Hatchet Man Book Reviews

Hatchet Man by Elie Honig Book Summary

This national bestselling account of Bill Barr’s tenure as Trump’s attorney general is “essential reading for all who cherish the rule of law in America” (George Conway).

“Written with all the color and pacing of a legal thriller” (Variety), this book by a former federal prosecutor and CNN senior legal analyst exposes William Barr as the most corrupt attorney general in modern U.S. history.

Elie Honig draws on his own experience as a prosecutor at DOJ to show how, as America’s top law enforcement official, Barr repeatedly violated the Department’s written rules, and those vital, unwritten norms and principles that comprise the “prosecutor’s code,” resulting in an unprecedented abuse of power. Barr, he states, was corrupt from the beginning: His first act as AG was to distort the findings of Special Counsel Robert Mueller, earning a public rebuke for his dishonesty from Mueller himself and, later, from a federal judge. Then, Barr tried to manipulate the law to squash a whistleblower’s complaint about Trump’s dealings with Ukraine—the report that eventually led to Trump’s first impeachment. He later intervened to undermine his own DOJ prosecutors on the cases of Trump allies Michael Flynn and Roger Stone, and fired the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York under false pretenses. Finally, Barr amplified baseless theories about massive mail-in ballot fraud, pouring gasoline on the dumpster fire battle over the 2020 election results and contributing to the January 6 insurrection that led to Trump’s second impeachment.

In Hatchet Man, Honig proves that Barr trampled the two core virtues that have long defined the DOJ and its mission: credibility and independence—and explains what we must do to prevent this from ever happening again.

“Indicts Barr for treating his role as that of a personal enforcer for the president rather than the leader of an independent Justice Department . . . for readers looking for an accessible overview of Barr’s time as attorney general—or dizzied by the sheer volume of scandals that took place during the Trump presidency—Honig provides a useful rundown.” —The Washington Post

“A comprehensive indictment of one of the most controversial figures of the Trump administration.” —Publishers Weekly

“A resounding excoriation of an unquestionably corrupt operator.” —Kirkus Reviews

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Hatchet Man (Elie Honig) Book Reviews 2024

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