Attorney General William Barr Authorizes DOJ to Look into Voting Irregularities
Attorney General William Barr in a memo issued on Monday authorized the Justice Department (DOJ) to look into voting irregularities in the 2020 presidential election.
The memo was addressed and signed from Barr to U.S. Attorneys, the assistant attorneys general for the DOJ’s criminal division, civil rights division, the national security division, and the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Christopher Wray.
The letter was also signed by:
Rep. Jim Banks; Reps. W. Gregory Steube; Bob Gibbs; Bill Posey; Ralph Norman; H. Morgan Griffith; Jeff Duncan; Ted Budd; Mark Green; Andy Harris, M.D.; Scott DesJarlais; Dan Bishop; Jody Hice; Mike Kelly; Randy K. Weber; Brian Babin; Chip Roy; Robert E. Latta; Ben Cline; James Comer; Guy Reschenthaler; Warren Davidson; Scott Perry; Rick Allen; Roger Marshall, M.D.; Doug LaMalfa; Bill Flores; Bill Johnson; K. Michael Conaway; Kevin Hern; Glen Grothman; Tom Emmer; John Joyce; John W. Rose; Lance Gooden; Jodey Arrington; and Dan Crenshaw.
“Now that the voting has concluded, it is imperative that the American people can trust that our elections were conducted in such a way that the outcomes accurately reflect the will of the voters,” the memo read.
Barr’s memo comes after 39 House Republicans pressed Barr in a letter on Friday to allow available DOJ resources to look into allegations of voting irregularities across the country in several key battleground states. The Trump campaign has filed a number of lawsuits in some of those states.
Barr Memo to DOJ on voting irregularities by Kristina Wong on Scribd
Barr said in his memo that, although the states have the primary responsibility to conduct and supervise elections, the DOJ has “an obligation to ensure that federal elections are conducted in such a way that the American people can have full confidence in their electoral process and their government.”
He added that while “most allegations” of purported election misconduct are of such a scale that they would not impact the outcome of an election that their investigation can be deferred, “that is not always the case.”
