Former Attorney General William Barr called out Fox News host Mark Levin’s “farcical” defense of Donald Trump during a brutal Wednesday for the conservative outlet. (Watch the video below.)
Appearing on Bret Baier’s Fox News show, Barr reacted to a clip of Levin, a vociferous supporter of the former president, from an episode of “Hannity” the night before.
Levin had sought to justify Trump’s possession of classified documents at his Florida estate, for which Trump was recently indicted.
“His power comes from the Constitution,” said Levin, who was chief of staff for then-Attorney General Edwin Meese during Ronald Reagan’s presidency. “He is a third branch of government. Him. He alone. Everything else flows from him!”
Baier noted to Barr, who was nominated to the AG post by Trump in 2018, that Levin was saying the Presidential Records Act protects Trump.
“The position is being taken that this is really just a document dispute over custody of documents and the president has good arguments as to why he should have kept them — I think the arguments are farcical, and will be shown as such,” Barr said. “But I also think, more importantly, they’re a sidelight and they’re distracting from the real issue.”
Barr said the critical charges against Trump stem from obstruction for his alleged resistance after he was subpoenaed for the documents. Trump could have opposed the subpoena legally “but he did not,” Barr said.
“What did he do?” Barr continued. “He engaged in an outrageous act of obstruction and deception that obstructed that subpoena. And that is wrong. That’s a violation of law. That’s a serious problem for him.”
Barr’s comments came amid a busy news cycle for Fox News as it fended off a slew of criticism, much of it from President Joe Biden’s administration.
The White House blasted the outlet for a deceptive headline about a Pride flag that flew during an LGBTQ+ event ― and Fox News soon changed it. The network also got flak from press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre for using a graphic that called Biden a “wannabe dictator.”
On Thursday Levin attempted to get in the last word on Barr’s comments, calling him “shameful” in a tweet.
“By the way, Bill, it’s the job of defense counsel to ‘jerk around’ the government when there’s a dispute. You don’t roll over if you believe you’re in the right.”
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