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20 doesn't have the power to make policy for the Department, but this was the practice of the Department generally.

There were always exceptions to that and the manual itself talks about exceptions and says this is the general rule and things like that. Obviously, you've got to exercise judgment in particular circumstances.

What AG Barr was concerned about, and what's reflected in the memo, is that this was a very unique situation and that, because there was so much at stake, because there was no way to redo a Presidential election, and because we had so many allegations coming in that called into question the outcome of the election, he wanted us to move away from that very passive approach and take a more proactive approach because he felt, as he explained to me and I heard explained to others throughout this time period, the American people have to trust the outcome of this election. If there's fraud that impacted the outcome of the election, they should know. If there's fraud allegations and we find that those are not supported by the evidence, the American people should know that as well.

So he wanted to take this more proactive approach. He wanted to give the U.S. attorneys the authority to do that, and I think they had that authority anyway. But the reality was, the way things had played out within the Department, the ECB acted as if they had approval and disapproval authority over the work of the U.S. Attorney's Offices. They did not. Their authority, their consultation authority wasn't changed by the November 9th memo. It remained the same.

But the individual AUSAs in those different offices around the country were very, very reluctant to go forward with any election-related matter without ECB concurring. So if ECB did not concur, typically the election would—investigation would stop in its tracks.