Mueller Left a Gap. Barr Just Filled It.

In today’s blockbuster hearings, Senate Judiciary Committee members cross-examined Attorney General William Barr on his short March 24 letter summarizing Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s probe. In that letter, Barr stated that Mueller had declined to reach a judgment on whether Donald Trump had obstructed justice. Senate Democrats seized on a letter by Mueller complaining that Barr’s short report to Congress “did not fully capture the context, nature, and substance of this office’s work and conclusions” and therefore threatened to “undermine a central purpose” of the special counsel: to ensure “full public confidence in the outcome of the investigations.”

Criticism of Barr’s summary makes much ado about nothing. Barr released the Mueller report just a few weeks later, with the crucial second volume on