Merrick Garland tells senators Capitol riot investigation will be his first priority as attorney general
By Matt Zapotosky, Ann E. Marimow and Devlin Barrett
Feb. 22, 2021 at 4:41 p.m. GMT
washingtonpost.com
Attorney general nominee Merrick Garland said Monday that his first priority and briefing if confirmed as attorney general would center on the sprawling investigation into the Jan. 6 riot the U.S. Capitol.
Testifying at his confirmation hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Garland drew parallels to the domestic terrorism threat the Justice Department faced in confronting the Ku Klux Klan and the prosecution he led of Timothy McVeigh in the bombing of a federal building in Oklahoma City in 1995. When Garland was last in the Justice Department, he supervised that case.
But, Garland said, “we are facing a more dangerous period than we faced in Oklahoma City at that time.” He said he imagined that investigators would explore not just those who entered the Capitol, but those who might be involved in other ways.
“We begin with the people on the ground and we work our way up to those who are involved and further involved,” Garland said. “And we will pursue these leads wherever they take us.”
Garland, a federal appeals court judge, is expected to be confirmed with bipartisan support, though Monday’s hearing offered Democrats and Republicans a chance to press the nominee on how he will manage the department.
Garland said he saw “no reason” to end special counsel John Durham’s review of the FBI’s 2016 investigation of former president Donald Trump’s campaign — though he also declined to provide a firm commitment to giving Durham the time and resources to finish his work.
Garland told Sen. Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa) that he had no information on Durham’s investigation, saying that, if confirmed as attorney general, he would speak with the special counsel. Grassley pressed Garland on whether he would only remove Durham “for cause.”
“I really do have to have an opportunity to talk with him. I have not had that opportunity,” Garland responded. “As I said, I don’t have any reason from what I know now — which is really, really very little — to make any determination on that ground. But I don’t have any reason to think that he should not remain in place.”
The exchange seemed to partially mollify Grassley, who said, “I think you’ve come close to satisfying me, but maybe not entirely.” Grassley noted that when then-attorney general nominee William P. Barr appeared before the committee, he had said of Robert S. Mueller III’s investigation into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election, “It’s vitally important that the special counsel be allowed to complete his investigation.”
Republicans are expected to try to extract promises of specific investigations and prosecutions in politically sensitive cases. Already, GOP members on the panel have called for Garland to pledge to investigate the administration of New York Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, a Democrat, for his handling of nursing home deaths related to the coronavirus pandemic.
Republicans also are likely to press Garland about the ongoing investigation of President Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, for possible tax or financial crimes.
Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) asked Garland if he had read a Justice Department inspector general report, which has seemed to form the basis of Durham’s investigation, that was critical of one aspect of the FBI’s investigation of Trump’s 2016 campaign: the applications to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to surveil former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page.
Garland said he had, and his “general take is that there were certainly serious problems with respect to [those] applications, particularly for Mr. Page,” and he supported the examination of that matter. But pressed more explicitly for a full-throated endorsement of Durham, he demurred.
“Do you believe the Durham investigation is a legitimate investigation?” Graham asked.
“I don’t know anything really about the investigation,” Garland responded.
Cabinet nominees often seek to deflect demands for specific actions or policy goals, and Garland’s current job as a federal judge may lead him to be even more circumspect in his answers.
Citing his role on the bench, Garland declined to answer when asked about whether he would commit to carrying out the federal death sentences of those already convicted of crimes, including the defendant in the Boston Marathon bombing. The Trump administration restarted federal executions for the first time since 2003, and under Trump the government carried out the highest number in a single year.
President Biden opposes the death penalty and has said he will work to end its use.
In his opening statement, Garland, 68, emphasized the Justice Department's 150-year history of battling discrimination in American life, while also highlighting his experience pursuing domestic terrorists.
Garland told lawmakers that his confirmation would be “the culmination of a career I have dedicated to ensuring that the laws of our country are fairly and faithfully enforced, and the rights of all Americans are protected.”
Before becoming a judge, Garland was best known in legal circles for his role guiding the investigation and prosecution of McVeigh, the man who detonated a bomb outside a federal building in Oklahoma City in 1995, killing 168. McVeigh was convicted and sentenced to death, and in 2001 he was executed.
How the Oklahoma City bombing case prepared Merrick Garland
washingtonpost.com
Garland said that his previous work is particularly relevant now, noting that if confirmed he will supervise the prosecutions of white supremacists and others who forced their way into the Capitol on Jan. 6, which he called “a heinous attack that sought to disrupt a cornerstone of our democracy: the peaceful transfer of power to a newly elected government.” He said that as he receives briefings on that case, he will seek to determine whether U.S. laws are sufficient for prosecuting wrongdoers and stamping out domestic terrorism.
Biden picked Garland as an antidote to what he has criticized as the intense politicization of the Justice Department during the Trump administration. Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.), the Judiciary Committee chairman, said in his opening statement that public faith in the Justice Department has “been shaken — the result of department leadership consumed with advancing personal and political interests.”
“Judge Garland, we’re confident that we can rebuild the department’s once hallowed halls,” Durbin said.
Garland said he would work to quickly improve morale among Justice Department employees and make clear that his job “is to protect them from partisan or other improper motives.”
While he said he would prefer to mingle with employees in the cafeteria and the Great Hall of the department’s headquarters to “let them hear what’s in my heart about this,” Garland said he would have to introduce himself to employees remotely because of the pandemic.
Garland was nominated to the Supreme Court during the Obama administration, but Republican senators refused to even consider the pick and Trump eventually filled the judicial slot.
Garland has spent the past two decades as a federal appellate judge in Washington, D.C., and is known as a moderate with a knack for building consensus. His nomination has public support from more than 150 former Justice Department officials from both parties and 61 former federal judges, as well as civil rights groups, the Fraternal Order of Police and the International Association of Chiefs of Police.
Republicans, though, worry Garland might abandon some initiatives undertaken by the Trump administration that they favor — including beefed-up protection of religious liberties, or getting the department out of the business of forcing court-monitored reforms at local police departments — for more liberal policies. Acting Attorney General Monty Wilkinson already has rescinded some Trump-era policies, and the Justice Department has changed course in some legal cases.
“What I don’t want is a return to the Obama years,” Grassley said in his opening statement.
Matt Zapotosky
Matt Zapotosky covers the Justice Department for The Washington Post's national security team. He has previously worked covering the federal courthouse in Alexandria and local law enforcement in Prince George's County and Southern Maryland. Follow
Headshot of Ann Marimow
Ann Marimow
Ann Marimow covers legal affairs for The Washington Post. She joined The Post in 2005 and has covered state government and politics in California, New Hampshire and Maryland. Follow
Headshot of Devlin Barrett
Devlin Barrett
Devlin Barrett writes about the FBI and the Justice Department, and is the author of "October Surprise: How the FBI Tried to Save Itself and Crashed an Election." He was part of a team that won a Pulitzer Prize in 2018 for National Reporting, for coverage of Russian interference in the U.S. election. Follow
washingtonpost.com |
