WASHINGTON — Maryland Democrats are clamoring for resignations and beefed up congressional scrutiny as the political fallout over Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report continues.
Maryland Sen. Chris Van Hollen on Tuesday called for the resignation of Attorney General William Barr after revelations that Mueller had written to Barr to express concerns with Barr’s summary of Mueller’s report.
Van Hollen said Barr had misled him in an April hearing, in which Barr told the senator, “I don’t know whether Mueller supported my conclusion.”
Van Hollen wrote Tuesday night on Twitter, “We now know Mueller stated his concerns on March 27th, and that Barr totally misled me, the Congress, and the public. He must resign.”
Maryland Rep. Jamie Raskin (D) told Maryland Matters on Wednesday that Barr has already effectively resigned his post as attorney general “and is acting essentially as a strategist, a propagandist and a consigliere for Donald Trump.”
Raskin added, “It’s interesting when people ask me whether he should resign as attorney general because it almost implies that everybody else in the cabinet is doing a great job and he has just fallen beneath this high standard in the administration.”
The Democratic congressman doesn’t see it that way. “I suppose the whole cabinet should resign and so should the president because they’ve dishonored their oaths of loyalty and duty to the American people, all of them,” he said. “So yeah, I guess he should be part of a mass resignation by the entire Trump cabinet.”
Meanwhile, Maryland lawmakers want continued scrutiny of Mueller’s findings in both chambers of Congress.
Sen. Ben Cardin (D-Md.) said in an interview this week that Congress must be “extremely aggressive” when it comes to oversight. He called for further inquiries into Russian election interference, as well as additional probes into President Trump’s conduct.
“I think that’s serious,” Cardin said. “I don’t think you can ignore it. I think you have to go into an oversight function so that the facts are well known to the American people.”
Cardin said it’s premature to discuss the possibility of impeachment in the House, but he isn’t ruling it out.
“They can’t ignore their responsibilities,” he said.
Raskin said the House must consider impeachment among its options.
“Everything needs to be on the table at this point. The president is driving us into a constitutional emergency,” he said.
Republicans in both the House and Senate, meanwhile, are eager to put an end to discussions about impeachment and about Mueller’s findings.
Maryland Rep. Andrew P. Harris, the lone Republican in Maryland’s congressional delegation, issued a statement in April saying that Mueller had “clearly exonerated the president from allegations of collusion with the Russian government during his presidential campaign in 2016. … It’s time we move on from partisan politics to issues Americans truly care about, like securing our border, addressing the opioid crisis, and continuing to grow our economy.”
Did someone forward this to you?
Get your own daily morning news roundup in your inbox. Free. Sign up here.
Related Articles
A bill that got a boost of momentum right before the end of the 2024 legislative session tries to keep lower- priced prescription drugs accessible to lower income Marylanders.
All 10 members of the Maryland congressional delegation have sponsored the measure, including the lone Republican, U.S. Rep. Andy Harris.
In a surreal turn, House conservatives invoke feminist icons Gloria Steinem and Ruth Bader Ginsburg to advance their arguments.
Creative Commons Attribution