Reached the conclusions he detailed in a fourpage summary letter until congress and the American People actually have the report in front of them, but the attorney general did open eyes with his answer when explaining his decision to take a detailed look back at how the russia investigation got started in the first place. Attorney general barr saying he wanted to make sure what he called spying on the Trump Campaign was justified. So youre not youre not suggesting, though, that spying occurred . I dont well, i guess you could i think there is spying did occur. Yes, i think spying did occur. Well, let me the question is whether it was predicated, adequately predicated, and im not suggesting it was inadequately predicated, but id need to explore that. Cnns Laura Jarrett is at the Justice Department. Laura, the attorney general not willing to talk about many issues, but talking in several questions about what he called spying and then surveillance and he wants to know was it legit. Talking about really one of the president s favorite topics, john, and opening seeming to open, i should say, a can of worms over this whole idea that president Trumps Campaign was spied on during the 2016 election by the fbi. Now, barr said he doesnt think that there is something endemic at the fbi that was wrongdoing here, but he does say he wants to look at some of the upper echelons, sort of a hint to former fbi director james comey and the Deputy DirectorAndrew Mccabe possibly there, saying he wants to take a look at that. He acknowledged the fact that the inspector general, the internal watchdog over here at the Justice Department, has already been reviewing this issue. Months ago was called upon to do so by the former attorney general jeff sessions. Barr saying he wants to take a look at it more broadly. He wants to take a look at everything thats been done into any unauthorized surveillance. He was pressed at link to explain what he saw as evidence. He declined to elaborate further on it, but saying he does think its a problem. As for the consequences, he says that depends, john. He said it may not necessarily be something criminal, but he really wants to take a look at it. So this is going to be just the beginning of a pretty long and contentious conversation over spying, john. A contentious conversation over that. Contention still to come over when we see the report and whats in it. Laura jarrett, appreciate the live report from the Justice Department. With me here in studio to discuss. Evan, he used the word spying, which, you know, for those of us in the, you know, mainstream or people watching at home, you might think thats james bond or jason bourne. Within the community, it is a term of art. It is a loaded term. He was later pressed and said he wants to see unauthorized surveillance. When the attorney general of the United States says spying, number one, hes channelling his boss, the president. Number two, how significant do we believe his concerns are about this and where do they come from . Is it just because this is the conservative chatter or is there something in the Mueller Report about this . Well, i dont believe its going to be addressed in the Mueller Report. I think the attorney general is he said towards the end of the hearing there, he said that there were he had his own concerns. He didnt want to discuss what specifically they were, but its a big deal. What he said today was a big, big deal because, you know, again, hes raising the prospect of investigating the investigators, something the president has been calling for, and if the message that the Justice Department and the fbi get from what the attorney general is saying is that there ought to be a higher standard if youre going to do a counterintelligence investigation, something a National Security investigation, thats very important, then there could be consequences. The fbi, thats five years from now, right . Somebody we find out that the fbi decided not to open something on on something that was of concern because they were concerned of exactly this. Then i think were going to remember this day, right . I mean, the Justice Department deals with this with this issue very, very difficult issue all the time. And what happens with counterintelligence investigations is that often we never know about them, right . They open them, they take a look at these people and then they close them without ever without any of that becoming public. Why this became public, some of this stuff, including the fisa on carter page, was because republicans in Congress Demanded for it to be made public. And so thats the consequence that were seeing here. And so some of the democrats are going to say, gee, you wont answer how you reached your conclusion, the president didnt obstruct justice. You wont tell us when we ask you questions about whats in the Mueller Report, but youre happy to sit here and say youre going to go back and look at the investigators. Democrats look at that you are a trump appointee and making republican talking points, but it also is a critical issue thats come up from the beginning. What are we learning . There are a lot of inconsistencies in what hes say. When he talks about unauthorized surveillance versus surveillance that wasnt correctly predicated. Those are two different things. One suggests that someone was freelances. It would be improper for him to summarize the Mueller Report. His march 24th letter literally said he thinks its in the Public Interest to summarize the report and the results of the conclusion. He refused to say whether or not he briefed the white house on the Mueller Report. I dont know if thats changed today. There is a lot going on here, senators might want to get a couple more round of questioning. We are starting to see over the past 24 to 30 hours why the president picked barr. Republicans are thrilled. I mean, this whole idea of investigating the investigator for a long time, a lot of people oh sort of dismissed it, even though republicans on the hill had been talking about it. It was seen as this Conspiracy Theory that there were rogue fbi agents, you had this antitrump bias. He has very much elevated that. Yesterday he actually seemed to take a crack at jerry nadler, who is the top democrat on the Judiciary Committee investigating the president when he was like, you know, some of the democrats during the clinton era argued against releasing the starr report, and he said im not im not interested in releasing grand jury information. And he specifically suggested that jerry nadler was a hypocrite for arguing against releasing that information in the 90s and then wants to have it released now. Republicans are very pleased. Democrats frustrated. If President Trump was watching from air force one this morning, im sure he was thrilled. This reinforces everything hes been saying and was saying just this morning about questioning the investigation, questioning the investigators, talking about dirty cops, and this plays into a line were hearing from him on the 2020 campaign trail. Hes really framing himself as a victim to his supporters. And the attorney general near the end of the hearing, which is now over said, look, i want to look at this. Well see what happens. Maybe it was all legally predicated. If i find that it wasnt, he was asked if he would prosecute. He said sometimes you prosecute and sometimes you change the rules. He went back to the vietnam era with surveillance on protesting groups. Be transparent about that as well. One of the key question for democrats was about to your point to the summary letter. The Mueller Report, which we will see at least part of next week, says that there was no collusion and bob mueller did not find collusion, but left open the question. He couldnt exonerate the president on obstruction of justice but wasnt making a case of obstruction of justice. Batte did he express any expectation or interest in leaving the obstruction decision to congress . He didnt say that to me, no. So he said the obstruction decision should be up to you . He didnt say that either. All right. But thats generally how the department of justice works. Generally grand juries are to investigate crimes and a prosecutors role at the end of the day is binary. Are there charges or no charges or is this a crime or not a crime . Just this sort of calm answer. The democrats want to know did you decide in your letter i dont see a case to prosecute obstruction of justice. He says mueller didnt ask him to do that, he decided that was his job as attorney general. I think thats an important answer because it answers something everybody has been wondering. Was mueller leaving this pregnant, so to speak, so the congress wouldnt pick it up. He said no, mueller didnt tell me that. Were going to see whether there is language in the report that sort of hints at that. We dont know. I think its important hes right, by the way, the attorney generals job is to make these calls. The Justice Departments decision is to make a decision on whether or not to bring charges. When you decide not to bring charges, youre essentially doing a declination. Hes right that thats what this is. To your point about him not wanting to answer some questions that one would think would be easy to answer, the president of the United States said this morning he has not seen the Mueller Report. Were going to get to that in a little bit in more detail. This is senator chris coons, democrat of delaware, asking because the attorney general left to uncleared whether he shared the day he released his summary letter, he said he had not shared it with the white house. He has since left it unclear. Democrats tried to again. Has anyone in the white house seen any of the report . You know, im not going to as i said, im landing the plane right now, and, you know, ive been willing to discuss my my letters and the process going forward, but the reports going to be out next week and im just not going to get into the details of the process until the planes on the ground. So hes willing to get into the details of the process of going back to investigate the investigators, but hes not willing to say yes or no as to whether he the president said he hadnt seen it today. The attorney general wont say whether he shared it with the president or the president s lawyers or anybody else. Why . Definitely suspicious, right . Democrats have said since, you know, barr sent his letter to capitol hill that he better not share this report with the white house. You know, there was some speculation that he could do that with some white house lawyers saying they want to go through it and look for information that they could claim executive privilege. Democrats on the hill say absolutely not. When you decided to participate in the investigation, you waived that privilege, but, again, this is just another point of contention we could potentially see between barr and hill democrats if he did give him a sneak peek. And i want to go back to the near the very end of the hearing. The chairman of the subcommittee, senator moran of answer, brings this issue, comes back to the spying question. I just want everyone to hear this. And what are the consequences for those who committed unauthorizing unauthorized surveillance . Did you say that i said that it occurred . You indicated i think i tried to at least reflect on what your quote was, that you thought spying on a Political Campaign occurred in the course of an intelligence agencys investigation into russian interference in 2016. I thought the question was, did i have any basis for saying that . And im now asking what the basis is or what the facts are that lead you to that thought. Okay. I felt i am concerned about it, and i was asked about whether there was any basis for it, and i believe there is a basis for my concern, but im not going to discuss the basis. And whats potential consequences for those who violated the law . Well, it depends what it depends what the facts ultimately prove to be. Which would be determined in a prosecution . Possibly, but, you know, there are also there can be abuses that may not arise to the level of a of a crime but that, you know, people might think is bad and might want to put in rules against again, the language of the trade is very important here in the sense that hes not saying a bunch of republican congressmen have said it happened so im going to take a look at it, he said i believe theres a basis. As the countrys top prosecutor, hes saying something there. He thinks he has a predicate, a reasonable certainty that he wants to look at this question. Look, this attorney general is very careful usually in saying exactly what he means. So we usually listen very carefully to his words because he chooses them very carefully. You know, i know for a fact that he reads everything. He reads a lot of stuff. And, you know, the wall street journals editorial page, for instance, has been hammering this point that this was an illegally predicated investigation. That is not supported by the evidence weve seen so far, but thats what thats what certain quarters of the media have been hammering on. So the attorney general talking about that . I dont know. Or is he did he see something from perhaps some of the finding of horowitz maybe, some of the things hes been briefed on. We dont know. But hes usually very careful in saying what he means, and so thats why i think you have to think that there are phone calls going on right now between the fbi, across the street to the Justice Department, trying to get a little clarity on exactly what the attorney general intends to do, what he means exactly because youre right. These are loaded terms. Spying. Again, this is what we do overseas. What the fbi does here is different. He tried to amend it some to surveillance. He used that word a couple of times. He knows what hes saying when he says it. Up next for us, we continue the conversation, but in a different way. 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If you listen, he made it pretty clear hes keeping close tabs on what his attorney general is saying about the coming release of the Mueller Report. On the one hand, so what, is the president s take. I have not seen the Mueller Report. I have not read the Mueller Report. I won. No collusion. No obstruction. As far as im concerned, i dont care about the Mueller Report. Ive been totally exonerated. No collusion. No obstruction. But if he doesnt care, why this . The president again attacking the investigation and the investigators in a very clear effort to raise doubts about anything in the report that casts him in an unfa