including Trump — over a Democrat in 2024. “Because I believe that the greatest threat to the country is the progressive agenda being pushed by the Democratic Party, it’s inconceivable to me that I wouldn’t vote for the Republican nominee,” Barr said.
Even if [Donald Trump] “lied about the election” and “threatened democracy,” as you write in your book, it’s better than a Democrat? –@SavannahGuthrie
As of now, it’s hard for me to conceive that I wouldn’t vote for the Republican nominee. -Former Attorney General William Barr pic.twitter.com/nguVCpt2gh
— TODAY (@TODAYshow) March 7, 2022
Barr served as attorney general from Feb. 2019 to Dec. 2020, when he stepped down because he wasn’t willing to use the Justice Department to help Trump overturn the results of the 2020 election.
Trump has been bashing Barr ever since, including in a recent three-page letter to Holt obtained by Axios. “When the Radical Left Democrats threatened to hold him in contempt and, even worse, to Impeach him, he became virtually worthless to Law and Order and Election Integrity,” Trump wrote. “They broke him just like a trainer breaks a horse.”
Trump also called Barr “slow,” “lethargic,” “a big disappointment,” “boring,” “lazy,” “cowardly,” and someone who lacks “energy, drive, or curiosity.”
Quite the Trump letter to Lester Holt about Bill Barr, obtained by @axios https://t.co/tYzfzpFBHL pic.twitter.com/dnCxH5oEmb
— Alex Thompson (@AlexThomp) March 7, 2022
“He is groveling to the media,” the former president wrote, “hoping to gain acceptance that he does not deserve.”
Trump is right about that, at least.