capitol riot

‘Nonsense': Former AG Barr Says He Told Trump He Didn't See Voter Fraud

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Former U.S. Attorney General William Barr said he repeatedly told Donald Trump he saw no evidence of voter fraud in the 2020 U.S. election despite Trump's false claims of a stolen election.

Speaking to members of the House special committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection, Barr said he "repeatedly told the president, in no uncertain terms, that I did not see evidence of fraud that would have affected the outcome of the election."

Former President Trump's false allegations included that some vote-counting machines were part of a corrupt system designed to ignore votes from his own supporters. Barr said conspiracy theories following the election were "nonsense" and "crazy stuff."

"I saw absolutely zero basis for the allegations but they were made in such a sensational way that they obviously were influencing a lot of people, members of the public," Barr said in the previously recorded interview shown Thursday. "That there was this systemic corruption in the system, and that their votes didn't count, and that these machines controlled by somebody else were actually determining it — which was complete nonsense."

"I told him that it was crazy stuff and they were wasting their time on that and it was doing a great, great disservice to the country," Barr said.

During the opening night of the House committee hearings on the U.S. Capitol Riot, congressional chairs Reps. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., and Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., laid out a damning indictment of former President Donald Trump with testimony from former U.S. Attorney General Bill Barr, Ivanka Trump and a U.S. Capitol police officer.

For more on the hearing, follow our live blog.

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