Elizabeth Warren says AG William Barr must 'resign or face impeachment'

Sen. Elizabeth Warren on Wednesday called on Attorney General William Barr to resign for "abusing official power to protect political friends" after Barr overruled career federal prosecutors to reduce the recommended prison sentence for Roger Stone, a longtime confidant to President Donald Trump.

"Donald Trump is shredding the rule of law in this country. His AG overruled career prosecutors to reduce the sentence for his buddy Roger Stone."

—Sen. Elizabeth Warren

"Congress must act immediately to rein in our lawless attorney general," tweeted Warren, a 2020 Democratic presidential candidate. "Barr should resign or face impeachment. And Congress should use spending power to defund the AG's authority to interfere with anything that affects Trump, his friends, or his elections."

"Trump and Barr's conduct has no place in our democracy," Warren added. "To end it, Congress must act—and the American people must hold them accountable in November."

Stone was convicted last November on seven counts of witness tampering and lying to Congress during the investigation into alleged collusion between Russia and Trump's 2016 presidential campaign.

Federal prosecutors on Monday recommended that Stone receive a prison sentence of seven to nine years for his crimes. Early Tuesday morning, Trump tweeted his disapproval of the recommended sentence, calling it "horrible and very unfair."

Just hours after Trump's tweet, the Justice Department said it was "shocked" by the recommended sentence and announced plans to reduce it, leading all four prosecutors handling the Stone case to withdraw in protest. In a tweet Wednesday morning, Trump applauded Barr for intervening.

"Congratulations to Attorney General Bill Barr for taking charge of a case that was totally out of control and perhaps should not have even been brought," Trump wrote.

Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), a government watchdog group that called for Barr to step down late Tuesday afternoon, tweeted Wednesday that "it's both scary and telling to see him so openly pat the attorney general on the back for interfering in a prosecution on behalf of one of his associates."