New reports place Bill Barr closer to insurrection plans -- and put him under increased pressure to testify

William Barr is facing intensifying pressure to testify about the Jan. 6 insurrection.

The former attorney general has taken part in informal discussions with the House select committee investigating the U.S. Capitol riot, but new reporting shows Barr was more closely involved in the legal discussions that led to the attack than previously known, reported Yahoo News.

"After operating so closely with President Trump for a long time, something clearly soured former Attorney General Barr on him, and so I'm very interested in what the sequence of events was that essentially broke the camel's back," said Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD).

Barr resigned from the Trump administration in December 2020, as the former president and his allies schemed to remain in power despite his election loss, and new reporting shows their efforts to have federal officials seize voting machines in key states to undo the results.

READ: Trump discussed having local law enforcement seize election machines with Michigan lawmakers

The New York Timesreported that Barr refused to go along with Trump's suggestion to have the Justice Department confiscate the voting machines, and Democrats want to speak with him again about these discussions after he previously told them he had no special insight into the attack on Jan. 6 -- which new reports show that Trump allies saw as their last chance to undo the election loss.

"If William Barr's public statements and private statements conflict with evidence coming from other sources, then I think prudence dictates that he be brought in and put under oath and questioned," said Rep. Hank Johnson (D-GA). "I don't know why he's still trying to protect the president that everyone now knows was trying to subvert our democratic process. In the interest of patriotism, he's duty-bound to come forward without a subpoena, and share voluntarily what he knows."