Democrats claim justice department being used for 'political retribution' – live

Trump seems to be lashing out against reports that hundreds of US troops will remain in northern Syria, despite the president’s announcement that he was withdrawing American forces from the region.

The Wall Street Journal reports:

The White House is considering options for leaving about 500 U.S. troops in northeast Syria and for sending dozens of battle tanks and other equipment, officials said Thursday, the latest in an array of scenarios following President Trump’s decision this month to remove all troops there.

The options, presented by military officials, would represent a reversal from the American withdrawal Mr. Trump wanted. It also would modify U.S. objectives—from countering Islamic State extremists to also safeguarding oil fields in eastern Syria with additional troops and new military capability.

However, Trump was on Twitter this morning insisting things in Syria were “gong well” and US troops were “COMING HOME.”

The president is also exaggerating the situation he inherited in Syria. There was never any agreement to completely withdraw from Syria after a month, and US forces only became involved in the country in 2014.

Trump is essentially demanding credit for a promise that he has not kept.

Good morning, live blog readers!

We are almost to the end of a very damaging week for the president, with more evidence of a quid pro quo in the Ukraine scandal coming to light, but it appears that the Trump administration may be using every tool at its disposal to fight back.

News broke last night that the Justice Department has opened a criminal investigation into its own Russia investigation, which Donald Trump spent more than two years criticizing as a “witch-hunt”.

The New York Times reports:

Justice Department officials have shifted an administrative review of the Russia investigation closely overseen by Attorney General William P. Barr to a criminal inquiry, according to two people familiar with the matter. The move gives the prosecutor running it, John H. Durham, the power to subpoena for witness testimony and documents, to convene a grand jury and to file criminal charges.

The opening of a criminal investigation is likely to raise alarms that Mr. Trump is using the Justice Department to go after his perceived enemies. Mr. Trump fired James B. Comey, the F.B.I. director under whose watch agents opened the Russia inquiry, and has long assailed other top former law enforcement and intelligence officials as partisans who sought to block his election.

Adam Schiff and Jerry Nadler, the Democratic chairmen of the House intelligence and judiciary committees, issued a statement last night warning that the reported criminal investigation could signal the Justice Department has become “a tool of political retribution”.

Schiff and Nadler said: “These reports, if true, raise profound new concerns that the Department of Justice under AG Barr has lost its independence and become a vehicle for President Trump’s political revenge.

“If the Department of Justice may be used as a tool of political retribution, or to help the President with a political narrative for the next election, the rule of law will suffer new and irreparable damage.”

Here’s what else the blog is keeping its eye on:

• Trump will participate in a criminal justice reform forum in Columbia, South Carolina, before traveling to Camp David.
• The funeral for the late congressman Elijah Cummings will be held in Baltimore. A number of notable Democrats – including Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and Nancy Pelosi – are expected to speak.
• Game 3 of the World Series will take place tonight in Washington as the city’s Nationals play the Houston Astros.

The blog will have much more coming up, so stay tuned.