MSNBC host Rachel Maddow says the Justice Department's review of the origins of the Russia investigation appears to be a "dangerous" extension of President Trump's reelection campaign.
On her show Tuesday evening, Maddow explained how there are signs that disinformation efforts in this election cycle bear resemblance to those in 2016, including Russian social media activity targeting Trump's political opponents.
This time around, Maddow said there is a "new" element because, as president, Trump appears to be leveraging the power of his own government to his advantage.
"It really does seem like they are going to use the power of the U.S. Justice Department to help them make that case that the Democrats are the real source of the scandal here," she said.
Reports over the weekend about the DOJ review, which is being led by U.S. Attorney John Durham and overseen by Attorney General William Barr, say it has expanded and investigators are seeking interviews with CIA analysts involved in the intelligence assessment of Russia's interference activities during the 2016 campaign. Among those high-profile figures Durham's team wants to speak with is former CIA Director John Brennan, who now uses his contributor gig on MSNBC to criticize Trump, and one of the places the DOJ is seeking help from is Ukraine, where Trump has pushed for an investigation into his 2020 political rival Joe Biden.
Barr has said he believes "spying did occur" on the Trump campaign and initiated the review to assess whether there was “failure among a group of leaders” in the Intelligence Community. Democrats are concerned the review may be a scheme to discredit the work of special counsel Robert Mueller.
Maddow said the media and its "both-sides-ism" will all too willingly give wide coverage to a "rerun" of the 2016 campaign "where they ginned up a fake scandal," alluding to the Hillary Clinton emails controversy.
The FBI investigated Clinton's use of a private server in 2016, and although then-FBI Director James Comey recommended no charges, he did admonish Clinton and her team for being "extremely careless" in handling classified information. Last month the State Department completed an inquiry into the matter and found "some instances" of classified information being "inappropriately introduced into an unclassified system in furtherance of expedience." But investigators uncovered "no persuasive evidence of systematic, deliberate mishandling of classified information."
Maddow said involving the State Department was "dangerous" enough, but "getting the Justice Department involved here is a dangerous new thing," and he compared it to authoritarian leaders in other countries leveraging the power of the state to bear on the election system to stay in power.
"With what Barr and Durham appear to be doing to try to boost the president's campaign, they are crossing a bit of a Rubicon in terms of what the U.S. government is for. And part of what we're going to have to figure out when this is all over is how we cross back over it," Maddow concluded.
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