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Former Attorney General\u00a0Bill Barr<\/strong> described\u00a0Donald Trump<\/strong>\u2019s 37-count federal indictment as \u201cvery, very damning\u201d Sunday morning, the latest in a\u00a0string of criticisms<\/a> Barr has made of the former president. The 49-page report, unsealed on Thursday, charges Trump with illegally possessing sensitive government documents and refusing to return them.<\/p>\n \u201cI was shocked by the degree of sensitivity of these documents and how many there were, frankly,\u201d Barr\u00a0said<\/a> in an interview with Fox News\u2019 Shannon Bream<\/strong>. \u201cIf even half of it is true, he\u2019s toast.\u201d Barr added that he felt the 31 counts that fell under a section of the Espionage Act were \u201csolid counts.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Barr\u2019s comments Saturday contrast with his strident criticism of Trump\u2019s indictment in March in New York on charges relating to hush money payments to adult film star Stormy Daniels<\/strong>. Barr has\u00a0called<\/a> the New York indictment an \u201cabomination\u201d and \u201cthe epitome of the abuse of prosecutorial power,\u201d and described the legal theory underlying the indictment as \u201cpathetically weak\u2026held together with chicken wire, paper clips and rubber bands.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n The irony of Barr\u2019s comments this morning is that, as attorney general, he helped pour gasoline on the fire of Trump\u2019s persecution complex and fed broader perceptions that Democrats had politicized the criminal legal system. \u201cYour 2016 victory speech in which you reached out to your opponents and called for working together for the benefit of the American people was immediately met by a partisan onslaught against you in which no tactic, no matter how abusive and deceitful, was out of bounds,\u201d Barr\u00a0wrote<\/a> to Trump in an obsequious resignation letter in December 2020.\u00a0<\/p>\n Barr addressed his past defenses of the president on Saturday. \u201cYes, he\u2019s been a victim in the past. Yes, his adversaries have obsessively pursued him with phony claims, and I\u2019ve been at his side defending against them when he is a victim,\u201d he said. \u201cBut this is much different. He\u2019s not a victim here.\u201d<\/p>\n Yet despite these criticisms, Barr has\u00a0continued to maintain<\/a> that he\u2019d still vote for Trump in a Trump-Biden rematch, due to\u00a0his belief<\/a> that \u201cthe greatest threat to the country is the progressive agenda being pushed by the Democratic Party.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Still, Barr\u2019s willingness to comment on the seriousness of the federal indictment makes him one of just a handful of high-ranking Republicans who have deigned to acknowledge the gravity of the charges. The Hill\u00a0reported<\/a> Sunday that Senate GOP leaders have stayed largely mum about the indictment, while their House counterparts have descended into howling fits of rage. Just one Senate Republican, who requested to speak anonymously, told The Hill that the federal prosecution wasn\u2019t necessarily politically motivated.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n