President Donald Trump
Kevin Lamarque | Reuters
President Donald Trump criticized Attorney General William Barr on Friday after being told during a live radio interview that a probe into the origins of the Russia investigation might not be released before Election Day.
Trump, speaking with conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh, had been asked about Axios’ report that Barr has warned Republicans on Capitol Hill not to expect the findings of the probe by the Department of Justice to be released before Nov. 3.
“If that’s the case I think it’s terrible. It’s very disappointing. And I’ll tell him to his face,” Trump said during the roughly two-hour radio interview.
“I think it’s a disgrace. It’s an embarrassment,” he said.
The president said he was previously unaware of Barr’s reported comments. “I’m hearing this for the first time,” Trump told Limbaugh.
“If Bill Barr made that statement, I would be very disappointed in him,” Trump added.
Trump has publicly pressured Barr and the DOJ to quickly wrap up the probe, which is investigating how the department under the administration of then President Barack Obama opened an inquiry into Trump’s presidential campaign in 2016 and its contacts with Russia. The probe is being overseen by John Durham, the U.S. attorney for Connecticut.
Justice Department spokeswoman Kerri Kupec did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the president’s remarks.
In an interview Thursday on Fox Business Network, Trump said of Durham’s probe: “These are people that spied on my campaign, and we have everything. Now they say they have much more, OK. And I say, ‘Bill, we got plenty, you don’t need any more.'”
Trump has asserted that numerous DOJ and Obama administration officials, including former Vice President Joe Biden, his rival in the 2020 election, should face charges.
“Unless Bill Barr indicts these people for crimes — the greatest political crimes in the history of our country — then we’re going to get little satisfaction unless I win,” Trump said on Fox Business. “But these people should be indicted, this was the greatest political crime in the history of our country. And that includes Obama and it includes Biden.”
Barr has previously said that Trump’s tweets about a separate case involving his longtime ally Roger Stone “make it impossible for me to do my job.”
