Scarborough: Bill Barr is Right to Say ‘Absolutely Horrendous Precedent’ Will Be Set by Indicting Trump Over Mar-a-Lago Docs
Joe Scarborough acknowledged that former Attorney General Bill Barr was correct in assessing there will be major ramifications for the future of American politics if Donald Trump gets indicted for illegally keeping classified documents at Mar-a-Lago.
On Thursday, Morning Joe reviewed Barr’s latest Fox News interview, where he projected that the former president is “very close” to getting indicted by the DOJ, though he wondered, “What will that do to the country? What kind of precedent will it set?” Barr further theorized there will be “a lot of pressure to indict [Trump] because…if anyone else would’ve gotten indicted, why not indict him?”
Willie Geist admitted Barr was correctly identifying the connotations at stake, and Scarborough agreed that the former AG was “asking the right questions” upon the matter.
“The government can indict Donald Trump, they have a case to indict Donald Trump,” said Scarborough. “Then Barr asks the question that certainly won’t be popular among many watching this show, won’t be popular among many Democrats, but asks the question, should they indict him?”
While Scarborough suggested Trump ought to be indicted, he warned that Republicans would use the precedent established to try getting revenge on Democrats.
If he is indicted, as the law would suggest he should be indicted, then you can bet your bottom dollar that Republicans will do everything they can, a Republican administration, to indict the next Democratic predecessor that they have. You know, there is a reason why Jerry Ford won his profile in courage, because he is willing to sacrifice a presidency to stop the long national nightmare that Richard Nixon was responsible for. Over time, when people cooled down, they decided that was best for our republic. I think the extent of what Donald Trump has done is so egregious that no attorney general, no fair-minded attorney general would have any choice to indict him, but that doesn’t also make it true that it will set, as Barr was saying, an absolutely horrendous precedent.
John Heilemann recognized Scarborough’s point about the broader consequences. However, he argued that Trump has already forced the country into an unprecedented situation, so there must now be a choice regarding how it is dealt with.
I fear that that is going to be the door that’s going to be opened here. Yet, I can’t believe — and I think you and I agree about this — I can’t believe that you would want to set the other precedent, which is that a president could leave office, steal a bunch of documents, take them off to their private home, including top secret documents…and we’re gonna let that president get away with that. You set a precedent in either case.
The consequences of Donald Trump’s actions going forward are terrible in both cases. But the question is which precedent do you want to set? Do you want the precedent where a president who has violated the law in this way is held accountable? Or do you want to set the precedent where he is not accountable? I think the only conclusion you can come to there is, despite the possible political ramifications, the right decision on that is gonna be you can’t let this go without accountability.
Watch above via MSNBC.
