There would be no legal basis for a court to compel Attorney General William Barr to release special counsel Robert Mueller's report, despite plans from the House Judiciary Committee to subpoena it this week, and it would be illegal for him to release it, Harvard Law professor emeritus Alan Dershowitz said Monday.
"There is nothing in the rules that require the attorney general to make the report public, particularly if it contains information critical of people who are not indicted," Dershowitz told Fox News' "America's Newsroom." "This is a political issue. This is a media issue. This is not a legal issue."
He compared the matter to when, during the 2016 election, then-FBI Director James Comey announced he would not indict Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.
"Let's assume that the Republicans said there was a report within the Justice Department that says she is extremely careless . . . and there was an effort by Republicans to subpoena that report," Dershowitz said. "First of all, every Democrat would be up in arms saying you don't subpoena reports about people who have not been indicted."
He added the difference between whether Mueller's report is released now, as Democrats want, or by the middle of the month, as Barr has said he plans to do.
"We need to have the attorney general redact it to make sure there is no national security classified material, no grand jury minutes, and I would submit nothing that is critical of people who have not been indicted and haven't had an opportunity to respond," Dershowitz said. "Remember this report is inherently one-sided. They didn't listen to testimony from people who were favorable to the subjects."
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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