Page 743 - Commitments News Today

Thing as a guarantee. if bill barr promised, yes, ill make the report public or give it to congress, is that a guarantee? >> you have to trust his good faith on that. once someone is confirmed in the cabinet, theres really no remedy except impeachment of the cabinet member which effectively never happens. david makes a point about the senate republicans. there is no sign currently any senate republicans are on the fence or against barr. barr is going to get confirmed. the question is what kind o...

I think the integrity of our institutions is just as much at risk today. president trump views the justice department as an extension of his political power. he is calling on it to target opponents. he ubseszs over the russia investigation. he attacks the special counsel almost daily. he fired both previous fbi director and attorney general for not handling the investigation as he pleased. that tells me the rule of law can no longer be taken for granted. so fif confirmed, the president will expe...

Than 1991, 1973. senator leahy asked you about the confirmation of president nixons nominee to be attorney general. that confirmation took place in the context of a similarly dw d divided period in american history where there was great concern at that time of the ongoing watergate investigation. elliott richardson reassured the country by making some important commitments during his confirmation hearing before this committee. then-senator strom thurman asked him if he wanted a special committee...

The president took the interpreters notes and swore him to secrecy. have you ever heard of that happening before with any president? >> i have not. i cannot conceive why there would be a necessity for doing that. translators are doing a linguistic thing. thats why its so important you have other people to stake substantive notes about discussions, and particularly commitments that are made and requests that are made in the course of a dialogue like that. i just think its really disturbing that w...

At your hearing a number of years ago. let me go back even before that, 46 years ago i was not in the senate. i was state attorney in vermont. i watched with a great deal of interest the elliot richardson hearings, nominated attorney general. he made several commitments to the committee including appointing a special prosecutor and promised to protect his independence. i thought how important it was to have the same independence. mr. richardson said it was necessary to create the maximum possibi...

Part and parcel of this nomination investigation? i want to confirm he will not interfere with the russian investigation in any shape or form. considering he wrote a 19 page memo outlining how president trump engaged in on construction of justice that kind of investigation by mueller had no basis, i want to make sure he will not interfere with muellers continuing investigation as to whether or not the president has engaged in obstruction of justice. that is totally contrary to what mr. barr wrot...

The pictures we showed a moment ago are live pictures of the nominee william barr arriving there. i want to bring in manu raju on capitol hill. the key is republicans in the larger senate here. is there any wobbling of support among republicans? the president has a majority in the senate. do you see that from your perch? >> not at this point. thats what democrats hope todays hearing may lead to. they believe if william barr does not give any sort of ironclad commitments for the mueller probe, ma...

Devastate turkey economically if it attacks the kurds i mean those are fighting words how did that go down in turkey. well interestingly by turkish standards the reaction was very restrained we had initial reaction from the president one spokesman who said that it is unthinkable that the u.s. to side to side with what he called terrorists rather than its nato ally further down the road we had the turkish foreign minister saying that they should address these things fruit telephone calls and conv...

Is here are the commitments to be attorney general, i will be looking for unequivocal commitments he will respect the independence of the investigation and receive all the resources, not to overrule muellers decisions about indictment and prosecutions and little on -- not allow anyone including the president did interfere with or curtail the investigation. any issues with that? >> it depends what he means by unequivocal commitments. will not hear the attorney general commit to specific decisions...

>> i guess you could say they are dirty cops. i have never seen a turnaround in a bureau or agency like i have with the fbi. they are so embarrassed -- i think 12 people now have been terminated. and others if you look at whats happening, others are going to go. >> shannon: that is the president responding to "new york times" report which alleges that after president trump fired fbi director james comey the fbi began investigating whether or not the president was a russian agent. that report cou...