William Barr says Trump privately told him he wanted to drop the focus on Hillary Clinton's emails, despite suggesting the opposite publicly

• William Barr says Trump told him that he did not want to see Hillary Clinton go to prison.
• Trump, Barr writes in his book, viewed such an outcome as worthy of a "banana republic."

Former Attorney General William Barr says President Donald Trump privately told him during a meeting at the White House that the federal government should drop its focus on Hillary Clinton's private emails. But publicly, Trump repeatedly pushed for such an investigation.

"He said that, despite the chants of 'Lock her up!' from some of his supporters, he had felt after the 2016 election that the e-mail matter should be dropped," Barr writes in his new book, "One Damn Thing After Another." "Even if she were guilty, he said, for the election winner to seek prosecution of the loser would make the country look like a 'banana republic.'"

Barr says the moment came during a November 2018 meeting with Trump in the White House residence before Barr agreed to replace the ousted Jeff Sessions as the administration's next permanent Attorney General.

Trump's reported private comment is contradicted by years of evidence showing that the president very much did not want to drop the focus on Clinton's private email server and was not above publicly pressuring the Justice Department to do so.

"You've got to speak to Jeff Sessions about that," Trump said during a September 2017 rally when his supporters began chanting "Lock her up!" A few months later he told conservative radio host Larry O'Connor that he was "frustrated" that presidents weren't supposed to interfere in the DOJ and FBI's operations, but added, "Hopefully they are doing something."

Trump's comments about Clinton did not stop once Barr became attorney general. Trump pressured Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to release more of Clinton's emails in the weeks before the 2020 election. Privately, Trump was going even further in pressuring Barr to deliver politically-motivated probes of top Democrats.

"The the president has also conveyed to Mr. Barr, directly and through surrogates, that he wanted 'scalps,'" the Times reported in October 2020.

And nearly four years after beating Clinton, Trump made it clear that he loved how his supporters wanted to send her to prison.

"Yeah. I agree with you," Trump said in October 2020 when "Lock her Up!" chants started at an event in Florida. "I used to just be quiet on that. I agree with you 100 percent."