Barr says documents case against Trump is “entirely of his own making.”
William P. Barr, who served as attorney general under President Donald J. Trump, on Sunday berated his former boss for “reckless conduct” that led to Mr. Trump’s indictment on charges of mishandling classified documents. his own making.”
Mr. Barr, in an interview with CBS News’ “Face the Nation,” discussed the seriousness of the allegations against Mr. Trump. He described the former president’s actions — detailed in a 49-page indictment — as damaging not only to the country, but also to the Republican Party and the conservative movement Mr. Trump leads.
Mr. Barr also attacked Mr. Trump’s character in extraordinary terms, describing him as “a consummate narcissist” and a “fundamentally flawed person” who would always put his own ego above everything else. He added that he believed Mr Trump had lied to the Justice Department about classified documents in his possession.
“He’s like a rebellious 9-year-old boy who always pushes the glass to the edge of the table and dares his parents to stop him from doing it,” said Mr Barr, adding that “our country doesn’t have a therapy session for so a man with problems.
Mr. Trump, charged with illegally holding classified documents and obstructing efforts to retrieve them after leaving office, is the first former president to be charged with federal crimes. Last week he pleaded not guilty.
Mr. Barr has become an outspoken critic of the former president, but was once a staunch defender, including during the 2016 special counsel investigation into Mr. Trump’s ties to Russia, which sought to discredit Mr. Barr.
Mr Trump “has been a victim of unfair witch hunts in the past,” Mr Barr said on Sunday. But, he stressed, the allegations in the documents case were very different.
“This was a case he made all by himself,” Mr. Barr said. “He had no right to those documents. The government spent more than a year quietly and respectfully trying to get them back – which was essential – and he let them go with a jerk. And he had no legal basis to keep them.”