when a.g. barr came to the white house, i think it was early afternoon, he noticed that it hadn't been cleared. gave the order for it to be clear. and that action took place. reporter: why did the president feel it was important to walk through the park to go to the church? secretary mcenany: the president wanted to send a very powerful message that we will not be overcome by looting, by rioting, by burning. this is not what defines america. going by and standing by st. john's church was a very important moment. i would note through all of time, we've seen presidents and leaders across the world who have had leadership moments and very powerful symbols that were important for a nation to see at any given time to show a message of resilience like churchill. we saw him inspecting the bombing damage. it sent a powerful message of leadership. and george w. bush throwing out the ceremonial first pitch after 9/11. and jimmy carter putting on a sweater to encourage energy savings. and george h.w. bush sign

t was a.g. barr who said the perimeter needed to be expanded one block each way because we were not going to see the church burn another night. i've already gone through in meticulous detail with my friend, jim, here, how that came about, that that perimeter was eventually moved. am not going to repeat myself again. reporter: [inaudible] would not have been violent protesters that would not have happened? no.etary mcenany: there were three announcements. if the protesters had remained perimeternd moved the if they were not instructed one, two, three speakers via loud that would have been different. hen bricks are thrown, rest assured, something will be done. naubl naubl down to the basement -- [inaudible] down to the basement to inspect it. what was he looking for? won't go mcenany: i further than what the president said because there are security matters and i won't engage on of discussion. yes. reporter: so going back to osenstein, what is the president's response to the fact nor neither rosenstein

you had a.g. barr, this week and he was talking about reduced immunity and he said i don't think we have to reduce immunity to go after bad cops because that would result in police pulling back which is not advisable. he has not reviewed it, but a.g. barr has reviewed it. >> does the administration support the banning of the use of chokehold? sec. mcenany: the president has not reviewed the legislation and is looking at what is a state issue and what is a federal issue right now. he is currently reviewing proposals on this very topic of police reform so i will leave it to him and not get ahead of him on that. but certainly we believe the appropriate amount of force should be used in any police interaction with an individual. >> two weeks after all of this civil unrest, why does the white house not have a plan? the president has said his plan for combating racism is a strong economy. how does that work? sec. mcenany: that is an important part of combating racism, is making sure there's equal opportunity

you had a.g. barr, this week and he was talking about reduced immunity and he said i don't think we have to reduce immunity to go after bad cops because that would result in police pulling back which is not advisable. he has not reviewed it, but a.g. barr has reviewed it. >> does the administration support the banning of the use of chokehold? sec. mcenany: the president has not reviewed the legislation and is looking at what is a state issue and what is a federal issue right now. he is currently reviewing proposals on this very topic of police reform so i will leave it to him and not get ahead of him on that. but certainly we believe the appropriate amount of force should be used in any police interaction with an individual. >> two weeks after all of this civil unrest, why does the white house not have a plan? the president has said his plan for combating racism is a strong economy. how does that work? sec. mcenany: that is an important part of combating racism, is making sure there's equal opportunity

when a.g. barrame to the white house, the order wasn't done so he made the action. >> why did the president walk to the clutch? >> the president wanted to send a powerful message that we won't be overcome by looting, rioting and burning. this defines america. standing by st. john's church was very important america. through all of time, we've seen presidents and leaders across the world who have had leadership moments and powerful symbols for a nation to see at any given time to show a message of resilience and determination. like churchill. we saw him with the bombing damage. george w. bush throwing out the ceremonial first pitch after 9-11 and jimmy carter putting on a sweater to encourage energy savings and george h.w. bush signing with the americans with disabilities act flanked by two disabled americans. for this president, it was powerful and important to say that the rioters will not prevail. in that moment holding the bible up is something hailed by franklin graham and others and a very impo

it was a.g. barr that made the decision to move the police. they saw the violence in lafayette square. when the protesters were moved by park police and they issued that tactical order, there were three loud warnings. as a.g. barr said on "face the nation", many moved back. other protesters started hurling objects. it was unacceptable. park police acted as they thought was responsible at that time and we stand by those actions. >> the country and the world saw this violent clash between people that were peacefully protesting. but the president is not sorry for the way things went? >> no. the president is sorry about antifa wreaked havoc in our streets and the failure of members of the media to note that like cnn's chris cuomo that said that protesters are supposed to be peaceful. i point him to the first amendment where you should protest peaceably. he should go back and read the constitution. many others out there like don lemon saying rioting is a mechanism to restructure the country. burning down st. johns. using a pick to literally carve o

certain, a.g. barr, who is a serious law enforcement fficer, he has a sterling reputation, to runaround and say e's interfering, he's running political interference for the president, it's absolutely laughable. cleaning up what are the ruins of the obama-biden d.o.j. particular, he's cleaning up rom jim comey who weaponized and politicized the f.b.i. look at ubt me, just the treatment of former national flynn.y advisor michael those were political abuses. gamesmanship ical that was orchestrated by f.b.i. director comey and what i call married band of never trumpers. omey's f.b.i. used the logan act. for those of you that don't highly e logan act is problematic and frankly highly unconstitutional. it makes it illegal for u.s. in zens to engage unauthorized foreign diplomacy. despite this, the f.b.i. act general flynn even though they knew he would never obscure d with the offense. in fact, since its enactment, usedogan act has only been twice to prosecute individuals. 1802 and one in 1852. and both were

certain, a.g. barr, who is a serious law enforcement fficer, he has a sterling reputation, to runaround and say e's interfering, he's running political interference for the president, it's absolutely laughable. cleaning up what are the ruins of the obama-biden d.o.j. particular, he's cleaning up rom jim comey who weaponized and politicized the f.b.i. look at ubt me, just the treatment of former national flynn.y advisor michael those were political abuses. gamesmanship ical that was orchestrated by f.b.i. director comey and what i call married band of never trumpers. omey's f.b.i. used the logan act. for those of you that don't highly e logan act is problematic and frankly highly unconstitutional. it makes it illegal for u.s. in zens to engage unauthorized foreign diplomacy. despite this, the f.b.i. act general flynn even though they knew he would never obscure d with the offense. in fact, since its enactment, usedogan act has only been twice to prosecute individuals. 1802 and one in 1852. and both were

a.g. barr: thank you. with that, i will open it up to questions. >> to ask a question, you may press star one. question.a today's first question, nbc news. go ahead. reporter: mr. attorney general, washington, d.c., has experience like the with large events and inauguration or meetings of the world bank. did you think it was necessary for you to take where does his and authority come from? rioting got going n may 29 and got worse and worse over the weekend. it culminated or came to a on sunday evening ight around the white house on the northern side of lafayette park. serious rioting. he treasury annex, treasury department annex was broken into. historical building on lafayette park, which is federal property, was burned down. fire set at the istorical st. john's church right there, across from the white house. an old church that goes back to the 18th century and is referred to as the church of presidents. crow bars to ed dig out the pavers at lafayette and used them as secret les, thrown at service and ot

and a.g. barr had the same concern that civil rights were being violated by local an irities, and -- and if he had no right, administration also have no right. it is absolutely incredible that people can come in here and after the justice department, dod wasintel, even paying come all these people were involved in trying to prevent a republican from theseng president, and three witnesses do not have any problem whatsoever with that? history will not judge you the days ahead, whether we get to continue this little experiment in self-government or not, because you have been an accomplice after the fact to what has occurred in the justice department, and you are so biased, you cannot even see it. i don't have a lot of questions for people who don't have credibility, have chips on their shoulders. elias, for heaven's sake, you come in here with your complaints -- it is a shame we do not have a serious hearing. it is just a sideshow. o be called for what it is. if we are concerned about justice, we need

actions but anti for i do think it's important to note that they are a big element of this protest a.g. barr has noted that. ambassador o'brien has noted that we have ample evidence that d.o.j. has received indicating that and he says roots responsible for that unrest but as to exactly how and he has identified that would be more of a question for d.o.j. yeah you know when you talk about it you know right now the president has already hit the 44th 'd floor but beyond the national guard he does i mean look we're looking at every tool in the in the federal tool kit available to us you know ideally this would have been resolved at the state level the states after all have the police power imbedded in the 10th amendment it is their responsibility to patrol their stair streets but you're right to say that there are many federal authorities including the one you cited available to us. the phone call with the focus of the call with the governors was really the national guard not that specific tool in the tool kit that you mentioned but the national guard and how it should be utilized much stronger

. -- a.g. barr. a member of the administration noted this. >> does the administration support the banning of the use of chokehold? kayleigh: the president has not reviewed the legislation and is looking at what is a state issue and what is a federal issue now? he is currently reviewing proposals on this very topic of police reform so i believe it to him and not get ahead of him on that. but certainly we believe the appropriate amount of force should be used in any police interaction with an individual. >> two weeks after all of this civil unrest, why does the white house not have a plan? has said his plan for fighting racism is a strong economy. how does that work? kayleigh: that is an important part of combating racism, is making sure there's equal opportunity for black americans in this country. you know we hear a lot of words from democrats about criminal justice that they wanted this and they got it with president trump, reducing racial sentencing disparities with the first step act. democrats ta

are disturbed by attorney general barr's possible role in ordering law enforcement personnel to suppress a peaceful domestic protest in lafayette square. on friday the a.g. denied giving the order to clear the protesters but earlier in the week the white house press secretary told reporters it was barr in fact who made the decision and this reminder. barr himself made a very public visit to the park knowing it would be spotted by the cameras that day as he conducted his personal survey of the crowd. back with us tonight the former fbi assistant director for counterintelligence. among our national security analysts for good reason. so, frank, people are exhausted. people have watched accountability wash away. these days when you have a problem in this government you fire the inspector general. people have seen other, the letters with mass signage get ignored. as a signee of this letter why is this important? >> first because we should refuse to allow what i call outrage fatigue to become numb to us. the members of the department of justice that signed this letter are saying we can't get used to this. this is not normal and we need answers about the role

committed and has made a commitment to those families, particularly hurting right now to work with the a.g. barrparticularly senator tim scott of south carolina. here's the president going after the previous administration on why we haven't seen this up till now. police reform that works. let's watch. >> president obama and vice president biden never tried to fix this during their eight-year period. the reason they didn't try is because they had no idea how to do it. >> harris: roger, i'll come to you first. your reaction. >> well, the president is kind of developing an appetite for the caffeine that is the executive order. it's a very fleeting thing. executive orders don't carry any weight when it comes to funding or anything. so this is a symbolic set of language. can it be an important compass that then he needs to build a legislative strategy around while he also reaches out to a variety of constituencies around the country. an executive order is essentially just a sugary kind of calorie. the question is whether or not he's going to sit down and try to do something that has more enduring lon

but what these former military officers and both a.g. barrt is this is not the time and it's not an issue of whether it's constitutionally right, but whether it is morally right. that's where jim mattis decided to walking in. i know it was a very difficult decision for him to speak up as well as general thomas, dempsey, i mean, the list goes on. howard: yeah. i think it's particularly hard for former military people to speak up against their president, although obviously some did, because it is ingrained in them to salute the commander in chief. and so this is a moment -- and i'm sure many people disagree, but it's great to have your perspective. jennifer griffin, thanks so much for joining us. >>> and that's it for this edition of mead ya with buzz. -- media buzz. i'm howard kurtz, let's continue the conversation, and it's a hot conversation in a difficult time. on twitter, i've got my podcast, we talk about this every day, "mediabuzz" meter, foxnewspodcast.com, apple itunes or spotify. we are back here next sunday 11 eastern. hope to see yo

an all staff meeting that the cannabis industry was "unpopular on the 5th floor," referring to a.g. barr's office at the d.o.j. headquarters >> desjardins: republicanse n the commitshed back, defending barr as fixing previous problems of anti- consvative bias. >> he's cleaning up the mess of the previous administration and restoring integrity and honor to the d.o.j. and the f.b.i. >> i mean, they're notpo tical, they're just right. bubbling tensions.with republico how nadler ran the hearing. a preview of a bigger hearing yet to come, attorney general atrr is expected to testif the end of next month. for more on today's hearing and the dismissal ofriminal charges against michael flynn, i'm joined by carrie johnson of n.p.r.. carrie, let's just start with the hearing. we heard these attorneys allege barr useds d.o.jwer for political reasons. how unusual is testimony like this? >> it is extremely unusual for prosecutors at this level in the stice department to be testifying at all, let alone when some of these matters are still ongoing, lisa. in the last 20 years, i feel like it's happened up

a.g. barrs leading the way but in a sign off capacity, he was. >> the white house provided in justification for the firing. the target of the investigation by the justice department after his ouster and cnn contributor andrew mccabe. thanks for being with us. are you surprised by the mixed messages and lack of clear explanation or any explanation for why mr. berman was unser moan -- fired? >> i'm not surprised by that. quite frankly, we've seen this level of confusion and incompetence with other maneuvers around certainly administration and now the j justice department. it's a series of deliberate misrepresentations to the people. the letter on friday night clearly misrepresented the circumstances around berman's leaving the post as the head of the southern district of new york and the attorney general and president's conflicting stories about the firing on saturday only made the matter even more confused. this repeated misrepresentation to the american people have to really undermine people's

he was not -- a.g. barreading the way but in a sign-off capacity, yes, the president was. >> which means president trump wasn't telling the truth to this question about why he fired the u.s. attorney. >> attorney general barr is working on that. that is his department not mine. so that is really up to him. i'm not involved. >> outfront now the former u.s. attorney for the southern district of new york daniel goldman. of course you know his face. thank you very much, dan. what do you make of this? you know, sort of -- he was involved or he wasn't involved. clearly, he was involved. it is a pretty easy thing to check and yet they aren't giving a straight story. why is that so hard to do, do you think? >> well, it is hard to do because of a quirk in the law which actually because geoffrey berman was actually appointed by the district court in the southern district and not confirmed by the senate, he can only be fired by the president not by bill barr. and so that is why bill barr wrote the letter on saturday sa

what the president should do is acknowledge that there are systemic issues and go against what a.g. barr. . to acknowledge that race is still a major issue in this country. that we need to reform the system and he should take the lead as the commander in chief in that. i'm not a betting man but i wouldn't put a penny on him doing that. >> i'm a mere civilian. i want you to help me understand this. the louisville police department just released breonna taylor's incident report. it was basically blank. we have to remember, this woman was fatally shot eight times in her own apartment. and it lists her injuries as none. how could that be? >> what did the police say happened to mr. floyd before the video came out? what did the police say happened in buffalo before the video came out? there are institutional cultures here in which people protect each other. the horrendous miscarriage of justice that resulted in miss taylor losing her life should have been assiduously detailed. every relevant fact there. that's an outright lie. a person doesn't get shot eight times and have no injuries. so this

a.g. barr coming in. we're moments away from hearing the president. we heard from john roberts. set us up with the three buckets, credentialling, info sharing, best practices and the co-responders. your time line thoughts. >> the co-responders is important. there's some situations where polices are expected to act like social workers and psychologists. you stop in the new york city subway. when i was an nypd police officers, you see someone homeless that has a mental health issue. police officers, it would be helpful to have a social worker there to co-respond. i don't see a down side to that. having said that, there's some scenarios where they call them a violent edp, emotionally disturbed person. those will remain law enforcement and don't want to put social workers in danger. the database, a good idea. a lot of law enforcement concerns about privacy, harris. you don't want people get put in this database and having their names leaked to the press if they had some use of force incident that was adjudicated. the president's team is very open to law enforcement input. here's the

so it's good that a.g. barr is doing. it to my kids who are asleep upstairs right now, probably not asleep and awake. if they do something wrong, and it's clearly wrong, and instead of punishing them at that moment and throwing the book at them and saying setting an example and saying here you go, you are in jail pending a court hearing because you set something on fire, i'm going to wait two months and then we will get the federal investigation going and then you are going to be, it's just not as useful as the point of impact. and so we're behind the curve already. but it's good to see that they're doing it. steve: you know, pete, that's why so many people were frustrated when they saw the looting and violence and they saw the trouble and it didn't seem like anybody was stopping them. and, you know, were they being prosecuted at a local level? not here in new york. so many people were released. it took the feds to actually do something. meanwhile, let's talk a little bit about this. it was just a matter of time there san

and a.g. barr had the same concern that civil rights were being violated by local an irities, and -- and if he had no right, administration also have no right. it is absolutely incredible that people can come in here and after the justice department, dod wasintel, even paying come all these people were involved in trying to prevent a republican from theseng president, and three witnesses do not have any problem whatsoever with that? history will not judge you the days ahead, whether we get to continue this little experiment in self-government or not, because you have been an accomplice after the fact to what has occurred in the justice department, and you are so biased, you cannot even see it. i don't have a lot of questions for people who don't have credibility, have chips on their shoulders. elias, for heaven's sake, you come in here with your complaints -- it is a shame we do not have a serious hearing. it is just a sideshow. o be called for what it is. if we are concerned about justice, we need

i also encouraged a.g. barr to meet with the news publishers who have been harmed by this anticompetitive behavior and learn firsthand about the fear and intimidation tactic activists have weaponized against legitimate journalism. madam president, this can no longer be chalked up to just simply bias. the people making these decisions are the most powerful voices in the world, and they have decided that they don't want you to think. they don't want you to challenge the narrative. and they sure don't want you to rock the boat and draw the ire of activists who still don't believe these efforts that censorship have gone far enough to silence conservative voices. i yield the floor and note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call: quorum call: mr. grassley: i ask that the calling of the quorum be suspended. the presiding officer: without objection. the senator from iowa. mr. grassley: first of all, unrelated to the remarks i'm going to make, i ask unanimous consent to

a.g. bill barr, first in a "new york times" interview.of foreign countries that could easily make counterfeit ballots, put names on them, send them in, and it would be very hard to sort out what's happening." but barr cautioned that, "i haven't looked into that," and he offered no evidence to substantiate the claim. so, this is just the attorney general speculating about a hypothesis. and so, we took a lot of heat for it, including from the federal election commission's ellen weintraub, who tweeted, "there's simply no basis for the conspiracy theory that voting by mail causes fraud. none." and there's a couple of reasons we know this. first, roughly a quarter of americans voted absentee by mail in 2016, as did president trump, vice president pence, the attorney general, ivanka trump, jared kushner, white house press secretary kayleigh mcenany. currently, five states all have vote by mail -- utah, colorado, oregon, hawaii and washington. and in the 20 years that oregon has done mail-in ballots, it's had a grand total of around a dozen case

brian: i like the fact that they said quickly a.g. barr said it's not about biden not about obama.ld be pure politics. even if they did have a role in it, the focus as trey gowdy said yesterday, you could call one guy it's peter strzok. he's the linchpin. his fingerprints are all over this for both investigations. finally, instead of talking at or about, we're going to get comey, clapper, samantha power, all trying to justify their actions. i just hope america will be paying attention. meanwhile jillian mele you are paying attention all morning. you have the rest of the news. >> that's right. we begin with a fox news alert. right now a manhunt is underway for the gunman who ambushed california deputies shooting one in the head. mason james lira, a homeless man accused of opening fire on a police station. when deposit i deputies respondy were met with a hail of bullets. >> we had unprovoked attack on local law enforcement. and, in my opinion, an act of a coward. jillian: the wounded deputy is in serious but stable condition with a bullet lodged in his head. confirmed covid-19 cases

listen to a.g. barr. >> i don't know of any book that's been published so quickly.hat is front and center right now is trying to get him to complete the process. go through the process and make the necessary deletions of classified information. we don't believe that bolton went through that process. hasn't completed the process and therefore is in violation of that agreement. >> going to come out june 23rd. and going to give the president's critics just another book talking about donald trump in a negative way. we will see where it goes from here, steve. steve: if it comes out it. sounds like the white house is going to -- the administration is going to seek a court injunction to bar the release. although apparently he also has an interview with abc news over the weekend to promote it. but it's interesting. mark zaid who that name is familiar to a lot of people. he was the attorney for the whistleblower, right? he says if the government deems even one word classified in john bolton's book he could be prosecuted regardless of failure to obtain approve subjecting him

they are certainly behind this , a.g. barrffect and still has ambassador o'brien and criminalizing making sure that they are labeled as domestic terrorists is so important because as i noted at the top there are legitimate peaceful protesters out there and i've seen them. i saw a video here in d.c. where a violent rioter was cobbeling the street in an effort to throw bricks at police officers and it was peaceful protesters that stopped this individual so we've got to distinguish this violent antifa from the protesters who do have a legitimate grievance. steve: sure. where are they getting all of those bricks? i'm just kind of wondering about that. of course yesterday, the president of the united states did say that he wanted to designate antifa as a domestic terror terrorist organization but kayleigh the president also said democrats are not tough enough on the violent protesters , and the troublemaker s and whatnot. why did he designate the democrats are not tough enough? >> yeah, i think when you look at some of the befuddli

and now we have a.g. barr in there and he is having a chance to really evaluate what was happening.s what he said was going on with the fbi leading up to the 2016 election. >> before the election i think we are concerned about the mode of force behind the very aggressive investigation launched into the trump campaign with a very thin slender read as a basis for it. it seemed that the spring loaded at the end of july to drive in there. and investigated a campaign after the election even though they were closing down. for some reason they went right at it. becoming painfully obvious or should have been obvious to anyone that there was nothing there. brian: it's easy for a politician to say that's the president i want and take sides. ag goes in and says what the hell is going on here. what are you getting from that. >> what i'm getting is we were right in. this brian, we have been talking about this for a long time you said rosenstein being a crossing guard he was complicit. he will signed these things he admitted he probably dngtsd read them and go into them. we see what attorney gene

a.g. and there was nothing like this. bill barrtaken the doj to a disturbing new level. >> let me get in what the doj spokesperson said. dismissing zelensky's claims. he did not have any discussion with the attorney general, the u.s. attorney or any other member of political leadership about the sentencing. instead the allegations concerning the u.s. attorneys motivation are based on his own interpretation of events and hearsay at best, not firsthand knowledge. so just back to you, can zelensky's testimony from today be dismissed as hearsay? >> absolutely not. first of all, i give aaron zelensky credit. that is giving corruption at the top. i'm not sure i would have had the guts to do that when i was on the line at doj. but aaron zelensky allegations were coming out of nowhere, not like anything we've seen before but it is part of a pattern that you cannot ignore of this doj bending cases to the political will of the president. we saw it after the mueller case. when bill barr tries to squash the ukraine complaint and michael flynn

manhattan, jeffrey berman, had been building nearly since the beginning when barr took over last january, february. berman had briefed the a.go trump's attorney rudolph giuliani's associates but barr did not think that the u.s. prosecutors in manhattan had given him enough information about where the investigation was going and how much of it was focused on rudy giuliani. the tensions have sillered over the past several months. barr is known as a hands-on manager. but for the u.s. attorney in manhattan, that was viewed as a bit more meddlesome. they believe barr was trying to steer investigations in different directions. this came with another investigation involving a sensitive turkish investigation. the a.g. was trying to push for a settlement with the bank that would result in no criminal charges, what is known as a deferred prosecution agreement. but in new york they were pushing to indict the bank. this was the bank could come up in conversations that president trump had with the turkish president and it was very politically sensitive. ultimately the u.s. attorney in manhattan got their way and the bike was endied. so t

. >> reporter: but berman refused, leading to that public standoff with barr, ending only when the a.g. asked the president to step in and fire him. >> i don't get involved, i just don't get involved. but the president has to sign a document or, i guess, give it the okay. >> reporter: berman's new york office had already sent the president's former fixer michael cohen to prison, and has been investigating his personal attorney rudy giuliani for months. former national security adviser john bolton telling martha raddatz president trump told turkey's president erdogan in december of 2018 he'd intervene in the office's investigation into a state-owned turkish bank. >> the president said to erdogan at one point, look, those prosecutors in new york are obama people. wait until i get my people in and then we'll take care of this. i thought to myself, and i'm a department of justice alumnus myself, i have never heard any president say anything like that. >> reporter: whatever was said to erdogan, halkbank was indicted last fall for fraud, money laundering, and sanctions violations after a neg

. >> reporter: berman refused, leading to that public standoff with barr, ending only when the a.g. asked the president to step in and fire him. >> i don't get involved. i just don't get involved. but the president has to sign a document, or i guess give it the okay. >> reporter: berman's new york office had already sent the president's former fixer, michael cohen, to prison and has been investigating his personal attorney, rudy giuliani, for months. former national security adviser john bolton telling martha raddatz president trump told turkey's president erdogan in 2018 he'd intervene in the office's investigation into a state-owned turkish bank. >> the president said to erdogan at one point, look, those prosecutors in new york are obama people. wait till i get my people in and then we'll take care of this. i thought to myself, and i'm a department of justice alumnus myself, i've never heard any president say anything like that. >> reporter: whatever was said, halkbank was indicted last fall for fraud, money laundering, and sanctions violations after a negotiated settlement fell a

barr to testify before the committee on july 2nd. a committee spokesperson confirmed that last night, nadler telling rachel maddow that he's preparing to force the a.g.'s compliance. watch this. >> let me say, we have other remedies, too, to try to force the attorney general. we can -- we can eliminate his -- his office budget. there are a number of things we can do, which we will do. >> his office budget like his paper clips budget or does he have some sort of large discretionary funding you can cut off? >> no, no. we're talking about the budget in the department of justice. >> so politico is reporting the decision with nancy pelosi over the weekend. it's going to be issued if barr declines to reskeed annual his march testimony which was canceled due to the coronavirus. joining me now, msnbc legal analyst danny cevallos. good morning to you. >> good morning. >> he felt like it would end at a standstill considering we have a republican-controlled senate, but nonetheless, he is now pursuing testimony from attorney general barr. he has to get him to comply. i mean talk us through this. the attorney general must comply with this subpoena. >> the attorn

. >> nixon had the saturday night massacre and now president trump and a.g. barrave the botched friday night massacre. >> reporter: failing to believe it was just a favor to barr's new pick jay clayton who has never been a prosecutor. administration officials tell nbc news clayton told the president over a round of golf that he was interested in the position >> i can't accept that explanation given the pattern and practice of both the president in seeking to use the justice system to reward friends, punish enemies, protect people he likes. >> reporter: rudy giuliani said in an interview sunday he has no evidence that he's being investigated as for berman's successor, it's unclear how this will play out his confirmation is likely to be held up because both of new york's democratic senators have said they oppose it. clayton has not responded to our requests for comment savannah>>> 7:18 what do you say we switch gears? who is that guy? >> all right gabe gutierrez at the courthouse, thank you. >>> 7:18 what do you say we switch gears? who is that guy? do i see bill ka