Attorney General William Barr hit the roughest patch of his tenure.
Barr’s come into conflict with President Trump on multiple fronts.
And now William Barr lost this big fight. Here is why it could cost him his job.
Three provisions of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) which allow the government to spy on American citizens expire on March 15.
Trump supporters in Congress insist that major reforms are necessary to prevent the type of abuse of power that allowed the Obama administration and the FBI to spy on the Trump campaign during the 2016 election.
Recently, Attorney General William Barr met with Senate Republicans and asked them to extend the law without any reforms and Barr would “fix” the law to prevent the government from spying on political campaigns with his administrative authority.
Kentucky Senator – and key Trump ally – Rand Paul blasted this plan.
“FISA warrants should not be issued against Americans,” Paul stated. “Americans shouldn’t be spied on by a secret court. I think he agrees completely with that and that’s the amendment that I’m going to insist on. I’m not letting anything go easy without a vote on my amendment.”
Paul declared that Barr utilizing administrative fixes to “reform” FISA was not good enough.
The Kentucky Republicans explained that Barr would not be in office forever and that the next Attorney General could undo Barr’s reforms and reinstitute the Obama domestic spying regime.
“His tenure could be six months and then the next attorney general changes it. This is an inflection point where we should change the law,” Paul told reporters.
The resolution to the conflict between Paul and other Trump supporters in Congress and the Attorney General came when Trump met with Paul and other key lawmakers and informed them he would not sign any FISA renewal without significant reforms.
“The president made it exceedingly clear he will not accept a clean re-authorization … without real reform,” Kentucky Republican Rand Paul told the press after the meeting. “He was told by the attorney general, we can massage around the edges and we can fix this through regulation, the president didn’t accept that, pushed back very vigorously and said ‘we’re not doing this.'”
POLITICO reported that, “Trump instead told the lawmakers: ‘You all work out a bipartisan deal and come back to me and I’ll sign it,’ according to a source in the room.”
This is the second time in recent weeks that Barr fought Trump.
The Attorney General rebuked the President over Trump’s tweets about how the Obama activist presiding over the Roger Stone trial colluded with Deep State prosecutors to rig the proceeding against Stone.
Barr said these tweets made it “impossible” for him to do his job.
Rumors floated that Barr may resign if the President continued to tweet about Justice Department investigations.
That, combined with the President siding with Senator Paul and other Trump supporters in Congress against Barr over FISA renewal, makes one wonder if Barr’s losing streak will lead to his resignation.
Great American Daily will keep you up to date on any new developments in this ongoing story.
