Barr testifies Portland protests have been ‘hijacked,’ defends federal response

“In the wake of George Floyd’s death, violent rioters and anarchists have hijacked legitimate protests to wreak senseless havoc and destruction on innocent victims,” Barr said.

Attorney General William Barr faced a grilling from Democrats at a contentious congressional hearing Tuesday as he spoke about the protests following George Floyd’s death and defended federal intervention in major cities where the administration says there has been a spate of violence.

In his opening statement before the House Judiciary Committee hearing, Barr said that Floyd’s death at the hands of police in May “understandably jarred the whole country and forced us to reflect on longstanding issues in our nation.”

And while it was a “shocking event,” Barr said, “The fact is that these events are fortunately quite rare.”

“According to statistics compiled by the Washington Post, the number of unarmed black men killed by police so far this year is eight. The number of unarmed white men killed by police over the same time period is 11,” he testified.

Barr added, “The threat to black lives posed by crime on the streets is massively greater than any threat posed by police misconduct. The leading cause of death for young black males is homicide.”

Chairman Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., who said he had to delay the hearing for an hour because he got into a minor car accident on his way to Washington from New York, stated in his opening remarks that Barr has “aided and abetted the worst failings of this president.” Nadler added, “The message these actions send is clear: in this Justice Department, the president’s enemies will be punished and his friends will be protected, no matter the cost.”

Meanwhile, Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, defended Barr and said Democrats are attacking him because of “spying. That one word, that’s why they are after you.”

Jordan then played a mash-up of video clips of violence across the country, which omitted images of federal law enforcement officers and members of the military taking aggressive action against protesters.

Barr defended the actions taking by the administration in Lafayette Square in early June, in which officers dispersed a crowd of peaceful protesters with tear gas and flash bangs. The attorney general said in the days leading up to the crackdown, protests in the area had erupted into violence, with officers getting injured and a nearby church being set on fire — a situation that became “so bad” that Trump was rushed into the White House bunker, Barr said.

Meanwhile, Barr said in his prepared statement, which he summarized for the committee, that the decision to deploy federal agents to several cities across the country where demonstrations are taking place “has nothing to do with the problem of violent mob rioting” and instead is “designed to help state and local law enforcement to meet their basic responsibility to solve crimes and keep their communities safe.”

The attorney general then specifically addressed the situation in Portland, saying, “In the wake of George Floyd’s death, violent rioters and anarchists have hijacked legitimate protests to wreak senseless havoc and destruction on innocent victims. The current situation in Portland is a telling example.”

Barr later testified that the Trump administration is “trying to protect federal functions and federal buildings” in Portland, saying they’ve had to increase the federal presence there because he said that rioters have been going after those facilities.

Nadler, however, scolded the attorney general, claiming that part of the reason federal agents have intervened in U.S. cities is that “the president wants footage for his campaign ads” and “you appear to be serving it up to him.”

“Shame on you,” Nadler said.

Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., said she believes Trump is trying to “create the impression that there is violence” and “divert attention from his catastrophic failure in dealing with COVID-19.”

On the other side of the aisle, Republicans expressed support for Barr and his actions. Rep. Mike Johnson, R-La., said Democrats claim the Justice Department has become highly politicized under Barr’s leadership, which Johnson said is a “totally unfounded allegation.”

Barr said in his remarks that the president has not interfered in any Justice Department decisions and that all matters have been left to Barr’s “independent judgment.” Democrats have accused him of doing the president’s bidding in the cases involving Roger Stone, whose sentence in the Russia probe was recently commuted by Trump, and former national security adviser Michael Flynn, whose case the Justice Department has sought to drop.

Barr, however, said that in Stone’s case, a recommended prison sentence of seven to nine years was too harsh and there was no comparable case to support such a prison term.

The attorney general also discussed the Russia investigation in his prepared statement, calling it a “bogus ‘Russiagate’ scandal” that involved “grave abuses.”

Barr also addressed mail-in voting concerns in his testimony, something Trump has repeatedly claimed would lead to fraudulent election results. When asked about the issue by Rep. Cedric Richmond, D-La., the attorney general said there’s a “high risk” that mail-in voting would lead to massive voter fraud, adding, “If you have wholesale mail-in voting, it substantially increases the risk of fraud.”