BOTCHED FRIDAY NIGHT MASSACRE: BARR FAILS TO OUST U.S. ATTORNEY WHO'S A THORN IN TRUMP'S SIDE
The loyalist Attorney General tried to fire SDNY head Geoffrey Berman by press release, but Berman said not so fast. For Trump, this could be Comey-firing-level catastrophe.
BY CHARLOTTE KLEIN
JUNE 20, 2020
vanityfair.com
Attorney General William Barr tried to pull a fast one late Friday night, following suit in what has become a dangerous pattern for the Trump administration: ousting anyone who might pose a perceived threat to the president’s power. But Geoffrey Berman, the United States attorney for the Southern District of New York who has investigated several of Donald Trump’s allies, isn’t leaving without a fair fight. “I have not resigned, and have no intention of resigning, my position,” said Berman—who was surprised to learn he would be “stepping down” from a DOJ press release—in a statement released late Friday night. “I will step down when a presidentially appointed nominee is confirmed by the Senate. Until then, our investigations will move forward without delay or interruption.”
CNN reports, citing sources with knowledge of the matter, including a Justice Department official, that Barr abruptly moved to fire Berman after he refused to resign, something he was asked to do during an in-person meeting earlier that day. The Manhattan prosecutor was reportedly offered other positions at the DOJ, which he declined. One person familiar with the situation told the New York Times that getting rid of Berman has been on Trump’s mind for some time: the president has been upset with the prosecutor ever since his office brought a case against Michael Cohen, Trump’s former personal lawyer. Berman’s office successfully prosecuted Cohen and has also been investigating Trump’s current personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani.
Barr’s late-night ousting attempt and Berman’s refusal came as a shock to former prosecutors as they watched the conflict unfold in real time. “Never seen anything remotely like this at DOJ” said former U.S. Attorney Harry Litman, who wrote in a subsequent tweet that he couldn’t think of “a bigger drama” inside the department since the so-called Saturday Night Massacre that took place during the Watergate scandal. “Barr lied about Berman stepping down, a lie he has to have known would surface. So Berman must be very close to doing something they view as being very dangerous for Trump,” said former federal prosecutor Joyce Vance, who served under former President Barack Obama. Berman’s statement followed the DOJ’s announcement that the president intends to nominate Jay Clayton, the chairman of the Securities and Exchange commission. CNN notes that Clayton has never been a prosecutor. Before Trump nominated him to his current post, he was a corporate lawyer.
Referring to the DOJ’s announcement that the acting role will go to the New Jersey U.S. Attorney while a replacement is pending, Vance wrote that “it's very unusual to not have the number 2 person in an office step in temporarily when a US [Attorney] leaves. Why replace an experienced person, familiar with investigations, with someone from another district who has NO prosecutorial experience?”
The extraordinary series of events that unspooled on Friday night brings further attention to the Trump administration’s war on oversight, a paranoid watchdog purge that the president has ramped up since being acquitted by the Senate in January. But the Times notes that Barr’s attempted ousting of Berman heightens concerns within the Justice Department “over whether Mr. Barr has undercut its tradition of independence from political interference,” accusations prompted by Barr’s intervention in cases involving former Trump advisers Roger Stone and Michael Flynn. In an appearance on CNN just before midnight on Friday, former federal prosecutor Laura Coates spoke to the timing of the move, which comes on the eve of Trump’s return to the campaign trail. Coates listed cases involving Lev Parnas, Rudy Giuliani, and other associates as among those “that could offend” Trump and his campaign going forward. “In mind, [his reelection campaign] starts tomorrow and suddenly we have a ‘Friday Night Massacre’ firing-esque situation,” noting "campaign finance violations [to be] at the heart of what Berman has overseen.” |
