US Attorney General Barr: Democrats want to tear down system

US Attorney General William Barr has accused the Democratic Party of believing in “tearing down the system” in what appears to be a partisan attack on the left.

In an interview with Fox News aired Sunday, Barr said that Democrats had disregarded classic liberal values for long and now were similar to the “Rousseauian Revolutionary Party” that aims to destroy the institutions upon which the country was built.

“They’re not interested in compromise, they’re not interested in dialectic exchange of views. They’re interested in total victory,” Barr told TV host conservative pundit Mark Levin. “It’s a secular religion. It’s a substitute for a religion.”

This comes nearly two weeks after Barr, in a contentious hearing before the House Judiciary Committee, denied allegations he was doing Republican President Donald Trump’s bidding by intervening in high-profile cases and dispatching federal agents into cities.

Democratic lawmakers questioned Barr’s decision to deploy federal authorities to Portland, accusing agents of excessive force and of violating the rights of demonstrators.

Trump, who is seeking re-election in November, has initially authorized the deployment of troops to major US cities to highlight his focus on law and order amid unrest across the US.

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Barr, however, defended police officers, saying they have been unfairly maligned and targeted with violent attacks during nationwide protests.

Speaking on Fox News, he did say he believed there exists systemic racism in the country, but that the “best example” was in education, with public schools consistently failing inner-city youth.

He said that a policy endorsed by Trump known as school choice was one solution to the problem.

“I believe Black lives matter, but I believe all Black lives matter. I also believe that it’s not just a matter of protecting their safety from physical harm, it’s also providing economic opportunity, which this administration has done,” Barr said.

Elsewhere in the interview, Barr was also asked about the push to expand mail-in ballots, saying he was “very worried about it.”

He said it is fine to have “individual cases” where people that have difficulty going to the polls can apply for and receive a ballot in the mail.

“But the idea that you, without any request from the voter, will mail out your voting list, all these thousands and thousands of ballots, is scary because most of those mailings go to a lot of addresses where the people no longer live,” Barr said. “They could easily create a situation where there’s going to be a contested election.”

Without providing any evidence, Trump and his allies have proclaimed that expanded voting by mail - due to the coronavirus pandemic - will result in widespread fraud.

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