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Bill Barr resigns days after Donald Trump blasts him for secrecy over Hunter Biden investigation

The president tweeted the AG's resignation letter in which the latter spoke on election fraud and even praised Trump's leadership

It has finally come to an end. Attorney General Bill Barr resigned on Monday, December 14, following a face-to-face meeting at the White House where President Donald Trump expressed his disappointment with the AG for keeping the Hunter Biden investigation secret. 

Trump tweeted the news the same day saying Barr did “an outstanding job!” and his relationship with the latter “has been very good”. He cited the 70-year-old’s decision as his own and said he will leave before Christmas and “spend the holidays with his family”. 

In another tweet, he posted the resignation letter of Barr (it says he will depart on December 23) and said Deputy Attorney General Jeff Rosen will be the acting AG while Richard Donoghue will perform the duties of the deputy AG. He called Rosen an “outstanding person” and Donoghue “highly respected”. 

Barr speaks over 'election fraud' in his letter

Barr has been serving as the 85th AG since February 2019 when he replaced Jeff Sessions who had also stepped down following differences with the commander-in-chief. 
Barr’s letter, which otherwise praised Trump for his leadership, also spoke on the matter of election fraud. 

"At a time when the country is so deeply divided, it is incumbent on all levels of government, and all agencies acting within their purview, to do all we can do assure the integrity of elections and promote public confidence in their outcome,” the veteran wrote. While Barr supported Trump’s claim before the elections that mail-in voting would lead to widespread electoral fraud, he held after the election that the justice department did not find fraud on a scale that could affect the outcome of the November 3 election that went to Joe Biden. This left the president and his allies fuming since they are continuing to challenge the election but faced an overwhelming number of losses at courts, including the Supreme Court, three judges of which were picked by Trump himself. 

In the past, Trump expressed his anger over Barr not being able to indict any of his domestic opponents, including former president Barack Obama, and warned that the outgoing AG was not doing a favor to his reputation. 

The Wall Street Journal recently cited sources to report that in the period leading up to the polls in November, Barr asked prosecutors and senior colleagues not to leak words on investigations into Hunter, the controversial son of Joe, to the public and keep the justice department out of campaign politics. The report also said that Barr took more steps to insulate the probe, despite Trump and the GOP allies wanting it. 

Trump expressed his disappointment about Barr over the weekend and told Fox News that the latter “should have stepped up”. 

“All he had to do is say an investigation’s going on,” the president said, adding: “When you affect an election, Bill Barr, frankly, did the wrong thing.”

On December 14, a White House spokesperson said Barr resigned on his own accord and was never pushed. “It was a very amicable meeting and as you can tell from the letter he thinks very highly of the president,” the spokesperson said. 
 
Trump tweeted the letter moments after the electors in California met to confirm Biden’s win in the Electoral College which met on December 14. The Democrat’s victory in the election was confirmed by the college and more Republican senators started calling the former vice president the president-elect.