AG Barr: When Trump Accused Biden and Obama of Treason, He Was Just ‘Using It Colloquially’
In an interview with CNN’s Wolf Blitzer on Wednesday, Attorney General Bill Barr dismissed comments by President Donald Trump accusing former President Barack Obama and former Vice President Joe Biden of treason, with Barr claiming that the president had just been speaking “colloquially” and neither Obama nor Biden were currently under criminal investigation.
“Is it appropriate for the President of the United States to be putting pressure on you in the way he clearly did?” Blitzer asked.
“I don’t feel any pressure from that,” Barr replied, adding that when he talks in private “when we talk in private, he doesn’t talk like that.”
Blitzer played another clip of Trump, in which he says Obama and Biden “spied on my campaign, which is treason” and asked Barr to respond.
Barr said, “If I was really concerned about being politically correct, I wouldn’t have joined the administration,” and he added that he had held a press conference to say that “neither president Obama or vice president Biden were under investigation.”
Blitzer pressed him further, about whether Trump’s comments were appropriate.
“Let me just follow up on this. Is it appropriate, though, for the sitting president to be accusing his predecessor, President Obama, and former Vice President Biden of committing treason?”
“Well, treason is a legal term,” said Barr. “I think he’s using it colloquially. To commit treason, you have to have a state of war with a foreign enemy to commit treason. But I think he feels they were involved in an injustice. And if he feels that, he can say it.”
Watch the video above, via CNN.
