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Congress should understand the rule of law

Typing Letter to the Editor for the Opinion page.

A recent letter writer urged that the unredacted Mueller report be released to the public by the Attorney General of the United States.

Luckily for us and the rule of the law, Attorney General William Barr is following the strict legal requirements pertaining to such matters and refusing the request by House Democrats.

Democrat members of Congress have access to the full report except for grand jury material, but have declined to review it.

While the Attorney General was not required by law to release any part of the report, he released 90% of it with the noted redactions. The redactions were to protect grand jury material under Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 6(e), information related to national security, information relating to ongoing investigations and information about unrelated third parties.

Grand jury material can only be released pursuant to a court order and such orders are very rarely granted and are subject to F.R.C.P. Rule 6(e).

Most first-year law students know grand jury material must be kept secret and cannot be released by the Attorney General or by any prosecutor. Any prosecutor doing so would be in clear violation of well settled law and subject to serious penalties.

One would think the members of Congress would know as much. However, they prefer to grandstand by creating phony issues that garner headlines.

There have already been four investigations into the subject matter of the Mueller report and all have reached the same conclusion that there was no collusion between President Trump, his campaign and Russia. Do we really need a fifth investigation?

When will the House of Representatives start working for the American people? There are too many real issues facing the country that need to be addressed instead of wasting even  more time and more taxpayer dollars on endless investigations.

Hal R. Crane
Morganville

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