This is the legal landscape now before the man who must be identified as the attorney general of the United States: The unanimous consensus of the American intelligence community, the findings of the Mueller investigation, and the bipartisan conclusion of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence all agree that the Russian Federation interfered in the 2016 presidential election “by harming Hillary Clinton’s chances of success and supporting Donald Trump at the direction of the Kremlin.” Special counsel Robert Mueller documented numerous interactions between Russian actors and Trump campaign officials and laid out 10 instances of obstruction of justice committed by President Donald Trump. And now Trump faces impeachment over his illegal solicitation of foreign intervention for his 2020 reelection campaign and his shocking quid pro quo withholding of military aid to Ukraine unless its government publicly promised to investigate groundless allegations against his potential opponent, former Vice President Joe Biden.

In response, William Barr, the man columnist William Safire aptly called the “Cover-up General” almost 30 years ago, is functioning as Donald Trump’s consigliere, not as the chief law enforcement officer for the American people. Barr’s mission now is to manufacture evidence to paint the very investigations into Trump’s lawlessness as illegitimate themselves. The very basis of the Trump-Russia probe, Barr suggested earlier this year, might well be illegal “spying” carried out by the Obama administration against the 2016 Republican nominee. Instead, the globe-trotting Justice Department boss hopes to show, it was Ukrainian skullduggery three years ago that framed Russia and the Trump campaign.