In a conference call with federal prosecutors around the country, Attorney General William Barr suggested that protesters and rioters arrested at demonstrations around the country be charged with sedition, the New York Times reports.

Barr also explored, in discussion with the Department’s Civil Rights division, the potential of criminally charging Seattle mayor Jenny Durkan for allowing protesters to set up a police-free zone in a six square block area of the city’s downtown.

The discussions continue a pattern of Barr acting as a crudgeon for President Trump in an election year, using his office to strong arm policy and punish people deemed opposing Trump’s reelection.

“The attorney general seems personally, deeply offended by the autonomous zone and wants someone to pay for it,” Chuck Rosenberg, the former U.S. attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia, told the Times. “If the people of Seattle are personally offended, they have political recourse. There is no reason to try to stretch a criminal statute to cover the conduct.”

In a town hall last night in Philadelphia, Trump claimed that he had told Washington leaders that he had ordered federal forces to dismantle the autonomous zone, but that the governor of Washington, Jay Inslee, ordered in the National Guard instead, so Trump didn’t send in the troops.  Both Governor Inslee and Mayor Durkan have denied that conversation ever took place.