WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump says he didn’t know the Justice Department was planning to drop its case against his former national security adviser, Michael Flynn.
By ERIC TUCKER and MICHAEL BALSAMO
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump says he didn’t know the Justice Department was planning to drop its case against his former national security adviser, Michael Flynn.
But it didn’t really matter.
The extraordinary action underscored the extent to which Trump and Attorney General William Barr have been in sync in their views on the federal Trump-Russia investigation — with or without communicating about it. Barr himself has openly challenged the decisions of predecessors and his own prosecutors. He’s launched internal probes to investigate the investigators.
Trump is emphatically welcoming the Flynn action. He has relentlessly railed against the special counsel’s inquiry into his 2016 campaign’s contacts with Russia — which the Flynn case grew out of — and was eager for news in his favor to shift voters’ focus away from his administration’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic that has crippled the U. S. economy.
Beyond that, the decision to dismiss the Flynn case had the effect not only of undoing a key prosecution from special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation of Trump’s winning campaign, but also of sparing the president from having to make a politically charged pardon decision in the current election year.
The sudden action on Flynn has produced familiar divisions in public opinion. Trump allies cheered the results, while Democrats and some current and former Justice Department officials expressed dismay.
“Bill Barr is a man of unbelievable credibility and courage,” Trump said during a Friday appearance on “Fox & Friends” where he devoted substantial time to the news. “And he’s going to go down in the history books.”
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi agreed about going down in history but for a different reason. She said, “Attorney General Barr’s politicization of justice knows no bounds.”
Trump suggested Friday that more surprises could be afoot, saying “a lot of things are going to be told over the next couple of weeks.” He said the “jury’s still out with regard” to FBI Director Chris Wray.
If Trump was upset for political reasons about the case of Flynn, the Justice Department says Barr was troubled by legal issues.
