CNN’s chief legal analyst, Jeffrey Toobin, came down heavily on Attorney General William Barr because of his defense of President Donald Trump, saying that it appeared as if it was not Barr who was the head of the Department of Justice, but Fox News host Sean Hannity, according to HuffPost .
Barr has been at the receiving end of criticism, especially from House Democrats, who have claimed the attorney general has done all in his powers to protect Trump from the findings of the Mueller report. Barr has since appeared before Congress, but his testimony was fraught with tensions, which only got exacerbated when he appeared for an interview on Fox News this week.
Not only does Barr seem to concur with Donald Trump in his characterization of the Mueller investigation as a “witch hunt” and “hoax”, but he has also even given precedence to the president’s demand of starting an investigation into the origins of the FBI’s probe into Trump’s ties with Russia.
“I think people have to find out what the government was doing during that period. If we’re worried about foreign influence, for the very same reason we should be worried about whether government officials abused their power and put their thumb on the scale,” Barr said, as quoted by HuffPost .
In another interview with The Wall Street Journal, Barr went one step ahead and reiterated Trump’s claims of the government “spying” on him before he got elected.
CNN’s chief legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin accused Attorney General William Barr of simply regurgitating Fox News’ talking points in a bid to cast a positive light on Donald Trump. https://t.co/OOEB4SewTE
— HuffPost (@HuffPost) May 18, 2019
Meanwhile, Toobin said that he was amazed by the “astonishing” interview William Barr gave to Fox News , saying that most of Barr’s talking points have already been expressed by Sean Hannity.
“It turns out the attorney general is Sean Hannity and Sean Hannity is the attorney general,” Toobin told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer.
“I mean, every talking point from Fox News gets repeated. That he has no problem with calling the FBI, which works for him, ‘a hoax’ and ‘a witch hunt’ and Donald Trump co-operated fully even though he didn’t talk to the investigation.”
Toobin seemed to suggest that Barr is now also taking cues directly from Sean Hannity, host of the widely watched primetime Fox News show Hannity and a massive supporter of Trump. From the beginning, Hannity has characterized the Mueller probe as an attempt by Democrats to besmirch Trump. The president has not hidden his admiration for the conservative news host and now, as Toobin claims, William Barr seems to be following suit.
