there were politicized issues within the department of justice, and then sort of a recalibration after. do you want to put this in perspective in how you see it, given your knowledge of the history of the department? david: i want to thank you as well for setting this up. knowned both josh's who more than i do about the justice department. thank you for the institutional government plug. [laughter] i still have more on that. and i am a nerd, so let me get that out there. him that much about the justice department, i had worked more overseas as a journalist. the key thing for me is understanding the modern justice department, and you understand it through the example of john mitchell, richard nixon's attorney general, who used his office to investigate the vietnam war protesters, black panthers, and other groups, as a way to reinforce president nixon's messaging about chaos in the country, the need for law and order. mitchell, he left his post as attorney general and then famously chaired president nixon's reelection campaign and then ended up going to jail for his actions as his role i

now, is this the american justice department? no. is the people who were trying to get back at donald trump because he head a revolution. -- he led a revolution. and, finally, justice has prevailed. lou: he has, he has prevailed. it has been three long years as well for general flynn under this immense burden. one can hardly imagine how his family has felt throughout all of this, the stress that the man has been put under and the absolute political corruption and without conscience. the fbi agents who went after flynn, the special counsel, the justice department attorneys, this is ignorance and evil, and it is obviously rampant within the obama era justice department and fbi. >> yeah. lou, i mean, i've been in government long enough to know this is not some mid-level bureaucrats who are conducting this. this is a cabal of people at the highest levels of the justice department, the fbi, the intelligence community. who knows, maybe even into the obama white house. and it was a concerted effort to reverse the will of the people who had

if that is asking too much of the justice department we have the wrong people trying to fix what is an evil and politically corrupt organization. >> the best thing the department of justice could do and do it very quickly is to agree. >> that. there you go. will you accept that? >> you never know what the next justice department will do because you can't trust the next gang that comes in. lou: i don't trust any of them. we will continue with you and if you will stay right there we would like to hear your thoughts on all of this, share your comments, follow me on twitter, loudobbs, follow me on instagram tonight. of next former department of justice official signing a letter, some 2000 of them calling for attorney general william barr to resign. justice department independent of the president. the only problem for them is the department of justice isn't independent. can you think of an executive branch that is independent of the president or should be? we take that up ananananan ♪ limu emu & doug [ siren ] give me your hand! i can save you... lots of money with liberty mutual! we custom

it is one thing to talk about it in the justice department and fbi. wrenching as it is to think. the court system itself to be accomplices. >> i don't understand, sydney and tom, how chief justice roberts appoint someone who is involved in the investigation to oversee the reforms. bose berg signs, he says they were fraudulent but he was asked did you notice the changes between warrant one 234, i was there for the beginning of the fisa court and then i have done 50 of those and i got asked questions by judges on title iii application which is the domestic wiretap application and the informants dropped off the fbi list. unless you're not reading the damn thing that jumps out at you like how did was he dropped off of the fbi list? maybe they asked that question, maybe they didn't. lou: andrew mccabe, the attorney general, pass on prosecuting him. what does that mean? what does it portend? >> william barr wants to restore the rule of law and he has to apply equally regardless of political party. to define to prosecute mccabe for lying to the inspector gen

it seems very much at the department of justice are in the -- that at the department of justice are in the headlines about what is going on in the country, if not the protest in portland or kenosha, if it is issues about covid and restrictions and whether they should be followed or not, if it is not about the election and concerns about the legality of elections, procedures to the election, not to mention the number of cases involving administration officials and the doj role as those cases through the system. i think we have a lot to talk about. i want to start with the big question. does it really look different to you? does it look like a different environment when the two of you were at the department of justice? are we just overreacting? let's begin with you because you were there the longest time ago. and i have the gray hair. of what has the department looked like, we are talking about national security today in particular, what does it look like over the last number of years, bringing us up to the present moment. in getting ready for today's conversation, i decided to go and lo

tougher but the bigger issue is what you went through piece by pace, the justice department is a locus of evil when it comes to fair administration of justice and at best william barr is trying to ride the tiger trying to figure out how to make these guys operate according to law but it is a complete mess and it is clear with the mueller thing where he was outflanked that he hasn't gotten a handle on the personnel issues there and that should be a priority rather than complaining about the president highlighting something the president has in my view a positive - >> make sure the justice department isn't violating the rate of americans. >> the president is doing something americans are not used to. he is keeping his promises that he made as a candidate for the office he holds, he is also expressing himself fully, freely and directly to the american people without going through the sage intermediary's of the national left-wing media and it is just, i'm so disappointed in william barr i have to say this. it is a shame when he doesn't get what this president has gone through and what the

seeing this horrible thing, and i didn't speak to them by the way. >> reporter: the justice department's department to seek a lighter sentence for mr. stone prompted four thunderstorm prosecutors to quit the case. mr. trump didn't seem to mind. >> he was treated pretty badly. i'm not concerned about anything. they ought to go back to school. nine years in jail, that's a disgrace and in the mine time comey walks around making book deals. the president will not rule out a pardon for mr. stone. administration officials claim there was no revenge sought against sacalexander vindman an his brother, after being pushed out of the white house, payback for the lieutenant's testimony. >> it was time for them to go back. their services were no longer needed. they've gone back to the department of the army and that's where they'll continue their career. >> that doesn't quite line up with the president, who said he was unhappy with vindman. >> well, i obviously was unhappy with the job he did and the military can handle him any way they want. >> reporter: but there are signs the president's latest fi

the grand jury is not in all of the justice department. awe of the justice department. the house and senate will come to the courts and it will be another dispute. it is a dispute only because of some convenience that the justice department is holding. >> could you respond to mr. freeman? i asked in the previous case, there have been two articles of impeachment that have been acted upon. are you here to say there may be a third? >> i will do the exact same brief, weh is in our tried to be very clear about this. a third?might be >> exactly. both committees said that for two reasons. one, the evidence that comes up might be usable in the senate trial. it could be that this material is useful for us, the house managers and the senate trial. >> who are the house managers? [laughter] >> i'm glad you asked. again, it could be useful. dennis, submitted to the court, obviously not hand as we made clear, the judiciary committee will look at this material and decide whether to recommend more articles of impeachment and i want to be clear because i think there was some hysteria. s

>> i would, but you never know what the next department of justice will do. i can tell you this, i don't trust any of them. tom, we'll continue with you and sid. we would like to hear your thoughts. up next, former department of justice official signing a letter, some 2,000 of them, calling for attorney general william barr to resign. a justice department independent of the president? the only problem with that is the department justice isn't independent. can you think an executive branch that is independent of the president or should be? we'll take that up and more with america's mayor. rudy giuliani. as a caricature artist, i appreciate what makes each person unique. that's why i like liberty mutual. they get that no two people are alike and customize your car insurance so you only pay for what you need. almost done. what do you think? i don't see it. only pay for what you need. ♪ liberty. liberty. liberty. liberty. ♪ she is on her way to our house. what? i got it. alexa, start roomba. the lexus es. eagerly prepared for the unexpected. lease the 2020 es 350

hearing for which they have scheduled testimony from two whistle-blowers, two currently serving justice department officials who will testify as whistle-blowers as to attorney general barr's repeated interference in the course of justice in ways that are designed to bolster the president's personal and political interests. john elias is due to testify from the antitrust division about william barr's alleged interference with antitrust cases. aaron zelinsky is expected to testify as well. he resigned from the roger stone prosecution after barr took a wrecking ball to the u.s. attorney's office in d.c., sidelined the real u.s. attorney, inserted his own handpicked flying monkeys instead, and then swiftly intervened to roll back prosecutions of stone and one other of the president's friends. so i mean this is the last three weeks. i know time has no meaning anymore and it's hard to figure out what day it is let alone what week it is. but over the course of three weeks, all of this has been rolling downhill faster and faster. and then friday night, late friday night, just days before this upcoming hea

this is not how the justice department has ever operated before. along with everything else from bill barr, it says something about how far the department has fallen. >> joyce vance, from being deep inside the executive branch of the government, i'm usually highly skeptical of any strategry. that was coined in the ministration i served. i wondered, when i saw both these stories break within minutes of another, and on the heels of matt and his colleague, unbelievable body of reporting about trump's rage from back in august about charges not being brought against comey and mccabe and others. these stories broke since then. but i wondered if it was -- if one was done to mullify the other. mccabe news broke he would not be charged with a crime. and barr was already cooking up another investigation into the investigators. so, that news came out and carol lee's been reporting. i wonder if it is, to you, some symptom of a really fragile and precarious moment for the justice department right now. >> that's such a horrible thing to speculates about they woul

i'm a career attorney with the department of justice. i joined at the department into thousand six, and over the past 14 years i have served under six attorneys general and three presidents. i have spent my entire legal career at the department. although i am a current department attorney, my testimony is personal and does not represent the views of the department. throughout my career in federal service, i have been taught to do the right thing, for the right reasons and in the right way. that is why earlier this year i asked the doj inspector general to examine whether multiple investigations launched under attorney general william barr were abusive of authority or other misconduct. the first matter i referred to the ig concern to 10 investigations the antitrust division launched into merger activity in the cannabis industry. even mergers were not close to meeting established criteria for these kinds of investigations, yet these cannabis investigations accounted for a full 29% of the division's full review of investigations. these kinds

he is using the justice department, named for an ideal justice, as his personal law firm. what a shame. what a defamation of what the constitution is all about. my senate colleagues who believe the president would be chastened by impeachment have been completely and disastrously wrong. the only lesson the president has learned is there is nothing he can do that senate republicans will not forgive or rationalize or simply ignore. the lesson the president has learned is that the courts are unlikely to stop him, too, because the senate republican caucus has voted to confirm virtually every judge he has nominated, no matter how unqualified or ill-suited to the bench. we are starting at a crisis of the rule of law. the institutions designed to check executive power are crumbling before our very eyes. the crisis was the president's own making, but it was enabled and emboldened by every senate republican who has been too afraid to stand up to the president and say no. i yield the floor. mr. menendez: madam president. the presiding officer: the senator from new jersey. mr. menende

for example ford's pardon of nixon when he didn't go through the pardon office and the department of justicege presidents have respected a process located in the department of justice that allows for filtering outnsered the president thene trump is crashing that process. it's becoming increasingly clear what he sees on television, what he hears from people, what his instincts tell him he should do, what the best politics for him is, that is how he is going to be thinking about the pardons that he grants and he's really quite open about it. so i think in this sense it's really quite extraordinary. as you point out, he's building a certain theme here, the public corruption theme that you mentioned. one has to think he's laying the foundation for some other pardons that will come in the future that people have long wondered whether he will grant. for example, roger stone eventually. paul manafort eventually. who knows who else eventually. he might be too angry at michael cohen to pardon him. who knows? maybe he'll commute his sentence. not clear. but i think there's a foundation he's laying for

but the justice department has decided to let it all go. this development was both expected and unexpected. a lot of people had been expecting and waiting for the president to maybe pardon mike flynn. but now he doesn't have to bother with that because effectively bill barr has done the same thing. the first hint something was about to come happened about 15 minutes ahead of the news about dropping the flynn prosecution when the lead government prosecutor in the case, a veteran of the mueller investigation, abruptly informed the judge in flynn's case in a one-sentence filing that he was quitting that case. if you feel like that's reminding you of something, if that's giving you deja vu, is because a similar thing happen in the roger stone case. remember all four federal prosecutors working on the roger stone prosecution quit that case in protest after attorney general bill barr stepped into their case and overruled their request that roger stone get a sentence of seven to nine years. in this case, this is a different matter, but it's the sa

and department of justice. the prosecutors filed what they said they wanted with the sentencing guidelines that they backed and almost immediately the justice department said, you know, furious. attorney general barr was furious saying we are going to reverse this. they moved in to take over. it all happened in the last few days. >> what do we know about the earlier iteration of this. one thing that is so key is that it happened weeks ago with the flynn sentencing memo and everybody scratched their heads. the justice department wasn't on the level about it. it all happened. we were seeing it from outside the box. >> right. nobody resigned. there was not a public spectacle about it. this is the story that we did last night. officials outlined to us what they see as a pattern of barr moving in to exert more control over these cases that president trump is very interested in. it happened in the flynn case, things were contentious between flynn and the prosecutors. he accused them of setting him up. on january 7th,

let's listen to this. >> what the biden justice department will do is let the department of justice be the department of justice. let them make the judgments of who should be prosecuted. they are not my lawyers. they're not my personal lawyers. >> so you're not going to rule it in or rule it out. >> i'm not going to rule it in or out. i'm going to hire really first-rate prosecutors and people who understand the law like democrat and republican administrations have had and let them make the judgement, but turning this into a vehicle for you as if it's your own law firm, you don't own that justice department. you pick the best people you can and you hope that what they're going to do is they're going to enforce the law as they see it. >> and renee graham, as you know, that was in response to george's initial question about should a biden administration's justice department be looking back at what happened in the administration for the four years before that? and so he left that as an open possibility. >> i think that was important that he did so. you know, i don't know, he made the comme

the department of justice has been under fire.barr under fire over the moves perceived as politically and furtherance of the president's agenda. >> this is not the first time that doj lawyers withdrawn for a case in similar circumstances in this administration. >> absolutely. bill barr had trouble in the case involving whether there should be a citizenship question on the census. it went to the supreme court. supreme court ruled against the trump administration and went back to the lower court and unbelievably the justice department said they were going to put the question on there. 11 justice department lawyers asked to resign from the case just as the 4 did this week and the judge actually held their feet to the fire and he said he wanted to know the reason. two were changing jobs and the other nine he made them come in and explain why. it will be very interesting to see if judge jackson next week wants to know the reasons that the four doj career attorneys withdrew and that the justice department substituted a new recommendatio

there was no department of justice to go along with that position.s, frankly, was pretty powerless. in the 19th century, had was powerless and in the 20th, that's when this became a play thing of the executive branch. and in the 20th century, different presidents, depending on their ethics, i guess, is what it really boils down to in some cases started to abuse the fact that the doj was under their direct control. >> i want to show you the president's tweet from monday night. where you have the president, you know, weighing in publicly, tweeting this about the prosecutor's recommendation of a seven to nine-year sentence for roger stone. some had said it's quite harsh, but if you look at the sentencing guidelines, it looks like it's in line with the federal sentencing guidelines. you have the president tweeting this is a very horrible and unfair situation. is it unusual, though, that you have a u.s. president weighing in, from modern presidents if look back? >> absolutely. absolutely. >> okay. >> so, really the high point of bad behavior on the part o

>> i would, but you never know what the next department of justice will do. lou: i can tell you this, i don't trust any of them. tom, we'll continue with you and sid. we would like to hear your thoughts. up next, former department of justice official signing a letter, some 2,000 of them, calling for attorney general william barr to resign. a justice department independent of the president? the only problem with that is the department justice isn't independent. can you think an executive branch that is independent of the president or should be? we'll take that up and more with america's mayor. rudy giuliani. lou: as i said at the outset of tonight's broadcast. over 2,000 former justice department employees signed a petition that calls on attorney general william barr to resign for what they call is interference in roger stone's sentencing case. the letter formed about it activist group called protect democracy is a straight-out radical dimm enterprise and never trump organization. it's been around since 2017. it decried the president's statements on stone as in

. >> the department of justice treated roger stone differently from everyone else. i was repeatedly told the department actions were not based on the law or the facts but rather on political affiliations, mr. stone's political relationships and that the acting u.s. attorney was afraid of the president. >> in response the justice department stated, quote, he did not have any discussion with the attorney general, the u.s. attorney, or any other member of political leadership. mr. zelinsky's allegations are based on his own interpretation of events and hearsay. >> i want to address today's sentencing of a man, roger stone. i want to see it play out to its fullest. roger has a very good chance of exoneration, in my opinion. >> even after stone's sentencing, the president did not relent and he targeted for criticism a private citizen who had served as a forewoman of the jury. >> it is my strong opinion the forewoman of the jury, the woman who was in charge of the jury, is totally tainted. when you take a look, how can you have a person like this? she was an anti-trump act

was turned over to congress, there hasn't been a need for compulsion because in the past the justice department knew what it was supposed to do. >> in a number of the cases cited, the materials were not in the possession necessary of the department of justice. congress received those materials through a variety of different means. it's not often clear from the record. none of them involved a court ordering a disclosure by the executive branch of the grand jury materials. >> your honor, that raises -- and as we say, at least since watergate it has involved that. in the john doe case, this was a dissent by justices brennan, marshall and blackman, but i think it cites an opinion by judge whitaker in procter & gamble, just to read for one moment, thus, the information generated by the grand jury's inquiry is, quote, not the property of the government's attorneys, agents or investigators, nor are they entitled to possession of them in such a case. instead, those documents are records of the court. that's a key ruling. that's a key statement, i'm sorry, not a ruling, because the only reason -- why do

>> it would have been another tool that the justice department had to work with communities and local leadership. >> reporter: but in 2017 then attorney general jeff sessions overhauled the program, ending the assessment process and the release of public reports. a department of justice spokesperson says "the program modifications were made to ensure that resources go to agencies that require assistance, rather than expensive wide-ranging investigative assessments." cbs news found at least 13 jurisdictions were impacted by the changes, including north charleston. >> this administration basically undid the program and left these jurisdictions in the lurch. >> reporter: that year north charleston residents called on the justice department to be transparent. >> release that report now. not yesterday, now. >> reporter: the state's republican senator tim scott also urged officials to release any final or near final findings and recommendations, but that never happened. >> it was really a punch in the gut to the community. >> reporter: monique dixon is the deputy director of policy at the n

the same justice department the leader of which attorney general bill barr doesn't like people talkingbout his department. it makes the job tougher he said. joining us is tom fitton who more than a few times has been accused of making the work of public servants in the justice department difficult. tom, good to have you with us. first your reaction for bill barr for whom i have immense respect and great hopes. but when he says the president of the united states is making his job tougher and the justice department has to hold accountable someone who so obviously and blatantly broke the law. your thoughts? >> i think the attorney general's job is being made more difficult by the obama holdovers on the roger stone sentencing recommendation. according to the attorney general is contrary to what the law requires and would have resulted in a man serving more time in jail than necessary. to complain about his boss holding the justice department to account makes his job tougher, but the bigger issue is what you went through piece by piece, the justice department is trying to ride the tiger try

when people at the justice department talk to the white house, if you work at justice, not only do you want to avoid actual impropriety. you want to avoid even the appearance of improper contact with the white house because of what that dwus the public's ability to have faith in the justice system. if the system looks rigged, who wants to comply with it? it is a horrible, slippery slope. what we're now looking at is the specter of actual impropriety of bill barr. may be he didn't actually have a conversation with the president. in some ways, i think it is far worse if what barr is doing is looking at a sentencing recommendation and thinking to himself, this won't make the president happy. instead of doing this recommendation that comports with the law, that congress has established for sentencing, i'll going to take it upon myself to do a favor. >> and then everybody else in america gets a tough sentence unless you happen to be a donald trump friend or as roger stone convicted of, lying for donald trump. a thank you both. roger stone donald trump's longest serving adviser. someone who

actually, this is the part where i think i have the most hope on what they will do at the department of justice. when the just at this time 'tis department moves to dismiss an indictment or information as it was in this case, it must be by leave of court which means that the judge must bless it. the reason for that is to prevent the prosecutors from jerking someone around by filing charges and dismissing them and filing them again, but the judge could, at the very least, call a hearing, to make the prosecutors come in and explain why they are dismissing the case here, and i think he could be very well inclined to do that, because the reason that the justice department gave for dismissing this is that there was no predication for the case, and that the lilaced materiality. judge sullivan himself found that this lie was material, in a motion filed by flynn's lawyer last summer seeking to dismiss the case based on an alleged brady violation, the judge found no violation, and also found that this lie was in fact, material. so having already made that finding, he may disagree with the reasoning behi

as joe biden is saying he is going to allow the department of justice to proceed independently he is t going to tell them who not to investigate. certainly who he picks to be his attorney general will factor into whether or not it looks like the department of justice will pursue an investigation or charges against then former president trump. one thing to kooeeep in mind is that president trump can only pardon himself for federal crimes. that is something neither president trump or biden can stop or interfere with. >> that is an important point. what does the exchange tell you about how biden and vice president-elect harris, how they will work together? >> that is one of the interesting aspects of the interview. we have seen the two of them sitting down, answering questions from reporters in this type of a format. as you saw from their answers, kamala harris is in lock step with what joe biden has to say about the possibility of prosecutions against the president. that is part of the reasons they ran during the primaries. they were on opposite ends of the issue. opposite ends of legal