Confirmed today by the U.S. Senate 70-31, 68-year-old former D.C. Appeals Court Judge Merrick Garland became the 86th Attorney General. Garland promised to return the Department of Justice [DOJ] to appropriate independence, free from the political fray, however that emerges in the future. Garland’s promise of judicial independence is a slap to 70-year-old former Atty. Gen. William Barr, whom Democrats trashed as a patsy for 74-year-old President Donald Trump. When it comes to judicial independence, the only thing biased about Barr was the way the media attacked him, all because it fit their case against Trump in the 2020 election. Barr actually showed incredible independence and evenhandedness, when trying to investigate the origins of former President Barack Obama’s illegal counterintelligence investigation of Trump’s 2016 campaign and presidency.
Garland doesn’t plan on looking in the rear view mirror when it comes to his Justice Department priorities moving forward. He pledged that he would pursue an investigation into the origin of the Jan. 6 Capitol riot that FBI officials now say was planned in advance, possibly coordinated with some White House officials. Calling the Capitol riot his “No. 1 priority,” Garland signaled that he’s not planning on reviewing the DOJ investigation into the 2016 Trump campaign and his presidency, using the FBI to investigate Trump for his alleged ties to the Kremlin. While Garland knows that U.S. Atty. John Durham (R-Conn.) was appointed Special Counsel by Barr to look into the origin of the FBI’s counterintelligence investigation, involving wiretaps from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act [FISA] Court. Garland doesn’t seem interested in completing the DOJ investigation.
Pledging to focus on the Jan. 6 riots, Democrats hope that Garland finds probable cause to prosecute Trump, something 78-year-old President Joe Biden says is entirely up to him. When Garland says he’ll defend the independence of the DOJ, it doesn’t look independent when anti-Republicans outside groups want the president prosecuted for inciting a riot on Jan. 6, Garland is well-aware of how an impeachment trial is a quasi-criminal proceeding, since, as everyone knows, the only punishment from conviction would be removal from office. So with the House managers and Senate already prosecuted the impeachment case against Trump, it would look like a violation of the Fifth Amendment’s Double-Jeopardy Clause, prohibiting prosecution for essentially the same offense twice. Democrats have an insatiable appetite when it comes to prosecuting Trump for real or imagined crimes.
Biden says he wants Garland to run the Justice Department independently of the White House but knows that his 50-year-old son Hunter is under investigation for income tax evasion from foreign business deals, including in the Ukraine and China. While Biden denied know anything about Hunter’s foreign transactions, his former business partner Tony Bobulinski testified that it wasn’t true. Bobulinksi, a former business partner of Hunter Biden, confirmed that he met with Joe on more than one occasion regarding a business deal with China. Garland says he wants to run the DOJ independently of the White House but it’s doubtful Garland, or any of his deputies, would pursue charges against Hunter, certainly not the president. All the partisanship at the DOJ in the Trump White House came not from Barr but from Democrats looking to discredit Trump’s 2020 campaign.
No one was more partisan than Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), trying and convicting Trump of Russian collusion on the Senate floor for more that four years. Yet Schumer now act ecstatic that the DOJ has been turned over to Garland. “America can breathe a sigh of relief that we’re finally going to have someone like Merrick Garland leading the Justice Department. Someone with integrity, independence, respect for the rule of law and credibility on both sides of the aisle,” Schumer said, saying exactly the opposite of the truth. Barr did everything possible to stop the political witch- hunt against Trump, only to be accused by Schumer and Democrats of colluding with Russia for his entire presidency. Schumer’s comments could not be more partisan and inaccurate, slamming Barr because he wanted to find out the origin of the DOJ and FBI investigation against Trump and his 2016 campaign.
Whether Garland wants to or not, he’s part of the Democrat spin machine designed to discredit Trump and the Republican Party. “He understands that the jobs of the attorney genera is one to protect the rule of law, unlike the previous attorneys generals under President Trump,” Schumer said, firing a shot across the bow that extreme partisanship has returned to the DOJ. As long as it favors Democrats, Schumer could care less about judicial independence. Under Schumer’s “rule of law,” the DOJ, CIA, FBI and National Security Agency [NSA] can be used to harass Republican rivals. “I would not have taken this job if I thought that politics would have any influence over prosecutions,” Garland told the Senate Judiciary Committee Feb. 22. Garland knows the only thing partisan about Barr were the Democrats looking to trash him for trying to get to the bottom of the Russian Hoax.
