TIMELINE: Barr said in statement Friday that Berman was stepping down, then Berman said he wasn’t. Barr said in Saturday letter that he asked Trump to fire Berman and that Trump did so. Trump then insisted he was “not involved” in the decision.
President Donald Trump on Saturday fired the federal prosecutor whose office put his former personal lawyer in prison and is investigating his current one, heightening criticism that the president was carrying out an extraordinary purge to rid his administration of officials whose independence could be a threat to his reelection campaign.
Since the beginning of the year, the president has fired or forced out inspectors general with independent oversight over executive branch agencies and other key figures from the trial. Story continuesThe choice of Strauss appeared to mollify Berman, who then issued a statement saying he would step down in light of the reversal.
Speaking briefly to reporters outside the White House before heading to a campaign rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Trump tried to distance himself from the firing. He insisted he was “not involved” in the decision to remove Berman despite what Barr said in his letter. The most prominent critic of the move was Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., and a close ally of the president’s.
Throughout the day Saturday, many current and former employees of the Southern District marveled at just how sour relations with their colleagues in Washington had gotten. Some worried openly that the move threatened the independence of federal prosecutors. When he later met with Berman, according to two people familiar with the conversation, Barr suggested that Berman could take over the civil division of the Justice Department or become chairman of the SEC if he agreed to leave his position in Manhattan.
“Because you have declared that you have no intention of resigning, I have asked the president to remove you as of today, and he has done so,” the letter read. When Barr became attorney general, officials in the deputy attorney general’s office, which oversees regional prosecutors, asked him to rein in Berman, who they believed was exacerbating the Southern District’s propensity for autonomy. The office has embraced its nickname the “Sovereign District” of New York because of its tradition of independence.
Trump has told advisers he was pleased with the move to dismiss Berman, and a person close to the president described it as a long time coming.
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