2,000 former DOJ, FBI officials call on Barr to resign over Michael Flynn case

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/justice-department/2-000-former-doj-fbi-officials-call-barr-resign-over-n1204601

May 11, 2020, 2:52 PM EDT
By Pete Williams

Nearly 2,000 former Justice Department and FBI officials on Monday signed an open letter strongly critical of Attorney General William Barr's decision to abandon the prosecution of Michael Flynn, calling the action "extraordinarily rare, if not unprecedented."

If anyone else who is not a friend of the president "were to lie to federal investigators in the course of a properly predicated counterintelligence investigation, and admit we did so under oath, we could be prosecuted," the letter said.

The letter calls on Barr to resign and encourages Congress to formally censure Barr over "his repeated assaults on the rule of law in doing the President’s personal bidding rather than acting in the public interest."

•••••

Most of the signers are former career lawyers from both Republican and Democratic administrations, though many former political appointees are included. The highest-ranking to sign so far is Stuart Gerson, who served briefly as acting attorney general at the start of the Clinton administration after leading the Justice Department Civil Division in the first Bush administration.